The American Bar Association Journal reported that “Suspecting artificial intelligence-generated errors, a federal appeals panel has overturned a preliminary injunction barring a Mississippi law that prohibits diversity, equity and inclusion in public schools and universities and ordered the case to be reassigned to a different judge on remand.” The October 26, 2026 article entitled “5th Circuit blasts federal judge for AI errors in rulings” (https://www.abajournal.com/news/article/5th-circuit-blasts-federal-judge-for-ai-errors-in-rulings) contained these comments:
In an Oct. 22 opinion, Judge Jerry Smith of the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals at New Orleans criticized the district court proceedings, noting that the temporary restraining order by U.S. District Judge Henry T. Wingate of the Southern District of Mississippi enjoining enforcement of the law “contained several factual assertions nowhere to be found in the record, or indeed, in any proceeding of the case.”
Smith noted that this included mention of plaintiffs and defendants who were not in the complaint, “declarations” from people who did not exist or were never present, and false quotations that were supposedly taken from the text of the law. He also said when these errors were discovered, Wingate replaced the order without an explanation.
Wingate later acknowledged that a law clerk used AI to draft the order, and that it was docketed by mistake, according to a story by Courthouse News Service. However, the appeals panel said the judge’s corrected version of the order also contained hallucinated information.
Anyone surprised?