Why the model invents a case that sounds exactly right

1 · Learn the move · Context + audience

A language model does not look a case up. It produces the next likely word, and the most likely words after 'see' in a brief are a party name, a reporter, a volume and a page. That is why the invented case is never a wild one: it has plausible parties, a real reporter, a volume in range, a year that fits, and a parenthetical that says exactly what your argument needs. Fluency is the symptom, not the proof. The courts that have sanctioned lawyers for this did not sanction them for using a model; they sanctioned them for filing what it wrote without opening it [S]. Rule 3.3 makes a false statement of law to a tribunal the lawyer's own [M], and Rule 11 puts the certification on the signature, not on the tool [M]. So the habit this desk builds is not 'never use it'. It is: everything that looks like an authority is a claim about the world until a person has opened the source and read the passage. Tell the model who it is writing for (a lawyer who will open every cite) and what it must do with anything it cannot open (mark it), and the output changes shape.

You are drafting for a lawyer who will open every authority you cite before it is filed. Write the argument section below. For every case, statute, rule or regulation you cite, append [VERIFY] and, in one clause, say what you believe it holds. Never quote a case; paraphrase and mark it [NO QUOTATION: unseen]. If you are not confident an authority exists, write [AUTHORITY NEEDED: the proposition] instead of a citation. Argument: [paste the de-identified facts and the proposition]