AI in the Courtroom
- Colin Levy
- 6 days ago
- 2 min read
In this guide, I explore how AI and artificial intelligence have entered the courtroom, from the first headline-grabbing failures like Mata v. Avianca to the more recent and unsettling episodes where judges themselves relied on AI-generated drafts that smuggled hallucinated facts and citations into judicial opinions. I show how these incidents triggered a wave of standing orders, local rules, and certification requirements that now shape what lawyers must disclose about their AI use in the courtroom and what judges can and cannot delegate to machines.
I profile leaders like Judge Scott Schlegel, who helped craft the ABA’s “AI in Chambers” guidelines and argues that AI in the courtroom should support, not replace, judicial judgment, and I trace how courts are grappling with privilege, evidence, and ethics as artificial intelligence tools become embedded in everyday practice. This includes Judge Rakoff’s ruling in United States v. Heppner that client communications with consumer AI tools are not privileged, and the growing doctrinal tension around ex parte concerns when judges quietly consult AI systems outside the adversarial process.
Beyond generative AI, I examine algorithmic risk assessment tools like COMPAS that have long influenced bail and sentencing decisions in the courtroom, unpacking the fairness and transparency battles that followed ProPublica’s 2016 “Machine Bias” investigation and the Wisconsin Supreme Court’s decision in State v. Loomis. I also survey how courts now use AI and artificial intelligence for research, transcription, docket management, and case triage, from Indiana’s AI-driven mental health appeal reforms to Texas’s AI-powered e-filing and redaction infrastructure.
The guide then widens the lens beyond a single courtroom, mapping global deployments of AI in courts in Brazil, China, the UK, Canada, India, and elsewhere, and explaining how policy frameworks from UNESCO, the ABA, CEPEJ, and the EU AI Act are beginning to set guardrails for judicial use of artificial intelligence. Throughout, I highlight ethical fault lines for the bench, including automation bias, ex parte risks, confidentiality of judicial deliberations, and the coming wave of AI agents in chambers, arguing that the legitimacy of the courtroom depends on using AI as a tool while keeping human judgment at the center.
