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Lawyer Cites ChatGPT-Invented Fake Witnesses in Murder Appeal
(www.404media.co)
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this post was submitted on 05 Oct 2026
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I had to check the date of the article to make sure it was recent. How a lawyer hasn't heard of the several times other lawyers have had issues with ChatGPT I have no idea. There's no way this guy didn't perjure himself be feigning ignorance. I feel like the bar needs to send out a written notice requiring some kind of acknowledgment to all lawyers so they can no longer claim ignorance if this happens to them.
In a quote in the article, one of the judges even points this out to him rather harshly.
....
The article also provides links to five other cases where lawyers used an LLM and filed AI hallucinations as fact. This bozo is clearly in the find out phase.
You can claim ignorance for breaking the law?
If you’re one of the people tasked with enforcing the law, then yes you are not expected to know it. If you are a mere citizen, then you are expected to know the law inside and out.
In theory, no. In practice, yes. I think it's generally fine for people to be able to use discretion in a lot of cases. That discretion is not always evenly applied, but there are plenty of laws that the average person doesn't know and has no reason to even think about. I'd rather live in a world where the justice system is able to give people leniency and the benefit of the doubt than otherwise. If one of your brake lights is out it's possible you have no idea. Technically it's illegal to be driving. Most people would agree that it's a good thing that you can be given a warning or something instead of have to face the same penalty as a person knowingly driving with the same issue.
You very explicitly cannot. The judge may take it into account when sentencing though.
Yeah I heard of a case like this at least a year ago. I was wondering if we were reposting an old article, but no. That makes it worse, and explains the judge's reaction.