Pennsylvania may force lawyers to certify they checked AI citations
A state judicial panel wants every court filer to confirm they verified AI-generated citations, with penalties up to case dismissal for fake ones.
What happened: A committee that advises the Pennsylvania Supreme Court has proposed requiring anyone who files documents in state courts — lawyers and self-represented people alike — to certify they personally reviewed any AI-generated content before submitting it. That includes legal citations, quotes, and summaries of legal principles. The proposal, published last month in the Pennsylvania Bulletin, allows penalties ranging from a reprimand to fines to outright dismissal of a case for noncompliance. Public comment is open until November 24, after which the committee can revise the plan or send it to the state's seven Supreme Court justices for a final vote.
Why it matters: Generative AI tools sometimes invent convincing-looking legal citations and quotes that don't actually exist, a problem known as hallucination. Spotlight PA found at least 13 Pennsylvania cases in 2025 with confirmed or suspected AI hallucinations, including a high-profile appellate gender-discrimination case. Nationally, a federal judge in Mississippi recently barred two lawyers from his court for two years after both sides in a civil case filed briefs containing fake citations. Fabricated case law can waste court time, mislead judges, and ultimately affect real people's legal outcomes.
How it works, plainly: Rather than banning AI tools, the rule shifts the burden of accuracy onto the human filer. Anyone submitting a document would have to attest they thoroughly reviewed every AI-assisted citation, quote, or legal summary for accuracy before filing it. This builds on a 2024 joint opinion from the Pennsylvania and Philadelphia bar associations that already urged lawyers to verify AI output, and on a 2025 interim policy letting judges and court staff use AI for research, drafting, and readability edits — though that earlier policy never applied to outside lawyers or the public.
The rollout: The public comment window closes November 24. After that, the advisory committee decides whether to adjust the proposal before sending it to the state's high court, where all seven justices must vote to adopt it. If approved, it would be broader than the existing policy because it would cover every filer, not just court insiders. Pennsylvania joins a growing list of state and federal courts writing rules in response to a wave of AI-generated fake citations surfacing in filings across the country.