In Jones v Family Court at Whangārei [2026] NZSC 1, the Supreme Court used a published judgment to call out a litigant for citing case law that an AI application had invented. Meanwhile, Bell Gully had become the first large New Zealand firm to roll out Harvey AI to its entire 200-plus lawyer team.
What the Supreme Court Said
Justices Ellen France, Stephen Kós and Forrest Miller dismissed Mr Jones's leave application after identifying that submissions cited several authorities that "appear to have been hallucinated by an Artificial Intelligence (AI) application".
Specific examples included "Teddy v Police [2015] NZSC 62" and "Baird v R [2013] NZSC 120" — real case names combined with incorrect citations, while four genuine cases were misused to support propositions they did not stand for.
The issue for New Zealand law firms.
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