AI Citation Hallucinations Trigger Contempt Notice as Ontario Court Annuls Fraudulent Divorce Order

Background and Overview

The Ontario Superior Court of Justice, in Hanna Ko v. Hai Chun Li and Zhou Hang Li, confronted two significant and distinct legal matters simultaneously. The first involved grave procedural concerns stemming from a counsel's factum that contained fabricated or misdirected case citations — a problem the court squarely attributed to the unchecked use of artificial intelligence in legal drafting. The second matter addressed the substantive question of whether a divorce order obtained through fraud and duress could be set aside under Rule 25(19) of the Family Law Rules, O Reg 114/99, and what estate-related relief ought to follow.

The case serves as a critical judicial warning to the legal profession about the dangers of deploying generative AI tools without rigorous human oversight — and simultaneously delivers a significant ruling on the intersection of matrimonial fraud, estate administration, and competing spousal claims.

Part I: The AI Hallucination Problem — Fabricated Citations and Contempt Proceedings

The Factum and Its Defects

Counsel for the applicant, Ms. Jisuh Lee of ML Lawyers, filed a factum dated April 25, 2025, in connection with a motion heard on May 1, 2025. The factum contained no page numbers and no paragraph numbers — an irregularity in itself. More critically, the court identified multiple instances where the legal citations provided were either entirely non-existent, directed to unrelated decisions, or actively contradicted the propositions they were meant to support.

Citation Problem No. 1: Mislinked Authority on Rule 25(19)

In support of the submission that the circumstances of the case met the threshold for duress, mistake, and procedural irregularity justifying the court's discretion under Rule 25(19) of the Family Law Rules, the factum cited:

  • Alam v. Shah, 2023 ONSC 1772 — the hyperlink provided directed readers not to a family law decision but to Gatoto v. 5GC Inc., 2023 ONSC 1772 (CanLII), a matter involving a commercial real estate dispute with no relevance whatsoever to Rule 25(19).
  • DaCosta v. DaCosta, 2010 ONSC 2178 — the hyperlink led to a standard 404 error page on CanLII. The case could not be located on CanLII, Westlaw, Quicklaw, or Google.

Citation Problem No. 2: Inverted Proposition on Trustee Removal

The factum also cited two cases in support of removing an estate trustee:

  • Johnson v. Lanka, 2010 ONSC 4124 — cited for the proposition that "the court removed a trustee for failing to account and for conduct that eroded the beneficiaries' confidence." In reality, the court held the opposite. At paragraphs 38 and 39, Pattillo J. expressly declined to remove the estate trustees, finding no clear evidence of necessity and dismissing the applications. The moving party was further penalized with substantial indemnity costs for making unfounded allegations of wrongdoing.

  • Meschino Estate v. Meschino, 1998 CanLII 14734 (ON SC) — cited as authority for removal of a trustee for non-disclosure and unilateral dealings with estate assets. The hyperlink instead directed readers to Antonacci v. Great Atlantic & Pacific Co. of Canada, 1998 CanLII 14734 (ON SC), a wrongful dismissal trial decision with no connection to estate trusteeship. No Meschino Estate case could be found on the CanLII website.

When the presiding judge followed the hyperlinks during the oral hearing and found them non-functional or misdirected, he questioned Ms. Lee directly on whether the factum had been prepared using artificial intelligence such as ChatGPT. Ms. Lee indicated that her office does not ordinarily rely on AI but stated she would need to verify the position with her clerk. She was unable to produce printed copies of the cited cases or provide accurate citations during oral submissions.

The court articulated the following foundational professional obligations that every lawyer bears: