New Mexico lawyer fined $5,000 for ChatGPT brief with fabricated police testimony
nordicinst · x · 2026-09-12
The New Mexico Supreme Court fined defense attorney Stephen Aarons $5,000 and held him in contempt after his murder-appeal brief, drafted with ChatGPT, contained made-up police testimony and wholly fabricated witnesses he failed to verify. The court cited his 'lack of remorse' and referred him to a disciplinary board. Aarons said he used ChatGPT to summarize trial proceedings and didn't understand how much AI could 'hallucinate' — a lesson for all professionals relying on this powerful but unstable technology.
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