What was hallucinated

Fabricated: Case Law | Appellant cited 'In re Estate of Denman' at 462 S.W.3d 641 (Tex. App.—Austin 2015, no pet.); the court found this citation incorrect/misplaced (page cite corresponds to an Arkansas criminal case) and that Texas decisions titled In re Denman have different cites. || Fabricated: Case Law | Appellant referenced 'Hercenberger v. Proctor' without a reporter citation; the court found no binding authority by that name and no supporting citation. || Fabricated: Doctrinal Work | Appellant cited a study titled 'Underestimating the Unrepresented: Cognitive Biases Disadvantage Pro Se Litigants in Family Law Cases'; the court indicated it could find no record of a binding authority or known publication by that name.

Sanction teardown · CA Texas, USA · 2026-04-23

Joann Crawford v. Buffalo Creek Properties, LLC

What happened

In CA Texas, 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)

Appellant cited 'In re Estate of Denman' at 462 S.W.3d 641 (Tex. App.—Austin 2015, no pet.); the court found this citation incorrect/misplaced (page cite corresponds to an Arkansas criminal case) and that Texas decisions titled In re Denman have different cites.
Fabricated (Case Law)

Appellant referenced 'Hercenberger v. Proctor' without a reporter citation; the court found no binding authority by that name and no supporting citation.
Fabricated (Doctrinal Work)

Appellant cited a study titled 'Underestimating the Unrepresented: Cognitive Biases Disadvantage Pro Se Litigants in Family Law Cases'; the court indicated it could find no record of a binding authority or known publication by that name.

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

Not specified in source record.

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/2027/Joann_Crawford_Appellant_v_Buffalo_Creek_Properties_LLC_Appellee.pdf, via Damien Charlotin's public AI Hallucination Cases Database (CC0).

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