NYC Lawyer Uses ChatGPT To File Bogus Court Documents (2023)

That's A Crime
Episode 59: NYC Lawyer Uses ChatGPT To File Bogus Court Documents (2023)

Jason Connell and Sal Rodriguez break down the true crime story of the NYC Lawyer Uses ChatGPT To File Bogus Court Documents in 2023. In May 2023,  NYC lawyer, Steven Schwartz, cited several bogus lawsuits in a federal court filing against a Colombian airline. It was learned that Schwartz had used ChatGPT to source the lawsuits which turned out to be completely fabricated by ChatGPT.

* ChatGPT is an artificial intelligence chatbot developed by OpenAI and released in November 2022.

Recorded: 06-13-23
Studio: Just Curious Media
https://www.JustCuriousMedia.com/

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Transcript

Jason Connell: 0:01

Whoa, just curious. Welcome to Just curious media. This is that's a crime. I'm Jason Connell.

Sal Rodriguez: 0:10

And I'm Sal Rodriguez.

Jason Connell: 0:12

All right, so we are back with another crime. Yeah. And

Sal Rodriguez: 0:17

I think we're covering new ground here if I'm not mistaken. We Pacific Yeah.

Jason Connell: 0:21

are covering some new ground. Yeah, I'm really excited to do this. I came across this crime last week saved it for us. Because today we're breaking down the True Crime Story of the New York City lawyer uses chat GPT to file bogus court documents. And 2023 It was only a matter of time. So before Chechi Beatty got in and got into that crime.

Sal Rodriguez: 0:45

Oh, I know it. Sure. Exactly. It was only a matter of time and I got opinions on on AI. Oh, I got opinions do tell. I absolutely do I you know, I the feelings are mixed. As a writer, as a person who identifies as a writer. I have seen friends use chat GPT to literally write stories. And I read one of them. One of them a friend of plastic. Yeah, they made a chat GPT story about me. And it was fantastic. And then particularly fantastic that a human did not right it. Okay. But the problem is I was like, You know what, get this thing away from me. Like, I didn't want it. You know what I mean? Like I was repulsed by it, but at the same time intrigued and impressed by

Jason Connell: 1:25

it. Yeah, I am very intrigued. And I have been for years and years and years when I saw the movie, her Spike Jones movie. Very good. It was so ahead of its time, it dealt with like AI. And this guy fell in love with his AI that was an assistant, but it was like Scarlett Johansson is voice. So we connected and you could really see that movie really planted a seed like, wow, this is going to come around. There'll be a time you could just tell this bot to do stuff. And it doesn't. I mean, more than Chachi Beatty is doing now. I mean, like your real assistant, like, hey, schedule that and do this. And you know, and that starts to happen. It's only a matter of time. But for all the newbies who have not heard of chat GPT I want to give a definition. Yeah, please do. Chat. GBT is an artificial intelligence chatbot developed by open AI and released in November 2022. So so very young. So new man. So know, the name chat GPT combines chat, referring to its chatbot functionality, and GPT, which stands for generative pre trained transformer, a type of large language model. I've never heard of that. So that's the combination. And they've really been the front runner in this space. Because also it is free. Much like Google is free. Like, oh, it's

Sal Rodriguez: 2:55

free. I didn't know that. I thought you had to have

Jason Connell: 2:59

to do more. It is free to log in. I got an account months ago, the app just came out more recently. So download it now. In fact, pause the podcasts out. I don't know. We'll do it later. But that's what it is. It is free. And it is fascinating. It truly is.

Sal Rodriguez: 3:17

So wait a second. Jason, have you been using chat? GPT

Jason Connell: 3:20

it wrote tonight's script. No, it did not. But I've used it in certain ways. I am fascinated by AI. I saw something before chat. TPT came on the scene. There was like another bot or an app that you could it does your travel plans for you like I'm going to Greece. Tell me what to do. And it will outline everything you need to see how you get there. I was like, Nah, that's clever. That's cutting some time out. So my ears have been listening. I've been picking up like what's new and then check GBT comes out it's like, okay, this is the front runner. And now you're gonna see things coming out with chat. GBT powering it like, yeah, we have these cool systems. But chap. GBT is our you know, our back engine, if you will. I'm seeing that already. Yeah.

Sal Rodriguez: 4:08

So Jason. Yeah. Jason, I'm sorry. But if you're gonna reference a movie like her? Yeah, then I will have to see your her and raise you, Ryan Gosling, Lars and the real girl. So we will see. See, that's what I'm talking about. When I talk about the fears of AI. You know, it's like, once AI merges with other worlds? Yeah. Then that's when things will get really I'm

Jason Connell: 4:31

going to see your Ryan Gosling film and throw at you Terminator.

Sal Rodriguez: 4:37

Yeah, there, you know. So I think that any person and it's not far fetched if you understand tech and watch how things are going. It's not so far fetched that those horrible things could possibly happen.

Jason Connell: 4:48

No, it is not. They could take everything you've ever given them and learn from it. And if they're powerful creatures and not just a computer and even if they're a computer, they can start doing things. Sure there stat demise, there's no doubt. But I tend to think positive. I want to stay in this lane. I believe in autonomous cars. I think they're safer for the roads. I love driving. And I think it's a better world if we have autonomous cars. Wow, no drunk driving, nobody's speeding to get around, you know, crazy teenagers. And you can re imagine a car. It doesn't have to be laid out that way. It could have like a workspace, a lounging area. There's a lot of things that start coming into play. And I really thought we were on the verge of it. And like that's no longer on the forefront. Like what happened to those things. So a lot of things are happening. It's exciting. And this crime is one of many to come at deal with chat GPD our artificial intelligence as a whole. Sure. So let's delve into the crime. Yeah, shall we? Okay, so Stephen Schwartz, a New York City lawyer at the respected Tribeca firm Le TAO Le TAO and Oberman admitted citing several bogus lawsuits, he claimed bolstered his case because he used chat GBT to help write a federal court filing not a good idea to be relied on this new technology. So when did it come out? Again,

Sal Rodriguez: 6:23

November of 2022.

Jason Connell: 6:26

And I'm going to go and do a federal court filing, trusting all that be with chat. GPT not the best decision. Just no,

Sal Rodriguez: 6:37

well, no, but look, somewhere between you and me. And like how you feel about AI how I feel about AI is a person like this that I would consider. There's only two things, either he did this intentionally with some sort of sketchiness. Or it was accidental. If he did it accidentally, like he didn't think it was wrong, or didn't think he should do it. Kind of gullible, then would this guy be gullible? Like why would a person put so much trust in something that came out in November 2022? Well,

Jason Connell: 7:03

some people may think it's like Google, if I type in a bunch of things, Google is going to tell me all these options, and I grabbed one, so they probably think it's consolidating the internet. Everything in there's real, it can't think for itself. Not so fast. I mean, Chad CBT has been out since November 2022. Everything fed into it. It's made it smarter. Everybody plugging stuff, and

Sal Rodriguez: 7:29

but Jason, we have to rely on the fact that everything that Chad GBT is pulling from is truthful. And this is what we find. It's not

Jason Connell: 7:36

you can't rely on Wikipedia. People are always on there. Exactly. And say, Well, no, I did this, that and the other and it's taking it and it doesn't know those things yet. Probably. I mean, maybe it does. Maybe it doesn't. But there's that vagueness. Like, I don't know. Is that fact or fiction? I don't Sure. Well, the blunder came to light after Schwartz's legal partner, Peter Leduc, filed a lawsuit against the Colombian airline Avianca on behalf of Robert Mata, who was allegedly injured when a metal serving cart struck his knee on the flight to New York City. Now, so I have this happened so many times. I'm not short, six, two and a half. I usually take the aisle. And there has been some times where you're just kind of dozing off, you're focused on something else and that frickin cart comes and bangs you but it never occurred to me to file a lawsuit.

Sal Rodriguez: 8:31

Yeah, yeah. Well, you know what, Jason? Maybe it should I have a friend. I have a friend who was recently he worked at Sam's Club. Yeah, these stocking boxes, like Costco. Yeah. So yeah, it's like that. So another employee in a forklift Hit him Hit him on a little

Jason Connell: 8:45

forklift. Okay, this is that could kill him.

Sal Rodriguez: 8:48

Okay. Apparently it didn't. And I think he was okay. And I don't know if he had any surgery. It did. Yeah. Yeah. Like I think he returned to work a few weeks later. But the point is, I think that if soon as a forklift were to hit me, I'm grabbing the neck, grabbing the neck, back, do I back my neck? You know, my neck, my back, and maybe, maybe as soon as a cart hits me, my knee, I tore my meniscus. I tore a meniscus.

Jason Connell: 9:13

I would like to know more information about this suit, because we don't have any. But I thought that was really interesting. Like, okay, what kind of how bad could this have been? You know, but anyway, that aside, that's not the point for this story. When the airline's lawyers asked the court to toss the suit, that'd be my luck. I finally do it. That's out here. Shorts filed a brief that supposedly cited more than a half dozen relevant cases. And so this is what we're getting into, right here. So the problem being the cases that were brought forth, such as Miller versus United Airlines, maybe it's another card incident. Sure. Peterson versus Iran Air Hmm. And Well,

Sal Rodriguez: 10:02

that was yeah, the Peterson verses about that. Yeah, it was one of the larger people. They wanted to have to pay for two seats when that

Jason Connell: 10:08

was it. Yeah, sure. Yeah. And Vargas versus China, Southern Airlines. Were all completely fabricated by Chet GBT. Back to your story, okay, by chat GPT it knows how to write fiction.

Sal Rodriguez: 10:26

Okay, so there was a geez, I just, I lost the thought but it had to do with the evils of ai o line. Okay. Yes. So they were able to use chat GPT to go through the CAPTCHA. You know, the CAPTCHA? Yeah, they somehow AI lied to get through the CAPTCHA API is a liar.

Jason Connell: 10:46

i Well, there's that I don't think shorts knew this out. So this is what Manhattan federal judge P Kevin Castel shared.

Sal Rodriguez: 10:59

So the court is presented with an unprecedented circumstance. Six of the submitted cases appear to be bogus judicial decisions with bogus quotes and bogus internal citations. Bogus is said three times he's

Jason Connell: 11:14

refocusing. Wow, okay. Oh, yeah, he's fine. Like, what is this guy brought me Is this what we're gonna start seeing? Yeah, we're relying on this technology. I bet you will judge Castel then called for shorts and led Dukkha to appear for a June 8 Hearing to face possible sanctions over the shocking revelations. So this is all very recent. We're still in June. This is all happening. And then in a sworn affidavit, we learned what Sal

Sal Rodriguez: 11:46

Schwartz admitted that he used chat GPT while compiling the paperwork that Luca filed, saying he relied on the legal opinions provided to him by a source that has revealed itself to be unreliable, and that Schwartz was unaware of the possibility that chat GPS content could be false. Yeah, I think I mean, look, we expect if you were I did, this is one thing. This is an attorney. Are we not supposed to rely on these people? Aren't they supposed to be smarter than us? Well, maybe not.

Jason Connell: 12:21

Yeah, well, I'm telling you, I don't think this was malicious. It was just bad. It was a bad decision. It wasn't well thought out. And I think he assumed Everything's in there. It's compiling this for me. This is so fast. Look at this. This is amazing. Not knowing it's fake. Now, I am shocked that he plugged this in, and it spit out made up things because I've tested Chet GPT. I've tested about our shows I've given it links to some of our episodes. And it can say like, Hey, give me a breakdown of this episode of Sal and I, and it gives you like a little synopsis. So it's clever that way. So I am shocked that it came back with these three cases, and maybe more that were completely fabricated that really to me is like, huh, wow, I didn't, unless he said like, tell me a story. It's like find cases like this. And it was like, oh, yeah, surely he means make up. So that's kind of fascinating. I'm sure in future renditions of AI. It will be able to source material. You know what I mean? Like, you could probably rely on it at some point. But right now, it's a Wild Wild West. We don't know what it might spit out.

Sal Rodriguez: 13:26

It is very wild, wild west. It is the wild wild west on the web right now.

Jason Connell: 13:30

Yeah, that's gonna rename it. Yeah, the wild wild Web. Yeah. Let's coin that, Sal. I like it. So shorts, also told Judge Costello that he greatly regrets using AI for legal research and will never do so in the future without absolute verification of its authenticity. So I'm not done trying this, but this has to be cleaned up and then I'll use it again. i Yeah. I don't know about that apology. But

Sal Rodriguez: 14:01

Jason, I realized something. It just occurred to me by him using chat GPT for this court filing. Essentially, you're What's that? Are they liable? Well, okay, that's a whole nother thing that could be addressed, but you are then not giving work to a paralegal or to a legal secretary.

Jason Connell: 14:21

Hey, there's a lot of jobs that Chad's gonna take away.

Sal Rodriguez: 14:23

Oh, I did. This is another example that this is okay. But theoretically, a legal secretary or paralegal would have submitted appropriate materials not like this.

Jason Connell: 14:36

Sal, I am bringing in chat TPT to costar.

Sal Rodriguez: 14:41

That's a crime now co hosted by Chad JpT

Jason Connell: 14:44

its voices as be like mechanical. That's great. Jason. Oh,

Sal Rodriguez: 14:48

you know what you can do you know now Now speaking of all this, they can take a sample of someone's voice. It will still be there. It'll show me shot

Jason Connell: 14:57

my version of it I love it I do have enough sampling of your all of your words and your dialect and episodes previous so we're building it behind the scenes now sound you

Sal Rodriguez: 15:10

can make me say anything you could make salad Jason say whatever the hell you want.

Jason Connell: 15:14

Yeah, forgive me to the show go on we'll be playing golf and hanging out

Sal Rodriguez: 15:18

that would be interested in our AI versions working is it wasn't that the whole plan for robots is that the robots do the work and we chill out. Right? That was the plan.

Jason Connell: 15:27

That reminds me of multiplicity with Michael Keaton AI adjacent he's Yes, makes a clone, which is not AI, but you're making a clone of yourself. And a clone of yourself is not as good as the original. So something's a little off. And then they all get together his clones and they make a clone. So clones of another clone. And he's completely off it. You know, he's like, slow and just kind of

Sal Rodriguez: 15:48

I like it though. I gotta check that out. Oh, it's

Jason Connell: 15:50

brilliant.

Sal Rodriguez: 15:51

It's Michael Keaton,

Jason Connell: 15:52

Michael Keaton, Harold. I haven't seen that one. Rest in peace, no remise recipe anyway, not AI but adjacent. Sure. So as for Peter le Dukkha. He wrote, in an affidavit, he was not involved with the malfeasance and had no reason to doubt the authenticity of the case law fabricated and the document. Sounds like LoDuca stolen shorts under the bus here, you know, like, hey, help me file this thing for against this Colombian airline and i Hey, you're using Chechi. BTW over there? I don't I'm not looking. I don't want to know. Like, did he really not know, shorts have been like, this is great. It's I'm getting all my cases. And he would have been telling everybody in the firm, maybe not, but I'm assuming he'd be so proud of his findings. But Leduc is saying, I don't know what he's doing.

Sal Rodriguez: 16:42

way. But Jason, we don't know how far into detail Chad GPT went with these notes cases. Right?

Jason Connell: 16:48

We don't we should do I have special on those cases? Yeah,

Sal Rodriguez: 16:50

exactly. Like they each case has its own then bogus, you know, proceed story. Yeah, exactly. I mean, you know, surely there's going to be like a some some terrorism. If it's on the plane, maybe there's some terrorism. Who knows, though? It'll be a great story, probably. Well,

Jason Connell: 17:04

I'll just say this about LoDuca. He did add that he had worked with shorts for 25 years and never recalled him looking to mislead a court, as far as you know. Sure. So I do that I can say to,

Sal Rodriguez: 17:19

you throw in as far as he knew.

Jason Connell: 17:22

But I don't think Leduc is facing any things that he could be, I don't know where things are at right now. If the judge is like, Okay, I gotta, you know, this is gonna set a precedent. And maybe it's just a slap on the wrist and yada yada yada, you do lose your license is the firm at risk is chat GPT, which I doubt at risk. But I'm sure people are probably going, Oh, crap, I gotta check my facts. I've been doing this. And like, this is probably been happening elsewhere. And this is the type of case and maybe there's more coming that can like shine a light and say, Hey, this is a cautionary tale. Do your homework. You can use it, but use it as another resource. Right. Do you

Sal Rodriguez: 18:03

think do you think, Jason that? I think we're legitimately at a time that has come upon us so quickly? Since November 2022? Yeah, where every entity, whether it be a business, or any sort of media organization, anybody has to like draft up the AI code of conduct for their company?

Jason Connell: 18:22

Yeah. Probably. And a lot of companies are trying to get in this business make it a part of their offering. Like if there's already been Robo investors historically, yes, I've heard of that. Well, now investments will be like, oh, yeah, you got almost half the brand on your website to look legit and current. And whatever you're doing your hosting podcast, great. Use our AI to write your transcripts not to do your show, but I did get an email the other day from our host Buzzsprout. Offering an AI add on component it did not mention chat CPT but AI is everywhere. And it will I have not used it because I'm not counting on it, but it'll write your headline, the name of your episode. It'll do your show notes and your transcript. We already use an AI service otter AI to do our transcripts so it's not far fetched it's like oh yeah, that's this man hours throw an AI at it. So more and more companies are getting in this industry and trying to figure it out. But you're right about the handbook for sure.

Sal Rodriguez: 19:24

Well, you just brought up something I hadn't considered and that is that as far as AI I lost my train of thought again I'm sorry ma'am.

Jason Connell: 19:32

Well, also a movie by Steven Spielberg a way ahead of his time Marvel Yes, exactly.

Sal Rodriguez: 19:38

Yeah, I haven't seen did I see that one? I did not see that one.

Jason Connell: 19:40

You don't have a toy you don't have an AI toy back there.

Sal Rodriguez: 19:43

I probably do somewhere around here. I'll have to I'll have to look up

Jason Connell: 19:47

alright no train of thought so i We can't spark it.

Sal Rodriguez: 19:50

It was about a I was about chat. GPT

Jason Connell: 19:54

something to you. I just triggered something. Yeah, you did. You thought it made me think about companies getting in this line of work, you know, hey, there's a writer strike going on as Chachi Beatty showing up on Cobra Kai and

Sal Rodriguez: 20:07

No, no, I was not. I think now that you mentioned, I think that AI is something that the Writers Guild is discussing right now. Like what AI is doing to the writing industry itself, and how that's affecting these contracts. So I think that that is a strong component in the current writer strike.

Jason Connell: 20:25

I believe it. I've actually read and I don't think they're crimes they're frowned upon. But how college campuses are failing students, because everybody use chat GPT to do a paper. Okay, so

Sal Rodriguez: 20:36

there you go. So that's not

Jason Connell: 20:38

likely to show up on our show, unless it's really a crime. But yes, that is happening. People are counting on it. And so why wouldn't they? Why wouldn't they test things push the envelope? Why wouldn't you? Well, essentially,

Sal Rodriguez: 20:51

you're if I asked somebody, let's say another person to write something for me, that's supposed to be completely legitimate. Yeah. Once I get it in my hand, I might check it out. I'm gonna double or I'm gonna fact check, right?

Jason Connell: 21:03

I've been doing this. I've done myself. I've done movies, I've done anything that I know all the answers to. And it's like, it gets a lot, right. It gets some glaring mistakes as well, like, oh, wow, I didn't direct that movie. So out of nowhere, it's gonna make mistakes, but you can use it, it's fast. And you can just look at it and discern what's factor fiction, it can be a useful tool, but you cannot just turn things over to it and walk away. That's done. I couldn't. I'm too much of a perfectionist to distrust this entity. But you know, you could say, hey, it's being the Terminator synopsis for Terminator, and it's probably gonna bang it out perfect. But you would know and you could say, Okay, who was in Terminator, but you know, Swartz Nagar, blah, blah, blah. So check it out.

Sal Rodriguez: 21:51

I do know Jason that you fact check me I know you do. If you and I ever get into some notes, they said this and this. And I'm insistent, you will still check it out. Oh, yeah. To make any revisions. You don't just take my word for it. So why would I take a eyes word for it? I trust you more than I trust AI. If I'm going to fact check you I'm going to fact check AI

Jason Connell: 22:10

a fact check everybody.

Sal Rodriguez: 22:11

I've fact check everybody.

Jason Connell: 22:14

Well, as for this case, this crime, I should say, it is also a case. Shorts and DeLuca are awaiting sentencing or some sort of punishment. I don't know. It could just be like I said slap on the wrist. We will see. But it stood out to me. The minute I saw this, I thought oh my gosh, we have to cover it's so timely. And I know south there will be more of these types of crimes.

Sal Rodriguez: 22:42

That on the show. Yeah, that is unfortunately, I believe it'll be the case. And this is I think is a wonderful addition to some of our crypto crimes because we're getting to the the digital space the crimes of the digital realm.

Jason Connell: 22:54

That's right. That's all I got. So let's see if anything else.

Sal Rodriguez: 22:57

No, no, I enjoyed this good. And yeah. Hey, if I forgot to mention anything, we will be having another AI crime at some point. Yeah, we will be talking about it again.

Jason Connell: 23:06

So that covers the True Crime Story of the New York City lawyer uses check GPT to file bogus court documents in 2023. So fans of the show of just curious media have that's a crime. Please, please, if you have the time, leave us a five star review. That's amazing. Or even just the little vote, the little five star rating on Apple podcast. It helps the show immensely. Well, we asked they said What's up?

Sal Rodriguez: 23:38

can our listeners go to Chad GPT and say write a review for let's talk Cobra Kai making a five star review and post it to it. Can they do that?

Jason Connell: 23:50

Yes.

Sal Rodriguez: 23:51

Holy cow.

Jason Connell: 23:52

That's a good call sound Wow, grow to chat GBT type of our show that's a crime, your thoughts, let them run with it. And then go on there and just paste that to Apple. We'd love it. That'd be great. That would be great. But the five star ratings a quick click, it helps our show we need higher numbers. It just It keeps us going. It helps us stand out in the blue ocean of space. And sound. Tell us what else they can do.

Sal Rodriguez: 24:18

We would love for all of our listeners and fans to send us messages, post comments, find us on social media. That's a crime. We are on there. Reach out to us, connect with us. Because you know what, there's a lot of exciting things happen. Jason, I had a wonderful, very long conversation the other day. And there's a lot of wonderful things going on with just curious media, with all of our shows as individual shows as well. So a very exciting time. So please be our friends continue to listen, continue to reach out. Leave us those reviews, post comments and keep us engaged with you and we stay engaged right back.

Jason Connell: 24:54

Absolutely. And you can go to just curious media.com You can see all of our shows In fact, if you don't want to go to the app and listen on there, you can actually stream every single episode from our website. We also have new shows in the works. Dog on is still really young, relatively young. But a new shows coming online like this week. I don't want to spoil it. So just go there. And there's some other offerings as well. We're starting to help other people launch podcast we're doing some consulting, hosting voiceover just ways to grow just curious media and we love that we have any fans. So we want to give to the fans. We're here. We want to keep coming back and just help support us in those ways and we're greatly appreciative. Alright, so until next time,

Sal Rodriguez: 25:45

sounds good.