New Mexico’s Supreme Court is punishing a lawyer for including AI-fabricated witnesses and fake police testimony in an appeal for his client’s murder conviction. The court filed a decision on Wednesday fining Stephen Aarons $5,000. Justices also held him in contempt.
Aarons failed to verify the factual claims and legal authority in his AI-generated brief. The filing states the document contained false testimony from wholly fabricated witnesses. It also included false testimony about the shooter’s clothing and appearance.
Justice C. Shannon Bacon questioned Aarons during an August hearing about his awareness of artificial intelligence risks. Aarons admitted to using ChatGPT. He stated he thought the tool would generate a bulletproof summary of the trial.
Justice Bacon addressed the attorney directly during the hearing. She asked if he watched the news, listened to the radio, or read about current events. She noted that problems with lawyers relying on AI hallucinations make headlines every single day.
More lawyers are using artificial intelligence tools in their professional work. Courts are subsequently discovering an increasing number of citations that are fabricated or hallucinated by AI systems.
A similar incident occurred last year. A judge penalized two law firms for submitting a brief with numerous false, inaccurate, and misleading legal citations and quotations.
Attorneys representing Mike Lindell of MyPillow faced fines for a separate incident. They included AI-generated misquotes and fake AI citations in a legal brief.
Aarons provided a statement to Reuters regarding the penalty. He expressed remorse for the incident. He also stated he hopes the disciplinary board considers that the mistake was honest.
