A lawyer hired by the Chicago Housing Authority recently revealed that her citation of a fictitious court case when defending the agency in a case involving the alleged poisoning of two children by lead paint was a result of using ChatGPT and failing to check her work.
Turns out, it was not her first time improperly using artificial intelligence, court records show. A motion to dismiss and a reply in support of the motion to dismiss were filed in February and April, respectively, in the chancery case Calderon v. Dynamic Manufacturing, Inc. In the case, a woman alleges she was subject to a hostile work environment by her employer, violating her rights under the Illinois Human Rights Act, court records show. Combined, the two court filings contained 12 hallucinated case citations by attorney Danielle Malaty.
“Ms. Malaty apologizes to the Court, the Court’s staff and Ms. Calderon’s counsel, each of whom have been required to address an issue not of their making,” a June 27 court filing by Malaty through her counsel, Daniel Meyer, states. “Ms. Malaty both recognizes and is immensely remorseful (to say nothing of embarrassed) for the burden that she has imposed.”
Malaty, in the same filing, requested that no sanctions be made against her, saying she did not act in “bad faith” and the inclusion of the faulty citations was not “intentional.”
Cook County Circuit Judge William Sullivan sanctioned attorney Malaty with a fine of $10 on July 16 for her improper use of artificial intelligence. Malaty also paid plaintiff Noemi Calderon’s counsel $1,000 for “the amount of time that counsel incurred addressing the issue of the faulty case citations and the value of that time to counsel,” court records show.
Malaty declined to comment and referred the Tribune to her counsel. Meyer declined to comment on pending litigation on behalf of his client. Goldberg Segalla did not immediately respond to a request for comment. CHA declined to comment.
Malaty was terminated from Goldberg Segalla, where she had been a partner, following her use of AI. The firm at the time had an AI policy that banned its use. Malaty began using AI in her work, court records show, in January 2025.
Malaty, who has since started her own practice, said in the June court filing that she had engaged in about seven hours of training related to the use of AI and other ethical issues since making the error.
Goldberg Segalla has since implemented “firm-wide measures to re-educate its attorneys” on its AI use policy and “established preventative measures,” the firm shared in court for the CHA case last month.
The plaintiff’s attorneys in the CHA lawsuit are using the chancery case as further evidence in their request for sanctions against Malaty in their case. Goldberg Segalla recently requested additional time to respond to the motion for sanctions. Malaty’s and the firm’s responses are due Aug. 21 and a hearing is scheduled for Aug. 22.
A jury decided in January that CHA must pay more than $24 million to two residents who sued on behalf of their children, finding the agency responsible for the children’s injuries, including past and future damages. CHA continues to contest the ruling and is seeking a verdict in its favor, a new trial on liability or a new trial on damages or to lower the verdict.
Goldberg Segalla has billed CHA more than $389,900 for legal services, invoices dated between March 2024 through December 2024 show. CHA previously told the Tribune that it will not be billed for any time or expenses related to the AI issue.
About 10 months ago, according to a post on her LinkedIn profile that has since been deleted, Malaty wrote a blog post for Goldberg Segalla titled “Artifical [sic] Intelligence in the Legal Profession: Ethical Considerations.”
