Noland v. Land of the Free, L.P., 2025 WL 2629868 (Cal. Ct. App. 2025)
Sylvia Noland asserted 25 causes of action against her former employer, including claims for wrongful termination, PAGA and other Labor Code violations, breach of contract, intentional infliction of emotional distress, etc. The employer filed a successful motion for summary judgment, which resulted in dismissal of the case. In the appellate briefing plaintiff’s counsel filed, “nearly all of the quotations… ha[d] been fabricated.” In addition, a few of the cases purportedly relied upon by the appellant-employee “d[id] not exist at all.” Plaintiff’s counsel acknowledged to the Court that he had relied on AI “to support citation of legal issues” and that the fabricated quotes were AI-generated; counsel further asserted “he had not been aware that generative AI frequently fabricates or hallucinates legal sources and, thus, he did not ‘manually verify [the quotations] against more reliable sources.’” The Court of Appeal declined to permit the filing of revised briefs and concluded that counsel’s reliance on fabricated legal authority rendered the appeal frivolous and violative of the California Rules of Court. Because the employer’s counsel did not alert the Court to the existence of the fabricated citations and apparently learned of same from the Court, the Court ordered plaintiff’s counsel to pay $10,000 in sanctions to the clerk of the Court rather than to the employer or its counsel.
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