"Instead, Claude Just Made Up More Stuff"
A court case revealed that a plaintiff's lawyer relied on an AI tool, Claude, to generate legal briefs, which resulted in misquoted precedents. After a human review identified errors, the lawyer mistakenly trusted Claude to correct them, leading to further inaccuracies. The court sanctioned the lawyer for failing to ensure the validity of the legal authorities cited in the brief, emphasizing the importance of human oversight in legal processes involving AI.
- ▪The plaintiff's briefs contained misquoted or mischaracterized precedent.
- ▪The lawyer took responsibility for using the AI platform Claude to generate the brief.
- ▪The court sanctioned the lawyer $1000 for failing to verify the accuracy of the citations.
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| Original publisher | Reason Magazine |
| Canonical URL | https://reason.com/volokh/2026/05/19/instead-claude-just-made-up-more-stuff/ |
| Publication time | Tue, 19 May 2026 12:47:26 +0000 |
| Retrieval time | 2026-05-19T12:54:57.539Z |
| Last seen | 2026-05-19T12:54:57.539Z |
| Headline source | Publisher (no WeSearch rewrite) |
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| Summary source text | contentText |
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| Publisher visit | Yes — open original |
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| Retrieval / RAG | May the content be exposed for third-party retrieval-augmented generation? | Not asserted |
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| Commercial reuse | May the content be reused commercially? | Not permitted |
Basis: Derived from the published RSS/Atom feed. Contact: [email protected]. Reviewed: 2026-07-24.
Opening excerpt (first ~120 words) tap to expand
AI in Court "Instead, Claude Just Made Up More Stuff" "How [plaintiff's lawyer] then could have blindly and solely trusted Claude to remedy the brief is difficult to fathom." Eugene Volokh | 5.19.2026 8:47 AM From Brooks v. Lowes Home Centers LLC, decided yesterday by Judge Jerry Edwards, Jr. (W.D. La.): In resolving a prior motion in this case, the Court discovered that the plaintiff's briefs contained misquoted or mischaracterized precedent…. Mr. Wilkins[, one of plaintiff's lawyers,] took full responsibility. Wilkins explained that he utilized an artificial intelligence ("AI") platform, Claude, to generate the brief. As part of his process, Mr. Wilkins had Claude's draft reviewed by a human law clerk, who discovered that Claude had hallucinated quotations. Mr.
…
Excerpt limited to ~120 words for fair-use compliance. The full article is at Reason Magazine.
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