ChatGPT in Court: Americans Are Ditching Lawyers for AI But Not Without Risk
Across the country, a growing number of people are swapping legal counsel for artificial intelligence. From eviction battles to small-claims disputes, Americans are using ChatGPT to write motions, find legal precedents, and challenge court rulings—and some are actually winning.
Lynn White, a Long Beach tenant facing eviction, lost her first case with a lawyer’s help. Then she turned to ChatGPT and Perplexity.ai to appeal on her own. The AI helped her identify procedural errors, draft responses, and research local laws. After months of filings, she overturned her eviction and dodged more than $70,000 in penalties and back rent.
“I never, ever, ever could have won this appeal without AI,” White said. “It was like having God up there responding to my questions.”
The New DIY Defense
White isn’t alone. From New Mexico to Florida, self-represented litigants—or pro se defendants—are relying on AI to build their cases.
Fitness entrepreneur Staci Dennett used ChatGPT to draft arguments in a debt collection case. By prompting it to “pretend to be a Harvard Law professor,” she refined her filings until she reached what she called “an A-plus argument.” She ultimately negotiated a settlement saving her over $2,000.
But the rise in AI-assisted cases has also created chaos in courtrooms. Paralegal Meagan Holmes says she’s seen more pro se litigants in the past year than in her entire career many armed with AI-generated briefs “filled with nonsense.”
Hallucinations and Hefty Fines
AI’s biggest flaw? Confidence. It often fabricates court cases that don’t exist, a phenomenon called hallucination.
Florida businessman Jack Owoc, founder of Bang Energy, was sanctioned after submitting a motion containing 11 fake citations. Another litigant, Earl Takefman, learned the hard way when ChatGPT invented Hernandez v. Gilbert (1995)—a completely imaginary case. “It really f—-d me over,” he admitted.
Courts are now issuing fines and requiring AI disclosure in filings. A California attorney was recently fined $10,000 for submitting 21 fabricated quotes generated by ChatGPT—the largest penalty of its kind.
A Divided Legal Frontier
Despite the growing skepticism, some legal experts see potential. Los Angeles attorney Zoe Dolan helped launch a class teaching self-represented litigants how to use AI effectively, fact-checking citations, verifying sources, and comparing results across platforms.
Attorney Andrew Montez said his firm uses AI to speed up research but always verifies results manually. “All attorneys will have to use AI in some way or another,” he said. “Otherwise they’ll be outgunned.”
‘David and Goliath, Except My Slingshot Was AI’
For Lynn White, AI wasn’t just a tool it was a lifeline. Reading from a ChatGPT-generated statement, she described her case as a “David and Goliath” moment:
“AI gave me research support, drafting help and organizational skills that I could not access. It doubled as a virtual law clerk.”
Her victory may be the future for thousands more Americans priced out of legal help—and willing to let a chatbot argue their case.
