Georgia — Deborah Leslie: six-month Supreme Court suspension
This is another unusually severe case. Deborah Leslie — Georgia Leslie was an assistant district attorney in Clayton County prosecuting the Hannah Payne murder case. She used AI in preparing legal filings. The filings…
This is another unusually severe case.
Deborah Leslie — Georgia
Leslie was an assistant district attorney in Clayton County prosecuting the Hannah Payne murder case.
She used AI in preparing legal filings.
The filings contained nonexistent cases and cases that did not support the propositions for which they were cited.
Even worse, an order substantially prepared from the State's proposed order incorporated the erroneous citations into the trial court's own ruling.
The Georgia Supreme Court consequently:
admonished Leslie;
admonished the Clayton County DA's office;
suspended Leslie's privilege to practice before the Georgia Supreme Court for six months;
required 12 additional hours of CLE in ethics, brief writing and AI;
vacated the defective trial-court order;
remanded the case for a new order.
But again, terminology matters
This is not a six-month suspension of her Georgia law license.
It is a suspension of her privilege to practice before the Georgia Supreme Court.
That's serious, but materially different from a statewide license suspension.