AI hallucinations land Dutch lawyer in trouble
Despite her wrongdoing, the defendant got off easy.
Courthouse in Amsterdam, Netherlands. Photo by Niels Wenstedt/BSR Agency/Getty Images
- A Dutch lawyer received a formal reprimand for citing AI-generated, false case law in two tenancy lawsuits.
- The disciplinary committee said her conduct undermined trust in legal proceedings and breached professionalism and integrity rules.
- The lawyer said she thought the AI tool worked like a search engine and later withdrew the incorrect references.
Key Takeaways by nexos.ai, reviewed by Cybernews staff.
The disciplinary committee has formally reprimanded a Dutch lawyer for using AI tools incorrectly to represent two of her clients.
In late 2025, the chief judge of the East Brabant District Court received a report regarding the defendant’s conduct in a tenancy case and launched an investigation.
Because the lawyer was too inexperienced and unfamiliar with tenancy rules, she used an AI tool to assist. However, she did so in a negligent manner.
According to a recent verdict of the disciplinary committee, the lawyer submitted incorrect and incomplete information in two separate lawsuits.
She referred to various judicial rulings that didn’t exist and 7 rulings concerning completely unrelated subjects.
The committee described this as “extremely negligent and reprehensible under disciplinary law,” because her actions not only harm the client’s behavior but also those of others involved in the legal process.
In her defense, the defendant argued that she thought that the AI tool she used was “a type of search engine” and that she wasn’t aware of the risks that AI tools might generate by referring to non-existent cases and incorrect information.
On top of that, when she found out about her mistakes, she immediately tried to rectify her errors by filing rectification documents, in which the erroneous references were withdrawn and no longer part of the legal dispute.
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“The disciplinary committee considers that all parties involved in legal proceedings must be able to rely on the fact that case law cited by an attorney in a pleading actually exists and that the references are accurate. However, the defendant has undermined this trust through her conduct in the proceedings and has thereby violated not only the core value of professionalism, but also the core value of integrity and code of conduct,” the disciplinary committee ruled.
Due to the severity of the matter, the committee isn’t letting the defendant off the hook by issuing a warning. Instead, she received a formal reprimand, which the committee feels is “appropriate and proportionate.”
Due to the fact that the lawyer hadn’t previously been convicted under disciplinary law and AI literacy was an issue at the time, she got off lightly.
