Georgia Prosecutor Punished for AI Errors in Murder Case Briefs

An Atlanta-area county prosecutor has been admonished and suspended from practicing before the Georgia Supreme Court for six months because of her misuse of AI.

The court vacated a trial court order that denied a motion for a new trial for convicted murderer Hannah Payne, and remanded the case.

Deborah Leslie, an assistant district attorney in the Clayton County District Attorney’s office, submitted a brief that contained non-existent cases and cases that didn’t match the arguments made, the Supreme Court said. That brief was used by the trial court to deny Payne’s request for a new trial.

In response to Payne’s appeal, Leslie again cited cases that didn’t line up with her legal argument.

“As a result of these filings, we have been sidetracked from our obligation of resolving the merits of Payne’s appeal and have had to devote significant time and resources to the discovery of this misconduct and deciding what to do about it,” Justice Benjamin A. Land said.

There were a total of 21 citations Leslie identified as generated by AI software and weren’t independently verified, Land wrote.

To be reinstated before the state Supreme court, Leslie must obtain and certify that she completed 12 hours of continuing legal education “beyond the hours regularly required,” the court said.

In a partial concurrence and dissent, Justice Shawn Ellen LaGrua said the majority “goes beyond what is necessary to make the point” that Leslie violated her duty of candor to the court.

Clayton County DA Tasha M. Mosley “assured this Court that she is immediately implementing policies and procedures to keep this from happening in the future. We have absolutely no reason to doubt the veracity of that letter. And I find such proactive disciplinary and preventative measures to be more than sufficient under the circumstances,” she wrote. Justice Verda Colvin joined LaGrua.

Neither Leslie nor Mosley immediately responded to requests for comment.

Sessions & Fleischman LLC and the Steel Law Firm PC represent Payne. The Georgia Attorney General’s Office and Clayton County District Attorney represent the state.

The case is Payne v. Georgia, Ga., No. S26A0459, 5/5/26.