Incident Tracker

Gauthier v. Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co., No. 1:23-CV-281 (E.D. Tex.)

sanctions

In the US District Court for the Eastern District of Texas, plaintiff's attorney Brandon Monk filed a brief with non-existent cases and fabricated quotations produced by the AI tool Claude, which he did not verify. Judge Marcia Crone ordered him to pay a $2,000 penalty into the court registry and complete a CLE course on generative AI.

Date of decision/order

2024-11-25

Court

US District Court, Eastern District of Texas (Beaumont Division)

Jurisdiction

US-FEDERAL

AI tool

Claude (Anthropic)

Conduct

Plaintiff's counsel Brandon Monk filed a summary-judgment response citing non-existent cases and fabricated quotations attributed to real cases. He admitted using the AI tool Claude to draft the brief and failing to verify the output, and initially took no corrective action after opposing counsel identified the fake authorities.

Consequence

USD 2,000