Matt McCormick v. Texakoma Financial, Inc.

Matt McCormick v. Texakoma Financial, Inc., E.D. Tex., Sherman Division, Civil Action No. 4:25-cv-773, 2026 WL 1746259, order filed June 11, 2026 (Judge Amos L. Mazzant). Copy of primary document: `~/workspace/goals/ai-sanctions-case-monitoring/files/sources/D-158-mccormick-v-texakoma-financial.pdf`.

Plaintiff's counsel Amy Lynn Bennecoff Ginsburg signed a summary-judgment response drafted by a law clerk. The brief contained fictitious citations, quotations, and unsupported propositions; Ginsburg acknowledged the draft appeared to have been produced with AI assistance. She added a date and certificate of service to the clerk's draft and filed it without verifying a single authority.

Federal Rules of Civil Procedure 11(b) and 11(c), and E.D. Tex. Local Rule AT-3(m). Sanctions: public reprimand; a $5,000 penalty payable to the court within 14 days, for which Ginsburg and her law firm are jointly responsible; the offending response stricken; a sworn review of every filing bearing Ginsburg's signature filed between January 1, 2026 and the order date; service of the order on her client with proof of compliance; at least two hours of CLE on the ethical use of AI and candor to the court; for one year after the order, a signed certification of verification appended to any filing citing legal authority; the order served on all district and magistrate judges in the district and submitted for publication in the Federal Supplement. Note: the order authorizes only a later motion for defense fees and fixes none; do not use the metadata's $6,000 figure.

Never file a draft, from a clerk or anyone else, without personally verifying every citation. A one-minute check of the cited cases would have exposed the fictional case, and the mandatory pre-filing certification means the risk attaches the moment the signature is applied.

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