Overview

• U.S. District Judge Anna Manasco issued a public reprimand and removed three Butler Snow attorneys from an Alabama prison system lawsuit for filing motions with unverified ChatGPT-generated citations.
• The sanctions order requires the lawyers to distribute the reprimand to clients, opposing counsel, judges and every attorney at their firm and to file proof of compliance in all ongoing cases.
• Manasco referred the matter to the Alabama State Bar for potential disciplinary action, emphasizing that professional responsibility extends to AI-assisted research.
• Butler Snow conducted an internal review of 52 federal cases and, according to the judge’s order, found no other instances of AI-related citation errors.
• The fabricated citations surfaced in filings defending the Department of Corrections in a 2021 lawsuit by an inmate stabbed multiple times at Donaldson Correctional Facility.