South African law firm ordered to pay costs after using AI to generate false legal citations
A South African law firm was ordered by a judge to pay court costs after being found to have likely used AI to generate fabricated legal citations in court papers. The judge referred the matter to the Legal Practice Council for investigation and characterized the practice as irresponsible and unprofessional.
What happened
Pietermaritzburg-based law firm Surendra Singh and Associates was accused of using artificial intelligence and Google to source non-existent legal citations in court proceedings for a client seeking leave to appeal a judicial decision.
Of nine cases cited by the firm's counsel, only two could be found to exist, and one of those was incorrectly cited. Judge Elsja-Marie Bezuidenhout concluded that while the real source of the authorities remained unknown, it was likely the firm had relied on AI technology to generate the citations.
Reported impact
The law firm was ordered to pay the costs of two court hearings held in September and January from its own coffers.
Judge Bezuidenhout referred the matter to the Legal Practice Council and urged it to obtain recordings of all proceedings and submissions related to the incident.
Index analysis
The incident involved the firm's reliance on AI to draft court submissions containing fabricated case citations, representing a failure of quality control and professional responsibility in legal practice.
Governance controls
Judge Bezuidenhout characterized the use of AI to source legal authorities as 'irresponsible and downright unprofessional' and took the step of referring the matter to the Legal Practice Council for potential investigation and disciplinary action.
Classification
Sources and evidence
This record was researched and written by the Index, based on the following original reporting.