Illinois court fines a lawyer $15,000 for ChatGPT's false citations

A Starbucks employee appealed the dismissal of a race discrimination charge to the Illinois Appellate Court. Her lawyer's briefs contained 10 false citations: four made-up quotes from statutes, one case that does not exist, and five real cases that do not say what he claimed. He said he used a corporate ChatGPT subscription and had checked the citations on LexisNexis, but missed the errors. On July 28, 2026, the court upheld the dismissal and fined him $15,000, or $1,500 per false citation. It said it set that rate above earlier fines on purpose. It also referred him to Illinois's attorney discipline commission.