What was hallucinated

Fabricated: Case Law | Plaintiff cited Hampton v. City of Oregon City, which the Court stated does not exist and identified as an apparent AI-generated false citation. || Fabricated: Case Law | Plaintiff cited State v. Burris, which the Court stated does not exist and identified as an apparent AI-generated false citation. || Fabricated: Case Law | Plaintiff cited Butler v. Oregon, which the Court stated does not exist and identified as an apparent AI-generated false citation. || Fabricated: Case Law | Plaintiff cited Curry v. Actavis, Inc., which the Court stated does not exist and identified as an apparent AI-generated false citation. || Fabricated: Case Law | Plaintiff cited Estate of Riddell v. City of Portland, which the Court stated does not exist and identified as an apparent AI-generated false citation.

Details

"Before addressing the merits of Schoene’s motion, the Court notes that Schoene cited several cases in her reply brief to support her motion to amend, including Butler v. Oregon, 218 Or. App. 114 (2008), Curry v. Actavis, Inc., 2017 LEXIS 139126 (D. Or. Aug. 30, 2017), Estate of Riddell v. City of Portland, 194 Or. App. 227 (2004), Hampton v. City of Oregon City, 251 Or. App. 206 (2012), and State v. Burris, 107 Or. App. 542 (1991). These cases, however, do not exist. Schoene’s false citations appear to be hallmarks of an artificial intelligence (“AI”) tool, such as ChatGPT. It is now well known that AI tools “hallucinate” fake cases. See Kruse v. Karlen, 692 S.W.3d 43, 52 (Mo. Ct. App. 2024) (noting, in February 2024, that the issue of fictitious cases being submitted to courts had gained “national attention”).6 In addition, the Court notes that a basic internet search seeking guidance on whether it is advisable to use AI tools to conduct legal research or draft legal briefs will explain that any legal authorities or legal analysis generated by AI needs to be verified. The Court cautions Schoene that she must verify the accuracy of any future citations she may include in briefing before this Court and other courts"

Sanction teardown · D. Oregon, USA · 2025-06-25

Schoene v. Oregon Department of Human Services

What happened

In D. Oregon, USA, a filing relied on an unnamed/unconfirmed AI tool to help draft legal argument. The court identified the following problems with the citations in that filing:

Fabricated (Case Law)

Plaintiff cited Hampton v. City of Oregon City, which the Court stated does not exist and identified as an apparent AI-generated false citation.
Fabricated (Case Law)

Plaintiff cited State v. Burris, which the Court stated does not exist and identified as an apparent AI-generated false citation.
Fabricated (Case Law)

Plaintiff cited Butler v. Oregon, which the Court stated does not exist and identified as an apparent AI-generated false citation.
Fabricated (Case Law)

Plaintiff cited Curry v. Actavis, Inc., which the Court stated does not exist and identified as an apparent AI-generated false citation.
Fabricated (Case Law)

Plaintiff cited Estate of Riddell v. City of Portland, which the Court stated does not exist and identified as an apparent AI-generated false citation.

Which AI tool

an unnamed/unconfirmed AI tool. Note: Charlotin's public database records tool attribution only where a court order, brief, or reporting on the matter states it explicitly; "unidentified" or "implied" means the record indicates AI use but does not name a specific product — we do not guess.

Outcome

Warning

Additional detail

"Before addressing the merits of Schoene’s motion, the Court notes that Schoene cited several cases in her reply brief to support her motion to amend, including Butler v. Oregon, 218 Or. App. 114 (2008), Curry v. Actavis, Inc., 2017 LEXIS 139126 (D. Or. Aug. 30, 2017), Estate of Riddell v. City of Portland, 194 Or. App. 227 (2004), Hampton v. City of Oregon City, 251 Or. App. 206 (2012), and State v. Burris, 107 Or. App. 542 (1991). These cases, however, do not exist. Schoene’s false citations appear to be hallmarks of an artificial intelligence (“AI”) tool, such as ChatGPT. It is now well known that AI tools “hallucinate” fake cases. See Kruse v. Karlen, 692 S.W.3d 43, 52 (Mo. Ct. App. 2024) (noting, in February 2024, that the issue of fictitious cases being submitted to courts had gained “national attention”).6 In addition, the Court notes that a basic internet search seeking guidance on whether it is advisable to use AI tools to conduct legal research or draft legal briefs will explain that any legal authorities or legal analysis generated by AI needs to be verified. The Court cautions Schoene that she must verify the accuracy of any future citations she may include in briefing before this Court and other courts"

How Citation Safe would have caught this

Citation Safe runs three deterministic layers before a brief is filed: (1) does the citation exist against CourtListener's database of published opinions, (2) if quoted, does that exact language appear in the source, (3) does the cited case actually support the proposition it is cited for. Fabricated case citations fail Layer 1. Fabricated or misattributed quotations fail Layer 2 even when the underlying case is real. Misrepresented holdings — a real case cited for a proposition it does not support — are the target of Layer 3. None of these checks involve asking another language model whether the citation looks right; they are lookups and text-matches against the actual source, which is why a hallucinated citation has to survive a direct lookup against the authoritative source — not another model's opinion — to earn a VERIFIED stamp; our measured false-verify rate is published live at /quality.

Check a brief before you file it → · See our live false-verify rate

Source: https://www.damiencharlotin.com/documents/560/Schoene_v._Oregon_DHS_USA_25_June_2025.pdf, via Damien Charlotin's public AI Hallucination Cases Database (CC0).