Lawyers have escaped contempt proceedings over the use of fake citations – but the High Court will be referring them to their regulators.
Dame Victoria Sharp, president of the King’s Bench Division, and Mr Justice Johnson heard two cases referred to them because of ‘actual or suspected use’ of generative AI tools used by lawyers to produce written legal arguments or witness statements.
The judgment handed down today in Frederick Ayinde v The London Borough of Haringey, states: ‘Artificial intelligence is a tool that carries with it risks as well as opportunities. Its use must take place, therefore with an appropriate degree of oversight, and within a regulatory framework that ensures compliance with well-established professional and ethical standards if public confidence in the administration of justice is to be maintained.
‘Those who use artificial intelligence to conduct legal research notwithstanding these risks have a professional duty therefore to check the accuracy of such research by reference to authoritative sources, before using it in the course of their professional work (to advise clients or before a court, for example). There are serious implications for the administration of justice and public confidence in the justice system if artificial intelligence is misused.’
Referring to Hamad Al-Haroun v Qatar National Bank, in which Abid Hussain of Manchester-based Primus Solicitors, acting for Al-Haroun, admitted he relied on legal research conducted by his client without verifying the authorities, Sharp said there had been a ‘lamentable failure to comply with the basic requirement to check the accuracy of material that is put before the court’.
She added: ‘A lawyer is not entitled to rely on their lay client for the accuracy of citations of authority or quotations that are contained in documents put before the court by the lawyer. It is the lawyer’s professional responsibility to ensure the accuracy of such material. We are satisfied that Mr Hussain did not realise the true position.’
The judgment said the threshold for the initiation on contempt proceedings was not met and, although Hussain had referred himself to the Solicitors Regulation Authority, the High Court would also make a referral.
