Colorado attorney is suspended from the bar and fired from his firm for using ChatGPT in court after the AI cited fake cases

A Colorado lawyer has been suspended from the bar and fired from his law firm after admitting to using artificial intelligence to file court cases. 

Zachariah Crabill was fired from Colorado Springs law firm and barred from court in November 2023 after he confessed to a judge that he used ChatGPT to submit a motion in civil court. 

He was suspended for one year and one day, with 90 days to be served and the remainder to be stayed upon Crabill’s successful completion of a two-year period of probation, with conditions. 

According to the court order, the suspended attorney had been hired in April 2023 to prepare a motion to set aside judgment in a client’s civil case. 

Zachariah Crabill was fired from Colorado Springs law firm and barred from court in November 2023 after he confessed to a judge that he used ChatGPT to submit a motion in civil court

Crabill, who later said he had never drafted such a motion and was 'overwhelmed' with his case load, ended up deciding to use ChatGPT to prepare the motion. 

He said: 'Stressed out to the max. And, you know, the legal profession is highly stressful because a lot is at stake on each of these cases.

'And I had just been exposed to the idea of ChatGPT. And I'm trying to save him money, trying to not eat through his entire retainer. And it dawned on me: What if ChatGPT could do case load research for me?

'And boom, it generated seemingly impeccable case law and case citations.' 

But while he did take the help of artificial intelligence to prepare the motion, Crabill failed to read the cases that were cited in the paperwork by ChatGPT and also did not verify if the citations were accurate. 

In May 2023, Crabill filed the artificial intelligence-created motion with Colorado's Civil Court. 

Crabill failed to read the cases that were cited in the paperwork by ChatGPT and also did not verify if the citations were accurate

The court order states that despite knowing that the citations were false, Crabill did not 'alert the court to the sham cases at the hearing nor did he withdraw the motion'

ChatGPT is a chatbot developed by OpenAI and was launched on November 30, 2022

But right before a hearing on the motion, he discovered that the cited cases from ChatGPT were either incorrect or fictitious. 

The court order states that despite knowing that the citations were false, Crabill did not 'alert the court to the sham cases at the hearing nor did he withdraw the motion.'

During the hearing, when the judge expressed concerns about the accuracy of the cases, Crabill blamed a legal intern for the mistakes.  

But six days after the hearing, he filed an affidavit with the court and admitted to using ChatGPT to draft the motion. 

Despite losing his job due to AI, Crabill has not lost faith in the technology. 

He has now set up his own law firm named Av{AI}lable Legal Solutions and said that AI is much like a virtual legal assistant, helping cut costs and level the playing field. 

Crabill explained: 'This technology can be leveraged for the benefit of people like my client. 

'Lower socioeconomic income populations who just can't afford legal services.

'This technology, if leveraged, rightly and well, can really mean the difference between injustice and justice for a lot of people.'

ChatGPT is a chatbot developed by OpenAI and was launched on November 30, 2022.