Attorney Is Sanctioned for Suspected AI Fabricated Citations

A federal judge imposed a $1,500 sanction on an attorney alleged to have used artificial intelligence to generate more than a dozen fictitious case citations in a filing earlier this year.

The attorney’s “submission of a motion with numerous nonexistent and erroneous citations, coupled with her repeated failure to be forthcoming with the court, constitutes conduct that is ‘akin to contempt of court,’” Judge Dena M. Coggins said Monday in an order that was docketed on Tuesday.

In the US District Court for the Eastern District of California, Coggins ordered sanctions against Sepideh Ardestani, who is an attorney at Crosner ...