Florida lawyer referred for discipline for AI-generated briefs with fabricated citations
The Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals rebuked attorney Anthony F. Sabatini for submitting legal briefs filled with hallucinated case citations, violating professional ethics. The court referred the matter to the Committee on Lawyer Qualifications and Conduct for potential disciplinary action.
What happened
Attorney Anthony F. Sabatini submitted briefs in Akerlund v. Atlas Air, Inc., a case before the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals challenging an airline's COVID-19 masking, testing, and vaccination policies, that were riddled with fabricated and hallucinated citations to nonexistent cases. His opening brief relied on at least eight hallucinated cases, including one purportedly decided by the Court itself.
After defendants identified the problem, Sabatini acknowledged in a proposed reply brief that the citations were 'erroneous or unverifiable' and sought to withdraw reliance on eight cases. However, the eight cases he identified for withdrawal were entirely different from the eight hallucinated cases in his opening brief, and all eight withdrawn cases were also hallucinated. Judge Britt Grant noted that Sabatini committed 'blatant and repeated misconduct' by completely outsourcing his legal work to AI without critically reviewing the output.
Reported impact
The court found that Sabatini's filings were 'substandard' and that by outsourcing his legal work to AI, he violated his ethical duties to both his clients and the Court. Judge Grant stated that completely outsourcing legal work to AI is not competent representation and constitutes a dramatic violation of the client's interests.
Index analysis
The fabricated citations were a failure of the AI system to generate accurate legal references combined with the attorney's failure to verify the citations before submission. This represents a hallucination failure mode in which the AI system generated plausible-sounding but entirely fictitious case law.
Governance controls
The Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals referred the matter to the Committee on Lawyer Qualifications and Conduct for investigation and potential disciplinary recommendations to the chief judge. The court criticized Sabatini for not being candid about his reliance on AI and for failing to maintain the professional competence required by the rules of professional conduct.
Classification
Sources and evidence
This record was researched and written by the Index, based on the following original reporting.