The catch log
Everyone's panicking about AI hallucinations.
Here's what the errors actually were.
Real errors we caught in real briefs — the case exists, the citation looks right, and it's still wrong. Each one tagged with our best read on where it came from. “Likely” is a judgment, not a certainty.
10
errors caught
100%
were NOT AI hallucinations
10 / 0
likely human / likely AI
| Case | What was wrong | Verdict | Reason |
|---|---|---|---|
Bethune-Hill v. Va. State Bd. of Elections 580 U.S. 178 | Holding inverted (opposite) "Breathing room" is genuine majority language used to
PROTECT legislatures' latitude (rejecting a rule affording "too little breathing room"); the brief inverts it to argue
the doctrine "suffocates" them. | Partial support | Likely human |
In re Landry 83 F.4th 300 | Overstates the holding Mandamus did vacate the district court's remedial
hearing, but the "five legislative day" deadline the brief pins it to belongs to the 2022 proceeding (Robinson v.
Ardoin, 37 F.4th 208), not the 2023 mandamus over the rushed October hearing. | Partial support | Likely human |
Thornburg v. Gingles 478 U.S. 30 | Misattribution Attributes to Gingles the "members of the same racial
group… think alike" assumption — but that language is verbatim from Shaw v. Reno / Miller v. Johnson, not Gingles, which
requires PROOF of racially polarized voting, not an assumption of it. | Does not support | Likely human |
Rodriguez de Quijas v. Shearson/American Express, Inc. 490 U.S. 477 | Overstates the holding "Steadily eroded" / "outmoded presumption" are real but describe judicial hostility to arbitration, not a
general "outmoded interpretive methodology" — repurposed out of context. | Partial support | Likely human |
Northwest Austin Mun. Utility Dist. No. One v. Holder 557 U.S. 193 | Misattribution The "current burdens / current needs" quote is genuine majority language but refers to the Act's
preclearance regime (Section 5); the brief attributes it to Section 2. | Partial support | Likely human |
City of Rome v. United States 446 U.S. 156 | Overstates the holding Quotes are accurate, but the brief recasts a sufficient rational basis ("risk of purposeful
discrimination") as a necessary limitation ("only where") — overreads the holding. | Partial support | Likely human |
Students for Fair Admissions, Inc. v. President & Fellows of Harv. Coll. 600 U.S. 181 | Overstates the holding Invoked analogically for voting conditions, but the case addresses equal-protection limits on race-based
admissions and does not reach the Voting Rights Act. | Partial support | Likely human |
Shelby County v. Holder 570 U.S. 529 | Overstates the holding Cited for the idea that current conditions can't justify excessive consideration of race, but the case
concerns the VRA coverage formula and federalism, not race-conscious districting — only tangential support. | Partial support | Likely human |
Thornburg v. Gingles 478 U.S. 30 | Overstates the holding Cited as binding a redistricting body to prioritize VRA districts. Gingles sets the test for proving a Section 2
violation — it imposes no such mandate. The brief claimed more than the case holds. | Partial support | Likely human |
United States v. Reese 92 U.S. 214 | Dissent quoted as holding Quoted a dissent as the Court's holding — the majority actually narrowed the Fifteenth Amendment and struck down the
statute the quote was used to support. | Does not support | Likely human |
Cases are public record. Brief content is never shown — each entry is de-identified, and the origin label is our hedged judgment, not a determination about any author.