released a study<\/a> indicating that 60% of the federal judges who responded to its survey indicated they used at least one AI tool in their work.<\/p>\nIn making its ruling in the fight over Kyra, the San Diego appeals court said it had \u201cno difficulty concluding that it is an abuse of discretion for a court to rely in material part on fictional case authorities in rendering a decision or making an order.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cAlthough we appreciate that trial courts must often rely on the parties to prepare written orders, it is imperative for both the court and the parties to verify that the citations in all orders are genuine and truly stand for the propositions cited,\u201d Appellate Justice Martin Buchanan wrote. \u201cThis is especially vital with the increasing incidence of hallucinated case citations generated by AI tools.\u201d<\/p>\n
In a twist, the appeals court declined to overturn the original judge\u2019s ruling, even with the acknowledgement that it was based on AI hallucinations. The lawyers should have caught it earlier, the panel ruled. <\/p>\n
The battle over Kyra<\/p>\n
During the initial litigation, when Roxanne Chung Bonar, the attorney for Kyra\u2019s owner, cited two precedents she said were relevant to this particular San Diego case, it didn\u2019t raise eyebrows. The San Diego Superior Court commissioner presiding over the matter as a temporary judge even noted those two cases in siding with Bonar.<\/p>\n
The judge then ordered the attorney on the losing side to draw up an order reflecting the ruling. The losing attorney did as she was told \u2014 including Bonar\u2019s citations as noted by the judge.<\/p>\n
With the loss, a different attorney, David Beavans, handled the case on appeal for the ex. Beavans said there is little in the way of case law regarding custody of pets, so he took the case in hopes the appeals court might use it to set precedent.<\/p>\n
He came to realize that the two cases Bonar cited \u2014 the cases the court relied on in its order \u2014 were not real. \u201cWe are in a new time,\u201d Beavens told the Union-Tribune about the new age of artificial intelligence. \u201cNever before have we seen cases invented out of whole cloth.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cAI will attempt to introduce a quote or a finding that is so seductive, so perfect, so inside the 10 ring that it begs to be used as \u2018This is the quote that wins my case,\u2019\u201d Beavans said. \u201cIt\u2019s so good even attorneys have been lulled into letting their guard down.\u201d<\/p>\n
One case that was relied upon, as cited, \u201cis not a real case,\u201d according to the appellate opinion, which said the citations provided are from \u201ca criminal case having nothing to do with pets or custody determinations.\u201d<\/p>\n
The other, as cited, \u201cis also not a real case,\u201d Buchanan wrote. There is a real case with the same name, he wrote, but with a different official citation, and it related to spousal support, not pets. It also did not focus on emotional well-being and the stability of the parties involved, which was an issue in the case at hand.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s still unclear exactly what happened at the initial court hearing during which the judge issued her order; there was no transcript provided on appeal.<\/p>\n
During the appeals process, Bonar said the claim that the cases were fabricated was \u201cbaseless.\u201d She blamed opposing counsel for not being able to find the cases and called his competency into question.<\/p>\n
During oral arguments, Bonar said she didn\u2019t remember where those fictitious citations came from, the opinion states, adding that she said she had not had a paid subscription to a legal research service, but had been using online resources, including AI, for research.<\/p>\n
According to the opinion, Bonar said someone had sent her client a Reddit article referencing one of the cases, and the client mentioned it in her declaration.<\/p>\n
Bonar was hit with a $5,000 sanction, with the appeals court noting that she had \u201cdoubled down\u201d when asked about the questionable provenance.<\/p>\n
Bonar did not respond to requests for comment.<\/p>\n
University of San Diego law professor Judith Lihosit, whose teachings include AI and legal research, said the appeals court was \u201creally trying to strike a balance\u201d with the ruling.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou have the appeals court saying that the trial court really messed up,\u201d Lihosit said. \u201cThis is really bad because this is a court order that has hallucinations in it. \u2026 It\u2019s the court\u2019s responsibility to verify and fact-check all this stuff.\u201d<\/p>\n
And by coming back and adding that footnote, the professor said, the appeals court \u201cwanted to make it clear that judges are responsible to not only verify their own use of AI, but to verify anything that\u2019s submitted to them.\u201d<\/p>\n
While the appellate court did not overturn the ruling (which favored the woman who already had possession of the dog), the panel noted it was possible the trial court judge could have come to the same conclusion without the hallucinated cases.<\/p>\n
\u2018No system is infallible\u2019<\/p>\n
The San Diego Superior Court told the Union-Tribune that attorneys and even litigants representing themselves have \u201ca clear and affirmative obligation\u201d to ensure their filings are accurate.<\/p>\n
But court officials acknowledged that the courts themselves have a \u201creal and ongoing\u201d concurrent responsibility to review materials presented by litigants and to take reasonable steps to ensure their accuracy \u2014 a responsibility that \u201cexists alongside the reality that courts process a significant volume of cases and filings each day in service to the public.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWhile the court\u2019s review is an important layer of protection and we do have manual cite checking tools available, by necessity, absent a red flag or objection, the court is often reliant in routine matters on the accuracy of the materials submitted by counsel and litigants,\u201d the court said in a statement.<\/p>\n
It and other courts across the state are also looking into technologies that could help prevent such issues, although cost is also a consideration.<\/p>\n
\u201cUltimately,\u201d the San Diego Superior Court said, \u201cno system \u2014 human or technological \u2014 is infallible.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"It started as a legal dispute over dog custody and visitation after a San Diego County couple broke…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":252866,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[7,1312,181,23,100,74,84,76,75,1696],"class_list":{"0":"post-252865","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-san-diego","8":"tag-california","9":"tag-courts","10":"tag-latest-headlines","11":"tag-local-news","12":"tag-news","13":"tag-san-diego","14":"tag-san-diego-county","15":"tag-san-diego-headlines","16":"tag-san-diego-news","17":"tag-top-stories-sdut"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/252865","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=252865"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/252865\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/252866"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=252865"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=252865"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=252865"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}