A Texas federal court is warning lawyers against using artificial intelligence to draft their legal papers without first verifying that work.
The new order from the US District Court for the Southern District of Texas, dated May 7, says that attorneys are already required to certify that their arguments are valid under existing law and have evidentiary support.
“Attorneys and self-represented litigants are cautioned against submitting to the Court any pleading, written motion, or other paper drafted using generative artificial intelligence (e.g., ChatGPT, Harvey.AI, generative AI services) without checking the submission for accuracy as certain technologies may produce factually or legally inaccurate content and should never replace the lawyer’s independent legal judgment,” reads the order, signed by Chief US District Judge Randy Crane.
The order also says that attorneys or self-represented litigants who file papers with the court “will be held responsible” for the contents under the Rule 11 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, which permits courts to hand down sanctions against attorneys who are found to have made arguments without evidence to back it up, or that don’t line up with current law.
The court is the latest to hand down a directive warning attorneys about the use of AI. Nearly 40 federal judges have issued standing orders on the use of the tools, according to Bloomberg Law data, including one in the Southern District of Texas.
Lawyers have faced sanctions from several federal courts after submitting made up cases to the court that were “hallucinated” by AI tools.
The US Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit — which hears appeals from the Southern District of Texas — weighed adopting an AI rule for its lawyers. But the court last year decided against adopting such a measure after attorneys said existing rules were a strong enough check against the risks of using the technology.
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