Civil Procedure: Court strikes multiple filings containing AI-generated hallucinations

Where the court found that at least 42 citations in multiple filings by the pro se defendant do not exist, and she admitted to using ChatGPT for at least one of her filings, the court struck each of the filings that misrepresent the law by citing nonexistent or utterly irrelevant cases.

Background

Before the court are numerous motions filed by pro se defendant Kandise Lucas. The plaintiff, the Powhatan County School Board states that, in several of the filings, it could not find the cited cases, or the cases were irrelevant to the issues.

Analysis

In perspective of the questions raised by PCSB, and mindful of the court’s own observations when considering the filings in this case, the court again reviewed the pending filings in this action. On the basis of that review, the court concludes that Lucas has violated the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure and the Local Civil Rules when making filings in this case.

Additionally, upon its review, the court has found numerous instances when Lucas has cited to caselaw that: (1) does not exist at all; (2) had incorrect reporter citations making it difficult, or, in some instances impossible, to find the putative authority; (3) improperly attributed decisions to the wrong court or (4) were given only by name and with no citation at all, making it nearly impossible for the court to discover, and therefore examine, the authority.

For example, across the motions and briefs that the court addresses today, the court has found at least 42 citations to authority by Lucas that, inter alia, do not exist. Moreover Lucas repeatedly has filed papers that exceed the page limitations of Local Rule 7(F) either by actually using more pages in the brief or by incorporating in the brief voluminous attachments (sometimes hundreds of pages).

More troublesome is that almost all of Lucas’ filings contain numerous conclusory and unconnected statements that are not complete sentences and that do not contain logical or understandable points pertinent to the issues. And, most of Lucas’ filings contain extensive hyperbole and pejorative comments about race or bias with no evidence to support the use of those terms. The result is that the reader is left to guess the points that Lucas intends to make and then to address them. That is a difficult task for Lucas’ adversaries. It is an impossible one for a court which, of course, cannot devise arguments in support of any litigant.

The most troublesome result of the review of the filings discussed above is that Lucas repeatedly has cited cases that do not exist. This is likely the result of Lucas’ use of generative artificial intelligence, including ChatGPT, which, on the record during a hearing held before the court on April 2, 2025, Lucas admitted to using in writing at least one of her filings.

The pervasive misrepresentations of the law in Lucas’ filings cannot be tolerated. It serves to make a mockery of the judicial process. It causes an enormous waste of judicial resources to try to find cited cases that do not exist and to determine whether a cited authority is relevant or binding, only to determine that most are neither. In like fashion, Lucas’ adversaries also must run to ground the nonexistent cases or address patently irrelevant ones. The adversaries must thus incur needless legal fees and expenses caused by Lucas’ pervasive citations to nonexistent or irrelevant cases.

If a lawyer or law firm engaged in the conduct in which Lucas has engaged, the lawyer would be sanctioned, perhaps monetarily or with an order to pay the opponent’s fees, perhaps by the entry of an adverse judgment or by removing the lawyer’s privilege to practice law. Courts have also routinely threatened to impose sanctions on litigants proceeding prose who cite AI-hallucinated or otherwise nonexistent legal authority to support their positions

However, Lucas appears to be judgment proof so monetary sanctions likely will not deter her from the abusive practices reflected in her filings and in her previously announced, consistently followed, abuse of the litigation proceedings created by the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. So the most appropriate remedy is to strike Lucas’ filings where they are burdensome by virtue of volume and exceed permitted page limits, where they are not cogent or understandable (when given the generous latitude afforded prose litigants) and where they misrepresent the law by citing nonexistent or utterly irrelevant cases. Lucas can submit replacement filings that comply with the rules.

So ordered.

Powhatan County School Board v. Skinger, Case No. 3:24-cv-874, June 2, 2025. EDVA at Richmond (Payne). VLW 025-3-236. 31 pp.