Courts on AI / Fabricated or misquoted citations
United States v. Robert Ponce, Jr.
United States District Court for the District of Nevada · Federal district courts · NV · · 2026 WL 540272 · No. No. 2:16-cr-00368-APG-PAL · order
District of Nevada on 2026-02-26 in United States v. Robert Ponce, Jr. found counsel's motion contained one citation defect involving nonexistent authorities, incorrect statutory or rule text. The court warned counsel to verify legal authorities before future filings in the challenged filing before resolving the pending matter.
- Disposition
- The court warned counsel to verify legal authorities before future filings.
- Recorded conduct
- Counsel's motion contained one citation defect involving nonexistent authorities, incorrect statutory or rule text. — outcome: warning; actor: lawyer
- Canonical record
- Incident tracker entry — verified outcome, regulator disposition and related rules
What the court wrote
Verbatim from the court's document (public domain). Ellipses mark omitted text; nothing is paraphrased.
1 Both of Ponce's motions and replies are filled with hallucinogenic citations to non-existent cases. To the extent Ponce has relied on artificial intelligence to write his papers, I caution him that it is his responsibility to check his case citations to ensure they are accurate and say what he claims they do. The failure to do so may expose him to sanctions under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 11.
Authorities cited in the passage: s motions and replies cited non-existent cases; the court described them as
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