Pasuengos v Minister for Immigration and Citizenship (No 2)
Federal Circuit and Family Court · Feb 3, 2026
- Jurisdiction
- international
- Court
- Federal Circuit and Family Court
- Record ID
- pasuengos-v-minister-for-immigration-and-citizenship-no-2-2026-02-03
- Observed outcome
- The court referred both the junior solicitor and the principal solicitor to the Legal Profession Conduct Commissioner (SA) for investigation.
- Known monetary consequence
- Not recorded
Why this matter warrants attention
The court referred the applicant's legal representatives to the Legal Profession Conduct Commissioner (SA) for disciplinary investigation after they filed submissions containing three non-existent, AI-hallucinated case citations. The court determined that the failure to verify the existence and relevance of these authorities constituted a serious breach of the practitioners' duty to the court.
Fabricated: Case Law | A case cited at para [27] of the applicant's original submissions was non-existent; the court found it was AI-generated and refused to reproduce it. Counsel admitted the citations came from an AI-generated Google summary. || Fabricated: Case Law | A second case cited at para [27] of the applicant's original submissions was non-existent; the court determined it was a hallucinated authority produced by AI and did not rely on it. || Fabricated: Case Law | A third case cited at para [27] of the applicant's original submissions was non-existent; the court treated it as an AI hallucination and the solicitors withdrew reliance on the citation.
Never cite from AI-generated Google summaries; treat any Overview snippet as unverified until confirmed in primary databases.
Failure modes and consequences
- Fake Citations
- Bar Referral
- Administrative
- Appellate
- AI attribution
- Admitted
- Recorded tool
- Google search AI summary
- Known monetary consequence
- Not recorded
- Procedural posture
- Judgment delivered following a hearing on 22 July 2025 regarding the conduct of the applicant's legal representatives in filing submissions containing hallucinated authorities.
Damien Charlotin case archive
Publisher document archive. The recorded document is hosted in the upstream publisher archive.
Open underlying sourceA recorded source link is not a substitute for checking the underlying order, filing, opinion, or disciplinary record.
What this record does—and does not—establish
Counsel admitted the citations were the product of a Google search and AI summary.
Retained unchanged after audit: the existing summary is source-specific, non-placeholder, and supported by the recorded source link. Read the underlying source before relying on it for legal advice or a filing.
Latest evidence review: Primary Document Verified (high confidence).
Controls suggested by the public record
- Verify each cited authority, quotation, and proposition against the underlying source before filing.
- Use only approved research and drafting tools for legal work.
- Train lawyers and staff to identify and verify generated legal content.