Here is a sanctions order in a patent litigation case in federal district court in Kansas. Several lawyers permitted their names to appear in a signature block of a brief. The brief contained a citation to a non-existent case. The brief cited multiple cases for saying things that they did not say. How did the judge choose the magnitude of sanction to be imposed on each of the lawyers?
You can read the sanctions order here. It is fascinating reading.
Most of the lawyers whose names appeared in the signature block had been admitted pro hac vice. One lawyer was local counsel. That lawyer got sanctioned, and I think rightfully so, for failing to check the brief before submitting it to the Court. Yes that lawyer received the to-be-filed brief on the last possible day, and thus had very little time to check it. But that lawyer got sanctioned.
The lawyer who actually “wrote” the brief (most of it was written by an AI) got sanctioned a lot.
A junior associate had participated in the review of the to-be-filed brief. When you read the sanctions order, you can tell that the judge’s heart went out to to that junior associate:
As the Court has already discussed, as the most junior attorney on this matter without supervisory authority, <redacted> was placed in a difficult position by his supervising attorneys. He was apparently neither expected nor instructed to substantively check Mr. Seth’s work, despite being asked to execute a declaration in support of the exhibits attached to it, and despite being asked to conduct a technical edit. One of his supervising attorneys at the firm was out of the country, and the other took no part in preparing, reviewing, or supervising the July 7, 2025 filings. The Court finds that the public admonishment of this Order is sufficient to deter any similar future conduct by <redacted> and releases him from further sanctions.