AI for Free Legal Assistance

AI isn't a substitute for a lawyer, but it can help defray legal costs.

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You may have seen this New York Times article earlier this year, a lawyer representing a man who sued an airline relied on artificial intelligence to help prepare a court filing.

The lawsuit began like many others: Roberto Mata sued the airline Avianca, claiming he was injured when a metal serving cart struck his knee during a flight to Kennedy International Airport in New York. When Avianca sought to dismiss the case, Mr. Mata’s lawyers strongly objected, submitting a 10-page brief citing over six relevant court decisions, including Martinez v. Delta Air Lines, Zicherman v. Korean Air Lines, and Varghese v. China Southern Airlines, which discussed federal law and the tolling effect of an automatic stay on the statute of limitations.

However, there was a significant problem: neither the airline's lawyers nor the judge could locate the cited decisions or quotations from the brief.

It did not go well for the lawyer. The AI made up those cases, and the lawyer didn’t check the sources, which should be required in such a situation. AI can help with research in many cases, but we must provide human-in-the-loop oversight. That’s especially true for legal issues. AI has become increasingly helpful in addressing various legal issues, offering significant benefits and limitations.

Here’s an overview of how AI can help provide legal assistance.

Ways AI Can Help with Legal Issues

Here's an analysis of how AI can help with legal matters, discussing both practical applications and areas where it falls short:

1. Legal Research: AI can significantly enhance legal research by:

• Quickly scanning vast databases of case law, statutes, and legal documents
• Identifying relevant precedents and legal arguments
• Summarizing critical points from lengthy legal texts

This capability saves lawyers considerable time and can improve the thoroughness of research. For example, tools like Westlaw Edge (a Thomson Reuters product) use AI to provide more comprehensive and faster legal research results.

2. Document Review and Analysis

Have you ever seen those movies where the big company buries the underdog in truckloads of documents, trying to bury them with unnecessary work and hide the smoking gun? Providing the data is digitizable; AI can process vast amounts of data more quickly and accurately than human reviewers. Even if AI only serves as a second set of eyes, it’s very efficient.

• Reviewing contracts and other legal documents for errors or inconsistencies
• Identifying potential risks or areas of concern in legal agreements
• Extracting essential information from large volumes of documents during discovery

4. Automated Document Generation

This capability can significantly reduce the time spent on routine document creation, allowing lawyers to focus on more complex aspects of their work.

• Draft standard legal documents like contracts or NDAs
• Customize templates based on specific inputs
• Generate initial drafts of more complex legal documents

Ways AI is Limited or Inappropriate for Legal Issues:

1. Complex Legal Reasoning

AI cannot currently:

• Fully understand nuanced legal concepts
• Apply legal principles to novel situations
• Engage in creative legal argumentation

These limitations mean that AI cannot replace the critical thinking and judgment of experienced attorneys in complex cases.

2. Ethical Decision-Making

AI is not equipped to:

• Navigate complex ethical dilemmas in legal practice
• Understand the full context of sensitive client matters
• Make judgment calls on conflicts of interest

Ethical considerations require human oversight and cannot be fully delegated to AI systems.

3. Client Counseling and Empathy

The human element of legal practice, particularly in areas like family law or criminal defense, remains crucial and cannot be replicated by AI, where empathy and context are critical.

• Providing emotional support to clients
• Understanding the personal context of legal issues
• Building trust and rapport with clients

4. Courtroom Advocacy

AI is not capable of:

• Presenting oral arguments in court
• Responding to unexpected developments during trials
• Reading and reacting to judges and juries

The dynamic nature of courtroom proceedings requires human intuition and adaptability that AI cannot match.

5. Interpreting Ambiguous Laws

These situations require human judgment and the ability to navigate uncertainty, which AI systems lack.

• Interpreting vague or newly enacted laws
• Applying legal principles to unprecedented situations
• Balancing competing legal interests in complex cases

While AI offers significant benefits in research, document review, and routine task automation, it does not replace human legal expertise. The most effective use of AI in law is as a tool to augment and enhance the work of legal professionals, allowing them to focus on higher-level tasks that require human judgment, creativity, and empathy. As the technology evolves, legal practitioners must stay informed about AI's capabilities and limitations so that they can use it responsibly and effectively.