Lawyers sanctioned after ChatGPT fabricated six fake case citations in Mata v. Avianca
In a personal-injury suit against Avianca, attorney Steven Schwartz used ChatGPT for research and submitted a brief citing six judicial decisions that did not exist — ChatGPT invented them and even 'confirmed' they were real when asked. U.S. District Judge Castel sanctioned Schwartz and co-counsel Peter LoDuca $5,000 and required corrective letters. It became the landmark cautionary tale about AI hallucination in legal filings.