A federal judge sanctioned a law firm manager for failing to oversee a junior attorney who used AI to generate a brief containing a fake case citation.
U.S. Magistrate Judge Peter Kang has sanctioned Lenden Webb, managing partner of Webb Law Group, after a junior attorney’s AI-assisted brief included a false case citation. Although Webb did not draft the filing, the court ruled that responsibility extends to supervisors. “Managers in law firms have an obligation to take reasonable steps to ensure all lawyers in the firm make ethical representations to the court,” the judge stated.
Webb, fined $1,001, called the error one of the “hiccups of issues such as a hallucinated citation.” Despite a Thomson Reuters spokesperson stating their tools were not responsible, the judge maintained that supervising lawyers must check every citation. “At minimum, a supervising lawyer should read and understand the content of all pleadings and check citations to ensure their accuracy,” Kang wrote, emphasizing that AI does not absolve professional oversight.