The first wave of AI sanctions cases had an easy headline: fake cases.
That problem has not gone away. But the next wave is broader and harder to catch. Courts are now calling out false quotations, inaccurate descriptions of real cases, unsupported legal propositions, fabricated record references, and correction filings that repeat the same verification failure they were supposed to fix.
That shift matters because a fake case name is often easy to spot. A real case with a fake quotation is more dangerous. It can survive a quick citation check, especially if the lawyer confirms that the case exists but never reads what it actually says.
Recent decisions from the Sixth Circuit and Michigan Court of Appeals, plus a new Oregon Court of Appeals notice, point in the same direction: legal teams need source-level verification, not just citation-level verification.
Farris: Real Cases, False Quotations
In United States v. Farris, the Sixth Circuit did not decide the merits of the criminal appeal. It stopped to address the conduct of appointed appellate counsel.
The court said counsel admitted using Westlaw CoCounsel to draft the briefs and then filing them without properly verifying the legal authorities. The problem was not simply that the briefs cited nonexistent law. The briefs cited genuine authorities but attributed quotations and propositions to them that did not appear in the sources.
One example involved the Sentencing Guidelines commentary. Other examples involved Sixth Circuit cases that were described as reversing role enhancements when they did not support the propositions asserted. The court said the briefs misrepresented the holdings of United States v. Washington and United States v. Anthony.
The Sixth Circuit drew a line that every litigation team should build into its review process: citing a real case does not make an AI-assisted brief safe if the quotation is fabricated or the holding is misdescribed.
The consequences were serious. The court ordered that counsel not be compensated under the Criminal Justice Act for the appeal, forwarded the opinion for possible disciplinary proceedings, served the opinion on district court and Kentucky Bar authorities, and separately removed counsel from further representation. Replacement counsel would be appointed and the briefing schedule reset.
The court also made an important vendor-neutral point. Lawyers cannot assume that a legal AI product is reliable merely because it comes from an established legal technology provider.
Barber: The Correction Filing Was Also Wrong
The Michigan Court of Appeals reached a similar point in Barber v. Morawa, a published medical-malpractice appeal.
The merits issue was straightforward: the court affirmed denial of a motion for a new trial or evidentiary hearing. The sanctions issue was not. Plaintiff's counsel had cited nonexistent cases in the trial court, relied on criminal authorities in a civil case, and then filed an appellate brief that cited another nonexistent case and used real authorities for propositions they did not support.
After the defendant identified the defects, counsel eventually filed a "Notice of Correction." But that notice, which counsel acknowledged was also prepared with AI assistance, repeated the problem by attributing quotations and legal propositions to cases that did not contain them.
The Michigan court held that counsel's repeated submission of fabricated and unsupported authority violated MCR 7.216(C)(1) and MCR 1.109(E)(5). It remanded for a determination of actual damages and reasonable attorney fees incurred because of the appeal, payable personally by counsel, and directed the clerk to forward the opinion to the Attorney Grievance Commission.
That is the deeper lesson of Barber: a correction cannot be just another AI-assisted filing. Once a court or opposing party flags possible fabricated authority, the next filing should be treated as a high-risk verification event.
Oregon Turns The Warning Into A Court Notice
The Oregon Court of Appeals has now posted a notice specifically warning about fabricated authority produced by AI.
The notice says the court has received an increasing number of filings containing fabricated authorities, including citations that do not exist, quotations that do not appear in the cited authority, propositions of law not reasonably related to the citation, and factual support with no basis in the record.
The listed consequences include striking the filing, monetary sanctions payable to the court, attorney-fee awards payable to the opposing party, and dismissal of the appeal.
The notice also gives a practical verification rule. Anyone using generative AI to prepare court-filing content must verify that all cited cases exist, that all quotations actually appear in the cited cases, and that all paraphrased propositions of law are objectively reasonable in light of what the case actually says.
That is a useful checklist because it is not limited to fake case names. It reaches the subtler errors that are becoming common in appellate sanctions orders.
The Pattern Is Broader Than One Tool Or One Court
These developments fit the recent sanctions record.
In Lnu v. Blanche, the Ninth Circuit sanctioned lawyers for briefs containing nonexistent cases, misattributed quotations, and gross misrepresentations of real authority. The court emphasized that the discipline became more serious because of the lawyers' responses after the errors came to light.
In Withers v. City of Aberdeen, a Mississippi federal court sanctioned and removed all counsel after filings from both sides contained AI-generated fabricated authority. The order is a sharp warning for local counsel and sponsoring counsel: signing and sponsoring are not administrative formalities.
In State v. Coleman, an Ohio appellate court sanctioned counsel after a filing contained ChatGPT-generated fabricated transcript quotations prepared by a paralegal. The AI problem there was not fake caselaw. It was a fake record.
Together, the cases show the sanctions framework maturing. Courts are no longer asking only whether a case exists. They are asking whether the filing honestly represents law and fact.
What Litigation Teams Should Change
The review process should be built around propositions, not just citations.
Before filing AI-assisted work, litigation teams should verify:
- every cited case, statute, rule, and record reference exists;
- every direct quotation appears in the cited source;
- every parenthetical accurately describes the source;
- every paraphrased proposition is fairly supported by the authority;
- every record quotation or factual assertion matches the underlying record;
- the lawyer signing the filing has personally satisfied the required level of review; and
- any correction filing receives independent source review before submission.
It is not enough to ask whether the tool hallucinated a case. A real case can be turned into a false authority if the quotation, holding, or procedural posture is wrong.
Bottom Line
The AI sanctions story is moving from "fake cases" to "false authority."
That is a harder problem and a more practical one. Lawyers have always had to verify the law and the record before filing. AI makes that duty more visible, not less binding.
The safest rule is simple: if a filing relies on a source, someone must read the source.