Man attempts to use AI avatar in court, is immediately 'chewed out' by judges

In an unconventional deployment of AI tools, a defendant in the New York Courts has attempted to use an artificial intelligence avatar to represent himself in a legal dispute.

2

Credit: Supreme Court of the State of New York

The defendant in question, 74-year-old Jerome Dewald, appeared in the New York Supreme Court on March 26 regarding an employment matter. During the hearing, Dewald attempted to submit footage of an AI-generated avatar, which appeared in front of the judges and uttered a few words before being quickly shut down by the judge.

"May it please the court. I come here today a humble pro se before a panel of five distinguished justices." the avatar began

Justice Sallie Manzanet-Daniels quickly alluded to the footage's mechanical nature, questioning whether the avatar was, in fact, Dewald's legal counsel for the case. Dewald responded, confirming that it was an avatar generated by artificial intelligence.

"I generated that. That's not a real person," Dewald answered.

The judge immediately ordered the footage removed, highlighting displeasure towards Dewald's attempt.

"It would have been nice to know that when you made your application. You did not tell me that sir," Manzanet-Daniels iterated.

Dewald later claimed that he applied for permission to play pre-recorded footage for the appearance, utilizing a product from a San Francisco tech company to generate the avatar. He reportedly intended to generate a replica of himself, but was unable to achieve this due to time constraints.

"The court was really upset about it," Dewald admitted "They chewed me up pretty good."

Dewald's attempt joins a growing number of cases of AI being inappropriately deployed into legal settings. Two New York attorneys were fined in 2023 for using AI tools to conduct legal research that was later found to be full of hallucinations. President Trump's former lawyer, Michael Cohen, was also criticized for using AI tools to conduct legal research, eventually realizing that the tools could produce fictitious outputs.