Courts now require lawyers and self-represented litigants (pro se) to report when using AI-generated filings and to certify their accuracy.
AI-generated papers cannot match the accuracy of documents created by humans who have personally done the legal research to assure the court that citations to statutes and appellate decisions are, in fact, accurate.
Just as AI cannot “understand” the case-winning tactics necessary to control judges and crooked lawyers, AI cannot “interpret” how a statute may apply to a particular set of facts or how justices reasoned their decisions in reported appellate opinons.
To protect other parties from the potential of material error and prejudice in court cases, parties submitting AI-generated text must certify that they checked all the references cited in such text and that AI did not make any material errors.
AI cannot replace the skill and experience of a knowledgeable litigant in real cases.
AI is, by definition, “artificial” intelligence.
To win real cases when both sides are fighting tooth-and-nail to make their points and back them up with citations and direct quotes from statutes and controlling appellate decisions, common-sense” and an experienced understanding of human nature is required.
AI has neither common-sense nor experience dealing directly with people like judges, lawyers, and witnesses.
This is a technological reality.
AI is not human!
Failure to comply with these new orders can result in sanctions ranging from striking of pleadings, financial penalties, contempt orders, or (in the case of licensed attorneys) disciplinary proceedings that could result in permanent disbarment.
AI can be useful to get a start on researching the law (statutes and appellate decisions), but it should be only a start. Use it to find a few statutes and/or appellate decisions by feeding it the facts of your case, but go beyond what AI retrieves. Cross-check AI’s citations. Do further research. Use your own head!
AI is essentially a giant “memory”. It can quickly retrieve documents stored across the entire internet. It can “interpret” what those documents say. But, its “interpretations” of what the documents say cannot meet the same stringent requirements your legal battles require when you are facing off with an experienced attorney on the other side who will (as experience attests) lie and cheat and twist the facts and law completely out of reason to confuse judge, jury, and you if you allow them to do so.
A South Florida court recently issued an administrative order stating, “Any attorney or self-represented litigant who uses any generative artificial intelligence tool in the preparation of a pleading, motion, memorandum, response, proposed order, or other court record, must disclose such use on the face of the filing.” The disclosure must state in substantial form that, “Generative artificial intelligence was used in the preparation of this filing. The undersigned certifies that all factual assertions, legal authority, and citations have been independently reviewed and verified for accuracy and accepts full responsibility for the contents of this filing.”
AI is not human and, though all humans are frail and prone to error, AI cannot and must not replace the human mind. Its statements to the court may be fraught with substantial misleading material errors and actual falsehoods.
The order further states, “When AI has been used or assisted in the use of preparation, researching, drafting pleadings, drafting documents, filing documents, and/or discovery requests, the document shall identify the specific tool used in such manner.”
Machines cannot win court cases.
Maybe someday we will see robots addressing juries in civil and criminal cases, but if anyone we love and care about depends on winning in court, let’s all agree we aren’t ready to be represented by robots.
AI is a robot.
It is not human.
You are!
Use your common-sense and experience dealing directly with humans.
AI has neither common-sense nor actual experience dealing directly with humans.
Court cases are strictly human affairs.
Thanks again for the wonderful updates and knowledge… because of god fearing, neighbor loving people like you, I am grateful and encouraged to learn more about my rights
Thank you for your kind words, Spencer. The more people know, the safer they are. Please tell others about this mission.
Excellent fact to point out and to keep using our own mind. The airlines are using some AI to reply to people and they are making errors. I am dealing with a reservation now and the airline bot and persons who are not capturing the entire conversation is refusing to honor the contract and service that I paid for. They finally admitted to the error but are still not correcting the issue properly.
And we’ve not yet seen the full degree of damage trusting AI will do! Thanks for your post! Please forward to others.
Thankfully, I learned this lesson before I started studying the law. I’m a software engineer by trade and have utilized AI for that purpose on many occasions and I learned quickly and early that you cannot simply trust it to do the right thing or even write the most efficient code.
So when I have used it with legal writing, I do not trust any citations unless I can find them, read them, understand them, etc. I use it now to re-word what I already typed up so that it can help with grammatical things and make other suggestions. I have had to remind it from time to time that I am the authority and it is merely a tool.
How I wish others would guard themselves from the dreadful mistakes you wisely see people making when they trust AI implicitly. Please tell others about our mission. Thanks for your post!