When transphobic lawyers filed court briefs opposing a school district’s transgender-inclusive policies, the lawyers didn’t expect the judge to reject their filing over a series of factual errors that seemed to result from artificial intelligence (AI) “hallucinations.”

Judge Matthew Wolf of Pennsylvania’s Commonwealth Court on Wednesday asked attorneys Thomas W. King and Thomas E. Breth whether their law firm had improperly used AI to prepare its brief in the case of the South Side Area School District et. al v. Pennsylvania Human Relations Commission, WESA reported.

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The suit involved two Republican state House members and parents who argue that the state commission illegally instituted LGBTQ+ anti-discrimination protections for queer students in 2023. The lawyers’ 50-page brief, submitted in October, cited prior cases that allegedly proved the plaintiff’s arguments.

However, Judge Wolf noted that the brief contained citations and quotes that had either been miscontextualized, were later overruled, or just didn’t exist.

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“You quote the Pennsylvania Supreme Court from the Bayada case for a quote that does not exist in that case,” Wolf told the lawyers. “You cite the Popowsky case for a proposition and a quote that does not exist, and that case is not even on point to this case.”

“I’m unhappy,” the judge continued. “I feel as though you’ve put the court at a disadvantage.”

King apologized for any AI that “might” be contained in the brief, adding, “We pride ourselves in being aware of this issue and not including such things in our briefs. And so I apologize to the court to the extent that any of that’s included.”

King told WESA that, after speaking to employees in his law firm, “No one used AI to compile this brief.” He jokingly added that he and Breth are so technologically inept that, “[We’re] lucky we can even use a phone.” He also noted that his firm allows AI use and also uses software to verify the accuracy of citations contained in briefs.

King told the judge that his law firm would happily correct and refile the brief, but it’s unclear whether the court will accept a new filing. “I spent a lot of time on this, and I had a lot of people double-check what I thought so that I would not come in here and say things that were not true,” King told the judge.

The American Bar Association, which sets licensing and accrediting standards to law schools and individual lawyers, has warned its members that AI can often produce “nonexistent opinions, inaccurate analysis of authority, and use of misleading arguments.”

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