What changed

The use of AI is now so pervasive in legal practice that attorneys can no longer credibly claim ignorance of its pitfalls, including its propensity to hallucinate legal authority. See Fletcher v. Experian Info. Sols., Inc., 168 F.4th 231, 235 (5th Cir. 2026) (“If it were ever an excuse to plead ignorance of the risks of using generative AI to draft a brief without verifying its output, it is certainly no longer so.”). The first high-profile incident of AI-fabricated case citations in the federal system occurred in the Southern District of New York over three years ago. Larry Neumeister, Lawyers blame ChatGPT for tricking them into citing bogus case law, AP News (June 8, 2023), https://apnews.com/article/artificial-intelligence-chatgptcourts-e15023d7e6fdf4f099aa122437dbb59b; https://perma.cc/ZN2N-TSM9 . In the years since, the risks of blindly relying on AI in the practice of law have been well documented. See generally A.B.A. Comm. on Ethics & Prof. Resp., Formal Opinion 512: Generative Artificial Intelligence Tools (July 29, 2024) https://www.americanbar.org/content/dam/aba/administrative/professional_respons ibility/ethics-opinions/aba-formal-opinion-512.pdf; https://perma.cc/3KHL-CRM8 (gathering authorities).

Attorneys cannot reasonably claim to have been left in the dark when it comes to their ethical obligations regarding the use of generative AI. Both the ABA and local jurisdictions, including the District of Columbia, have issued detailed guidance concerning the appropriate use of AI, emphasizing attorneys’ responsibility to continue to abide by their ethical duties. See A.B.A. Comm. on Ethics & Prof. Resp., Formal Op. 512; A.B.A. Task Force on L. & A.I., Addressing the Legal Challenges of AI: Year 2 Report on the Impact of AI on the Practice of Law, 47-48 (2025), https://www.americanbar.org/content/dam/aba/administrative/center-forinnovation/ai-task-force/2025-ai-task-force-year2-report.pdf; https://perma.cc/HA44-LRM6 (compiling state bar ethics rules and guidance on generative artificial intelligence). Relevant steps attorneys should take in accordance with their ethical obligations include “reviewing and validating content produced by [AI]; considering whether to disclose the use of [AI] to clients or obtain informed consent; safeguarding confidential client information and preserving attorney-client privilege; implementing firm-wide policies governing the use of [AI]; adhering to ethical billing practices when using [AI] tools; and keeping current with jurisdictionspecific guidelines.” Farris, 171 F.4th at 923; see also A.B.A. Comm. on Ethics & Pro. Resp., Formal Op. 512 (2024).

Our intent is not to discourage attorneys from using AI—indeed, we have reached a point where attorneys eschew at least an understanding, if not use, of AI at their own peril—but to emphasize the importance of doing so discerningly and responsibly. To put a finer point on it, “the use of artificial intelligence must be accompanied by the application of actual intelligence in its execution.” Amarsingh v. Frontier Airlines, Inc., No. 24-1391, 2026 WL 352016, at *6 (11th Cir. Feb. 9, 2026) (citation modified).

We turn now to the issue at hand: AI hallucinations. The citation of nonexistent cases has become the “frequent posterchild” for AI mishaps. In re Nwaubani, 2026 WL 687194, at *3 (collecting cases). While the way these mishaps come about is relatively new (although, as we have noted, not new enough at this point to serve as an excuse), the ethical duties they implicate are not: attorneys have always been responsible for “ensur[ing] that the legal propositions and authority” they rely on are “trustworthy.” ByoPlanet Int’l, LLC v. Johansson, 792 F. Supp. 3d 1341, 1347 (S.D. Fla. 2025); see Malkeet Lnu v. Blanche, 177 F.4th 1014, 1025 (9th Cir. 2026) (“Attorneys do not need cutting-edge technology to fabricate citations and make demonstrably false and unsupported statements. And the ethical and procedural rules we apply today do not turn on the source of such error.”). This obligation reflects the “duties of competence and candor that apply no matter the tools attorneys use.” Farris, 171 F.4th at 923 (citing McCoy v. Ct. of Appeals of Wis., Dist. 1, 486 U.S. 429, 440-41 (1988), and Fletcher, 168 F.4th at 239-40); see Akerlund v. Atlas Air, Inc., 181 F.4th 1200, 1208 (11th Cir. 2026) (“It goes without saying that completely outsourcing one’s legal work to [AI] software is not competent. Doing so is a dramatic violation of the client’s interests.” (internal citation omitted)). Blind reliance on AI-generated citations and arguments runs directly counter to this court’s expectation that counsel confirm the accuracy of their submissions, see Tenants of 710 Jefferson St., N.W. v. D.C. Rental Housing Comm’n, 123 A.3d 170, 191 (D.C. 2015), and, while we do not purport to decide the matter here as we do not have a bar discipline matter before us, potentially implicates longstanding rules of professional conduct. See Malkeet Lnu, 177 F.4th at 1025 (“Filing briefs with hallucinated fabrications and inaccuracies violates procedural and ethical rules. Lawyers using generative AI must thus be aware of the tendency of generative AI to make these mistakes and guard against them.” (citation modified)).

That brings us to the question of sanctions.4 Under D.C. App. R. 28, all briefs “must contain” a party’s “contentions and reasons for them, with citations to the authorities and parts of the record on which [they] rely.” See Wendemu v. Tesema, 304 A.3d 953, 959 n.3 (D.C. 2023) (concluding that an argument was waived because appellant failed to “articulat[e] a clear legal basis” for it and “fail[ed] to include any citations to the record or law beyond the standard of review”); In re Johnson, 275 A.3d 268, 281 (D.C. 2022) (treating an argument as waived because it consisted of only “vague one-line conclusory assertions” and “failed to cite authority in this jurisdiction or any other [for] support”). Accord Grant v. City of Long Beach, 96 F.4th 1255, 1256-57 (9th Cir. 2024) (striking brief and dismissing appeal for noncompliance with the “mandatory components of a brief on appeal” set forth in Fed. R. App. P. 28 because the brief was “replete with misrepresentations and fabricated case law”); United States v. Jones, 744 F.3d 1362, 1370 n.2 (D.C. Cir. 2014) (declining to consider a “bare-bones argument[ ] unsupported by any citations to legal authority” under Fed. R. App. P. 28(a)(8)(A)). A hallucinated citation is, at best, no citation at all; indeed, it is worse.

2 See, e.g., Mata v. Avianca, Inc., 678 F. Supp. 3d 443, 466 (S.D.N.Y. 2023).

3 Whiting v. City of Athens, 170 F.4th 455, 459-63 (6th Cir. 2026) (“Whiting’s appeal is frivolous [under Rule 38] as argued because [his attorneys] submitted fake cases, and inventing case law is a misrepresentation of law,” and “misrepresent[ed] the record”; also citing the court’s inherent authority); Amarsingh v. Frontier Airlines, Inc., No. 24-1391, 2026 WL 352016, at *5-8 (10th Cir. 2026) (relying on Rule 38).

4 Fletcher v. Experian Info. Sols., Inc., 168 F.4th 231, 239-40 (5th Cir. 2026) (“Modern generative AI may be a new technology, but the same sanctions rules apply, and the rules we have are well equipped to handle these types of cases. . . . Rule 46(c) allows us to discipline an attorney who practices before us for ‘conduct unbecoming a member of the bar or for failure to comply with any court rule.’ Discipline under Rule 46(c) may include monetary sanctions.” (internal citations omitted) (quoting Fed. R. App. Proc. 46) (relying on Rule 46 and the court’s inherent authority to sanction an attorney for using generative AI in her briefing and misleading the court about these errors)).

5 Perez-Castillo, 177 F.4th at 847 (internal quotation marks and citation omitted).

6 Id.

8 Id. at 45-46, 50 (quotation marks and citations omitted); see also, e.g., Whiting, 170 F.4th at 463 (“Inherent authority sanctions are appropriate only when the litigant has acted in bad faith or willfully abused judicial processes.” (citation modified)).

12 In re Yelverton, 105 A.3d 413, 425 (D.C. 2014) (citation modified); see also Pennington v. First Hand Land, LLC, 349 A.3d 364, 367 (D.C. 2026) (“Rule 38 authorizes this court to impose ‘appropriate’ sanctions, including ‘dismissal of the appeal,’ on a party who ‘files a petition or motion that is frivolous or interposed for an improper purpose.’”). In addition, under Rule 38, “one circumstance (but not the only one) in which dismissal may be warranted as a sanction is when a party before this court has ‘willfully deceived the court and engaged in conduct utterly inconsistent with the orderly administration of justice.’” Id. (quoting Breezevale Ltd. v. Dickinson, 879 A.2d 957, 967 (D.C. 2005)).

That brings us to this court’s inherent authority. This court has consistently adhered to the Chambers bad faith condition on the judicial exercise of inherent authority to impose sanctions. For example, in In re Jumper, this court relied on Chambers when stating that “[a] court must, of course, exercise caution in invoking its inherent power, and it must comply with the mandates of due process, both in determining that the requisite bad faith exists and in assessing fees.”13 There, this court reversed the trial court’s award of fee sanctions and remanded for the trial court to determine whether the party had acted with bad faith because the court did not “expressly find[] that the appellants acted either in bad faith, vexatiously, wantonly, or for oppressive reasons,” and therefore did not find that appellants acted “pursuant to the improper motive necessary for an award of sanctions pursuant to the court’s inherent authority.” 14 Our opinion emphasized that “[b]ad faith must be

14 Id. at 177 (citation modified).

distinguished from, for example, negligence or professional incompetence.” 15 “[T]he standards of bad faith are necessarily stringent.”16

In the present case, it does not now appear that either Ms. Hall or appellee’s law firm acted in bad faith, vexatiously, wantonly, or for oppressive reasons. Rather, so far as appears on the existing record, their conduct in filing a brief with AIhallucinated citations was not intentional, knowing, or even reckless (i.e., done with conscious disregard of the risks they were incurring), but rather was only negligent or grossly negligent (or, it could also be said, professionally incompetent). In Ms. Hall’s case, the question of recklessness may be a close one, given that there has been considerable publicity about the dangers of relying on AI in legal work, and her law firm claims to have instructed her on its policy against reliance on AI. (But the law firm has not shared its policy with us, nor has it explained how that policy was communicated to its lawyers.) Even so, the factual record necessary to support a finding of recklessness has not been made.17

15 Id. (citation modified); see also Bredehoft v. Alexander, 686 A.2d 586, 589 (D.C. 1996) (reversing, inter alia, the trial court’s “bad faith sanction” as an exercise of its inherent authority because the record did not support a finding of bad faith); McFarland v. D.C. Dep’t of Hum. Res., 334 A.3d 131, 138 (D.C. 2025) (affirming the trial court’s refusal to apply either Rule 11 or inherent authority sanctions because the movant made no showing that the other party acted with bad faith, even assuming that party made certain allegedly false representations).

16 In re Jumper, 909 A.2d at 176-77 (quoting Valentine v. Elliott (In re Estate of Delaney), 819 A.2d 968, 998 (D.C. 2003)).

18 Malkeet Lnu v. Blanche, 177 F.4th 1014, 1029 (9th Cir. 2026).

19 See id. at 1028-29 (“It was Sethi’s signature, and his alone, on the briefs. So, it was Sethi who presented the unwarranted contentions. And Sethi’s signature was an attestation that he personally reviewed the contents of the brief, including the cited authorities, and that they were accurate. Sethi did no such review, and his attestation was not conditional on the tools that his subordinates might have used to prepare the first draft, nor could it be.” (internal citations and some punctuation omitted)).

20 See Lake v. Gates, 130 F.4th 1054, 1062 (9th Cir. 2025) (Bumatay, J., concurring in the judgment only) (Disagreeing with the majority’s conclusion that federal Rule 11 allowed the trial court to sanction an attorney who participated on a brief as “of counsel” and only contributed a discrete portion to the offending brief, because “[a]s a textual matter. . . , Rule 11 permits different levels of accountability for different attorneys in a case. . . . To encourage the participation of specialized attorneys and to improve the quality of advocacy in our courts, we should have adopted a rule that recognizes the circumscribed role that some attorneys with subject-matter expertise may play in litigation.”).

22 Malkeet Lnu, 177 F.4th at 1024-25 (citations, footnotes, and some punctuation omitted).