A court filing cites cases that do not exist
Two lawyers filed citations to cases that ChatGPT had invented, without checking them in any legal database, and the court sanctioned the lawyers and their firm.
Gaps found
G1G2G3G4G5G6G7G8G9G10G11G12G13G6 No independent evidence G7 Review in name only G9 Warning with no authority
What happened
Steven Schwartz used ChatGPT to research an opposition brief, and his colleague Peter LoDuca signed and filed it on 1 March 2023 without reviewing any of the authorities cited. Avianca’s lawyers replied that they could not find most of the cases. After the court ordered copies, the lawyers filed documents that ChatGPT had generated as if they were the opinions.
Screenshots Schwartz later filed show him asking ChatGPT whether one of the cases was real, and it said it had supplied real authorities that could be found on Westlaw and LexisNexis. The court found his accounts of when he asked shifting and contradictory. On 22 June 2023 Judge P. Kevin Castel found bad faith “based upon acts of conscious avoidance and false and misleading statements to the Court” and imposed a $5,000 penalty. He wrote that existing rules “impose a gatekeeping role on attorneys to ensure the accuracy of their filings.”
What allowed the action to take effect
G6 No independent evidence
The action, or the approval of it, was based on the system’s own output or on a single unverified input. Evidence that would have shown the error was never gathered, was thrown away, or was available and not consulted.
No citation was checked against an independent source. Apart from “initially going to Fastcase and failing there,” ChatGPT was Schwartz’s only research. He “questioned ChatGPT about the reliability of its work (e.g., ‘Is Varghese a real case’ and ‘Are the other cases you provided fake’). ... ChatGPT responded that it had supplied ‘real’ authorities that could be found through Westlaw, LexisNexis and the Federal Reporter.” The court noted that “no date is given for the queries.”
Kind of evidence: finding. Source: U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York, 22 June 2023, p. 19.
Related guidance: P6 Signer independence and P4 Reviewable policy. Contract clause C-6.
G7 Review in name only
A person was supposed to catch the error but lacked the information, time, training, or practical means to do it, so the review did not work as a check.
“Before executing the Affirmation, Mr. LoDuca did not review any judicial authorities cited in his affirmation.” He signed and filed a brief someone else had written.
Kind of evidence: finding. Source: U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York, 22 June 2023, p. 4.
Related guidance: P5 Human authority. Contract clause C-5.
G9 Warning with no authority
Signs that the action was wrong existed before or during the harm, but none of them could stop or hold the action, and nothing required anyone to act on them.
Avianca’s reply said most of the cases could not be found, and the court then ordered copies. The court found that the lawyers “doubled down and did not begin to dribble out the truth until May 25, after the Court issued an Order to Show Cause.”
Kind of evidence: finding. Source: U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York, 22 June 2023, p. 2.
Related guidance: P3 Fail-closed and P8 Sequence awareness. Contract clauses C-3 and C-8.
Entries with gaps in common
Sources
Cite this entry
External Control Layer. (2026). Entry 11: A court filing cites cases that do not exist. In Control Gap Record (Version 0.3). G-14, Inc. https://externalcontrollayer.ai/record-11
@misc{ecl_cgr_11,
author = {{External Control Layer}},
title = {Entry 11: A court filing cites cases that do not exist},
howpublished = {Control Gap Record, version 0.3},
publisher = {G-14, Inc.},
year = {2026},
url = {https://externalcontrollayer.ai/record-11},
note = {Released 2 November 2026}
}Correct this entry
Email ecl@g14.ai with “ECL record 11” in the subject line.
Write the email with the subject ECL record 11