Judge slams lawyers for legal bungle

FACED with non-existent legal citations in a matter before the Gauteng High Court, Johannesburg, an acting judge asked counsel responsible for it whether the citations constituted artificial intelligence (AI) "hallucinations," to which the red-faced advocate confirmed that “it appears to be so”.

- ZELDA VENTER

Acting Judge DJ Smit made this discovery when he was about to write his judgment in a matter of Northbound Processing, which wanted to compel the South African Diamond and Precious Metals Regulator to release a refining licence to it.

Judge Smit remarked that while drafting this judgment, it came to his attention that two cases cited in Northbound’s heads of argument do not exist.

He invited Northbound’s counsel to clarify the position.

Time pressure was given as an excuse, as the matter came before court as an urgent application.

The lawyer explained that he used an online subscription tool called “Legal Genius,” which claimed that it was "exclusively trained on South African legal judgments and legislation”.

The court was, however, told that while some non-existent citations (of previous applicable case law) did appear on the heads of argument, the senior advocate who argued the matter did not rely on the non-existent cases during oral argument.