Birmingham, Ala, – – A federal judge said Wednesday that he is considering sanctions against lawyers with a high -price company hired to defend Alabama’s penitentiary system after ChatgPT was used to write two judicial presentations that included quotes of non -existent cases.
The American District Judge Anna Manasco held a hearing in Birmingham to interrogate lawyers with Butler’s snow firm about the presentations. She said there were five false events in two presentations in a federal court. Manasco said that there has been Broad warnings of the courts on the use of artificial intelligence Generate legal presentations due to the potential for inaccuracies.
Manasco said he is considering a variety of sanctions, including fines. He gave the firm 10 days to present a summary before the court.
Butler Snow’s lawyers apologized repeatedly during the hearing.
They said that a firm partner, Matt Reeves, used chatgpt to investigate the support jurisprudence, but did not verify the information before adding it to two presentations with the Federal Court. These quotes turned out to be “hallucinations”, which means incorrect quotes, by the AI system, they said. Four lawyers signed the presentations with the information, including Reeves.
“Butler Snow is ashamed of what happened here, which was against a good judgment and firm policy. There is no excuse for using chatgpt to obtain legal authority and not verify the sources it provided, even if it supports the principles of well -founded law,” wrote the firm lawyers in a response to the judge.
Reeves told the judge that only he was responsible for false quotes and that “I hope that his honor would not punish my colleagues.”
Alabama has paid millions of dollars to the company to defend the state prison system and its officials in demands. That includes representing the State as accused in a lawsuit from the Department of Justice that claims that inmates live in violent and cruel conditions.
The presentations in question were made in a lawsuit filed by an inmate who was stabbed multiple times in the William E. Donaldson Correctional Center in Jefferson County. He alleges that prison officials cannot keep inmates safe.
Manasco also questioned Bill Lonsford, head of the Butler snow division that manages the prison litigation, who signed the files. Alabama’s attorney general has appointed Linsford as attached attorney general because it represents the State in the Court.
Linsford wrote in a response to the judge who scanned the documents before presenting them, but did not make a detailed review since Reeves reviewed it. He told the judge that the company has been proactive by warning lawyers about the limitations of artificial intelligence.
