EWJ August 62 2025 web - Journal - Page 92
Prompting Misconduct:
When Lawyers Misuse AI
James Lloyd, Barrister at Mountford Chambers, discusses the judgment handed down on 6
June 2025 in Ayinde v London Borough of Haringey and Al-Haroun v Qatar National Bank
[2025] EWHC 1383 (Admin), in which the Divisional Court issued a powerful warning to
legal professionals about the risks of using generative artificial intelligence tools for legal research
and drafting, and provided a stark reminder of the severe consequences for both lawyers and
litigants who knowingly or inadvertently present ‘fake’ material to the court.
The combined cases of Ayinde v London Borough of
Haringey and Al-Haroun v Qatar National Bank [2025]
EWHC 1383 (Admin) involved the use or suspected
use of generative AI resulting in fictitious caselaw, fake
citations, and misstatements of law being relied upon
by parties to litigation. The cases were heard under
the inherent jurisdiction of the High Court to regulate
its own procedures and enforce lawyers’ duties to the
court (R (Hamid) v SSHD [2012] EWHC 3070
(Admin)).
Before the Divisional Court, as in the earlier wasted
costs application, the suggestion that counsel had
relied upon Chat GPT or some other LLM was
disputed. An explanation, rejected by the Divisional
Court, was given. Within counsel’s submissions,
criticism appears to have been levelled at the
chambers at which counsel was, at the relevant time,
a pupil barrister:
[Counsel] says that she had received little formal supervision
during her first six months pupillage. She does not recall attending court with a member of chambers in relation to a claim
for judicial review in a homelessness case. She says that during her second six months pupillage she had an extremely busy
practice in her own right. She did not receive any supervision. None of her written work was checked. [51]
Ayinde – pupil barrister allegedly using AI
The facts of Ayinde will be well-known to most
lawyers, given recent publications following the wasted
costs application on 3 April 2025. In the course of judicial review proceedings relating to interim accommodation, counsel instructed on behalf of the claimant
relied upon case law in correspondence of which the
Court said:
The tenor of those submissions, the veracity of which
was not determined, garnered little sympathy:
We do not accept that a lack of access to textbooks or electronic
subscription services within chambers, if that is the position,
provides anything more than marginal mitigation. Ms Forey
could have checked the cases she cited by searching the National Archives’ caselaw website or by going to the law library
of her Inn of Court. [67]
The case that is cited (El Gendi) does not exist. There is no case
with that name, held by the National Archives, or anywhere
else. The neutral citation number, [2020] EWHC
2435 (Admin), does exist, but it is the citation reference to a
different case. [36]
In the settled grounds, further concerns arose. The
Court noted that the settled grounds significantly misstated the effect of s.188(3) of the Housing Act 1996
and:
Ultimately, the Court concluded that:
On the material before us, there seem to be two possible
scenarios. One is that Ms Forey deliberately included fake citations in her written work. That would be a clear contempt
of court. The other is that she did use generative artificial intelligence tools to produce her list of cases and/or to draft parts
of the grounds of claim. In that event, her denial (in a witness
statement supported by a statement of truth) is untruthful.
Again, that would amount to a contempt. In all the circumstances, we consider that the threshold for initiating contempt
proceedings is met. [68]
… four further cases cited by Ms Forey do not exist either. We
note too the Americanised spelling of “emphasized”, which
contrasts with the English spelling of the same word by Ms
Forey in correspondence; and further, the somewhat formulaic style of the prose. [38]
The solicitor for the defendant raised concerns about
the citations and misstatement of law in pre-hearing
correspondence. Those concerns did not prompt, in
the Court’s judgment, sufficient scrutiny by the
claimant’s solicitor. Rather, the claimant responded
dismissing the concerns as “easily explained” and suggesting that the defendant lawyers “may better serve
your organisation by giving attention not to the normative discoveries you have made, but whether you
can locate the authorities in support of the points
raised.” [42]
EXPERT WITNESS JOURNAL
That the Law Centre acting for the claimant “relies
heavily on the expertise of specialist counsel” and that
it had “not been its practice to verify the accuracy of
case citations or to check the genuineness of authorities relied on by counsel” [59] was not a satisfactory
retort in the Court’s judgment:
We accept that they are an overstretched charity providing an
important service to vulnerable members of society with limited
resources. It could be said however, that in those circumstances,
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