In a recent legal filing, lawyers working on behalf of the Houston Housing Authority quoted from a 1993 case called Walling v. Metcalfe. But there was a problem: the citation was made-up.
Walling v. Metcalfe was a real case, but the line cited by the Houston Housing Authority didn’t exist. In fact, a report from the Houston Chronicle found 11 fake quotes from real cases in the document.
R.A. Schuetz, housing reporter for the Houston Chronicle, spoke to the Texas Standard about the made-up quotations.
This transcript has been edited lightly for clarity:
Texas Standard: Eleven fake quotes from real cases. Was that all in a single court filing, or is scattered among several court filings?
R.A. Schuetz: It was all in a single court filing.
How did you find out that the housing authority in its filing had used these fabricated quotations?
So this case was actually very tied to my previous reporting. Actually, the defendant cited some of my previous reporting in their arguments.
I had written about an internal investigation the Houston Housing Authority had done into its own employees for doing exactly what this woman was alleging, which is terminating voucher improperly. And she said that one of the employees I had named in my story was the person.
Oh, so you were going through some of their citations and you found, wait a minute, these cases are real, but what is being cited or quoted in the filing, that’s not in the case?
Yeah, it was very surprising. I mean, there are a few of these stories in the news right now.
Yeah, let’s just put it out there: AI has created havoc for a lot of people who are supposed to be sticking with the facts. And we’ve seen this coming up in journalism. We’re now seeing it in the courthouse as well. Is it clear whether or not these particular quotes were generated by AI?
So yeah, that’s why we’re kind of dancing around it, right? Because it seems like a very AI type of mistake.
Because they’ve been known to do what are called hallucinations, which would be, you know, saying something that doesn’t exist. And for AI, that is just a mistake. Whereas if a person created a quote out of whole cloth, that’s not a mistake.
That’s why, you know, that’s where your mind immediately goes. But when I reached out to the law firm, the law firm said that it didn’t go through their usual multi-lawyer review, but they didn’t answer any questions directly about whether AI was used.
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There are these sites that will analyze documents for you to tell whether or not it appears to have been written by AI or not. But of course, that is not singularly determinative one way or the other. It can just kind of tell you, yeah, this looks like AI. It’s hard to really know.
But I’m wondering if that’s really the issue here. Because I know that in the federal courts, there’s an affirmative duty on the attorney to make a reasonable determination that any citation you file with the court is grounded in fact. Otherwise, the attorney can get sanctioned for misrepresentation.
And this doesn’t matter whether AI gave it to you or a dog, while you were dreaming, gave it you. You still have to go back and check.
Or your intern, let’s say, a paralegal or your summer associate.
Right. And this goes back way before AI. We’re talking about at least the early 1990s, and I’m sure before in certain jurisdictions. But we’re talking the federal rule. This was probably not a federal case, I’m guessing. Does Texas have anything like that duty on attorneys?
Oh yes. I did not include this in my story, but in the Texas Judicial Ethics requirements, it says something along the lines of, you shall not knowingly include any falsehood. And of course, like I said, if you made up a quote, that would be very knowing.
With AI, it could be a mistake. You do have the responsibility to check, so it still is a lapse. And again, like I said, we don’t know if AI was in this case, but it is happening at a time when AI is changing the game.
Lawyers, judges, they’re looking at these arguments and the assumption is never like, oh, part of this might not exist. Now there’s this additional wrench that the courts aren’t prepared for.
And, you know, in cases where taxpayer money is being used and a tenant who has like much fewer resources on the other side, you know, you can see how this just changes the dynamic.
Certainly does, and it certainly raises the risk for the legal profession here and beyond, really, when you’re talking about having to go through this with a finer tooth comb than ever before, especially if you are using this tool that almost everyone uses one way or another.
But I’m curious, aside from the courts saying, here’s a wrist slap, you should never do this again – is it possible that the attorneys responsible for this could get sanctioned?
Yes. So I spoke with Nikolas Guggenberger, who’s a law professor at University of Houston who often advises government entities. And he was telling me there was actually like a very large range of repercussions.
He said it could range from reputational damage for the attorney to the attorney being held in contempt of court, which is a criminal offense. And the judge could also just decide to dismiss the case or to issue a fine.
So there could be anything from just your reputation, to a monetary, to the outcome of the case, to actually like a criminal offense. And judges have this wide palette of tools that are used to address, I mean, usually like a rare situation, but it’s becoming much less rare.
