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Incident Tracker / United States (federal)

Mata v Avianca, Inc.

·US District Court, Southern District of New York·US-FEDSanctions

The origin case of legal AI hallucination sanctions: two New York attorneys were fined $5,000 after citing six ChatGPT-invented cases in a personal-injury filing and persisting after the fabrications were questioned, prompting the first widely reported judicial rebuke of generative AI misuse by lawyers.

Court
US District Court, Southern District of New York
Date
2023-06-22
Who used the AI
Not recorded
AI tool
ChatGPT
Conduct
Attorneys filed an affirmation citing six non-existent judicial decisions generated by ChatGPT, then doubled down when challenged, submitting fabricated opinions.
Outcome
Sanctions
Penalty
US$5,000
Regulatory outcome
No separate regulatory disposition recorded
Status
Verified against listed sources
Last checked
2026-09-16

What was fabricated or misused

  • Varghese v. China Southern Airlines Co., Ltd., 925 F.3d 1339 (11th Cir. 2019) — generated by ChatGPT and did not exist
  • Shaboon v. Egyptair, 2013 IL App (1st) 111279-U (Ill. App. Ct. 2013) — generated by ChatGPT and did not exist
  • Peterson v. Iran Air, 905 F. Supp. 2d 121 (D.D.C. 2012) — generated by ChatGPT and did not exist
  • Martinez v. Delta Airlines, Inc., 2019 WL 4639462 (Tex. App. Sept. 25, 2019) — generated by ChatGPT and did not exist
  • Estate of Durden v. KLM Royal Dutch Airlines, 2017 WL 2418825 (Ga. Ct. App. June 5, 2017) — generated by ChatGPT and did not exist
  • Miller v. United Airlines, Inc., 174 F.3d 366, 371-72 (2d Cir. 1999) — generated by ChatGPT and did not exist

What the court said

“Respondents abandoned their responsibilities when they submitted non-existent judicial opinions with fake quotes and citations created by the artificial intelligence tool ChatGPT, then continued to stand by the fake opinions after judicial orders called their existence into question.”
US District Court, Southern District of New York, p. 1
“Respondents have now acknowledged that the “Varghese”, “Miller”, “Petersen”, “Shaboon”, “Martinez” and “Durden” decisions were generated by ChatGPT and do not exist.”
US District Court, Southern District of New York, Findings ¶36
“A fake opinion is not “existing law” and citation to a fake opinion does not provide a non-frivolous ground for extending, modifying, or reversing existing law, or for establishing new law.”
US District Court, Southern District of New York, Conclusions ¶9
“A penalty of $5,000 is jointly and severally imposed on Respondents and shall be paid into the Registry of this Court within 14 days of this Opinion and Order.”
US District Court, Southern District of New York, p. 34

Timeline

  1. Avianca moved to dismiss, arguing the Montreal Convention time bar.
  2. LoDuca filed the opposition affirmation citing purported decisions.
  3. Avianca's reply said most cited cases could not be located.
  4. Court ordered LoDuca to attach copies of seven cited decisions.
  5. LoDuca filed excerpts purporting to be the required decisions.
  6. Court held the sanctions hearing.
  7. Court imposed a $5,000 joint penalty and nonmonetary directives.

Why this case matters

Mata is the tracker’s baseline for lawyer-filed AI hallucinations. The order matters because the sanction did not rest only on the first ChatGPT error; it rested on counsel's failure to verify, false statements about how the research was done, and continued reliance after Avianca and the court questioned the cases. Later records such as Mezu and Douglas repeat that distinction: using AI is not forbidden, but signing or defending fake authority after a reasonable check would have exposed it triggers court action.

Practice note

If AI suggests a case, treat it as unverified until the full decision has been opened in an official reporter, court database, Westlaw, Lexis, or another reliable source. If an opponent or judge says a citation cannot be found, stop relying on it, disclose the research path, and correct the filing before supplying excerpts or summaries.

Primary sources for this incident

Related regulation records for this incident

Similar incidents on the record

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Cite this record

SafeLegalAI Global Legal AI Incident Tracker, “Mata v Avianca, Inc.”, safelegalai.com/tracker/mata-v-avianca (accessed 2026-09-16). Data: CC BY 4.0.

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