Lawyer's reliance on ChatGPT backfires in court

The legal battle began when Roberto Mata filed a lawsuit against airline Avianca, claiming that he was injured when a metal serving cart struck him in the knee during a flight to New York's Kennedy International Airport.

Avianca attempted to dismiss the case, which prompted Mr. Mata's lawyers to vigorously object, filing an 10-page brief.

However, there was a significant problem: none of the cited court decisions or quotations in the 10-page brief could be found by anyone involved, including the airline's legal team and the judge. It was revealed that ChatGPT had fabricated the entire content of the brief.

In an affidavit, attorney Stephen A. Schwartz of the law firm Levidow, Levidow & Oberman took responsibility for the mishap. He admitted that he had used artificial intelligence software for legal research, but the source was unreliable. Mr. Schwartz, an experienced New York attorney with three decades of practice, assured Judge P. Kevin Kastel that he had no intention of misleading the court or the airline. He claimed that he had never used ChatGPT before and was unaware that the content it generated could be false.

He even claimed to have asked the program to verify the validity of the cases cited, and it reportedly confirmed their existence.

Judge Castel issued an order scheduling a hearing on June 8 to discuss potential sanctions in response to the submission containing fabricated information.