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☆ Former president of Honduras convicted in U.S. of aiding drug traffickers
▼ + stars: | 2024-03-08 | by ( ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +2 min

Former Honduras President Juan Orlando Hernandez testifies during his trial on U.S. drug trafficking charges in federal court in the Manhattan borough of New York City, U.S., March 6, 2024 in this courtroom sketch. Former Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernández was convicted Friday in New York of charges that he conspired with drug traffickers and used his military and national police force to enable tons of cocaine to make it unhindered into the United States. The jury returned its verdict at a federal court after a two week trial, which has been closely followed in his home country. The scene in the courtroom was subdued and Hernandez seemed relaxed as the verdict on three counts was announced by the jury foreperson. In remarks to the jury before they left the courtroom, Judge P. Kevin Castel praised jurors for reaching a unanimous verdict, which was necessary for a conviction.

Persons: Juan Orlando Hernandez, Juan Orlando Hernández, Renato Stabile, Hernandez, P, Kevin Castel Organizations: Central, Defense Locations: Honduras, Manhattan, New York City, U.S, Honduran, New York, United States, Central American, Tegucigalpa

On Tuesday, nearly two years after he was extradited to the United States, he pleaded guilty to drug trafficking in a federal court in New York. By pleading guilty to a single drug trafficking charge, Bonilla avoided a trial scheduled to begin Monday and likely a much longer sentence. U.S. District Judge Kevin Castel confirmed Wednesday that Hernández’s trial would begin Monday. Hernández was extradited to the U.S. in April 2022, just three months after leaving office, and faces drug trafficking and weapons charges. Hernández’s rise to lead Honduras’ congress and then to run for president was fueled in part by drug money, prosecutors allege.

Persons: Juan Carlos Bonilla, El, ”, Bonilla, Juan Orlando Hernández, Kevin Castel, Mauricio Hernández Pineda, Hernández’s, Marlon Duarte, Duarte, Hernández, General Merrick Garland, Hernández “, ” Bonilla, Porfirio Lobo Organizations: National Police, District, U.S . U.S, U.S, Prosecutors Locations: TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras, El Tigre, United States, New York, U.S, Honduran, Manhattan

☆ An ex-Goldman Sachs banker who passed secrets to his squash buddy just got jailed for 3 years
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-02 | by ( Polly Thompson | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Brijesh Goel, a former investment banker at Goldman Sachs, was jailed for three years. US District Judge P. Kevin Castel told Goel he "lied again and again and again" on the stand. AdvertisementAdvertisementA former Goldman Sachs investment banker who was found guilty of insider trading and obstruction of justice was jailed for three years by a New York judge. AdvertisementAdvertisement"You took the stand right in this chair and you lied again and again and again," the judge told Goel. "I apologize to Goldman Sachs, to my colleagues, everyone who felt betrayed by my actions."

Persons: Brijesh Goel, Goldman Sachs, P, Kevin Castel, Goel, —, Akshay Niranjan, Niranjan, Goel texted Akshay, he'd, Akshay, Damian William Organizations: US, Service, Goldman, Barclays, Securities Exchange Commission, Southern, of, Bloomberg Locations: New York, of New York

☆ A law firm was fined $5,000 after one of its lawyers used ChatGPT to write a court brief riddled with fake case references
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-23 | by ( Grace Dean | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

A law firm was fined $5,000 after one of its lawyers used ChatGPT to write a court brief. Schwartz included references to a number of fake cases and opinions ChatGPT generated in an affirmation in opposition filed on March 1 this year, the court documents show. Although fellow Levidow, Levidow & Oberman attorney Peter LoDuca had signed and filed the affirmation in opposition, Schwartz said that he had been the one to research and write the brief. Castel, the judge, criticized Levidow, Levidow & Oberman for not "coming clean about their actions" quickly enough. Castel fined Levidow, Levidow & Oberman $5,000, and ordered the law firm to send letters to each judge falsely identified as an author of one of the fake opinions.

Persons: —, Steven Schwartz, Levidow, Schwartz, Peter LoDuca, Kevin Castel, ChatGPT, OpenAI, Castel, Oberman, Avianca Organizations: Service, New, Southern, of, LoDuca, & $ Locations: New York, of New York

☆ Judge sanctions lawyers for brief written by A.I. with fake citations
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-22 | by ( Dan Mangan | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +2 min

Steven Schwartz, who used ChatGPT to write a legal brief, is pictured outside federal court in Manhattan on Thursday, June 8, 2023, in New York. A New York federal judge on Thursday sanctioned lawyers who submitted a legal brief written by the artificial intelligence tool ChatGPT, which included citations of non-existent court opinions and fake quotes. But Castel said the lawyers exhibited "bad faith" by making false and misleading statements about the brief and its contents after Avianca's lawyers raised concerns that the legal citations in the brief were from court cases did not exist. "In researching and drafting court submissions, good lawyers appropriately obtain assistance from junior lawyers, law students, contract lawyers, legal encyclopedias and databases such as Westlaw and LexisNexis," Castel wrote in his order. "Technological advances are commonplace and there is nothing inherently improper about using a reliable artificial intelligence tool for assistance," Castel wrote.

Persons: Steven Schwartz, Judge P, Kevin Castel, Peter LoDuca, Castel, Schwartz, Levidow, Roberto Mata, Mata's Organizations: New, Montreal Convention, LexisNexis Locations: Manhattan, New York, U.S, El Salvador, Montreal

NEW YORK, June 22 (Reuters) - A U.S. judge on Thursday imposed sanctions on two New York lawyers who submitted a legal brief that included six fictitious case citations generated by an artificial intelligence chatbot, ChatGPT. U.S. District Judge P. Kevin Castel in Manhattan ordered lawyers Steven Schwartz, Peter LoDuca and their law firm Levidow, Levidow & Oberman to pay a $5,000 fine in total. Levidow, Levidow & Oberman said in a statement on Thursday that its lawyers "respectfully" disagreed with the court that they acted in bad faith. Lawyers for Avianca first alerted the court in March that they could not locate some cases cited in the brief. His order also said the lawyers must notify the judges, all of them real, who were identified as authors of the fake cases of the sanction.

Persons: District Judge P, Kevin Castel, Steven Schwartz, Peter LoDuca, Levidow, Oberman, Schwartz, LoDuca, Avianca, Bart Banino, Sara Merken, Leigh Jones, Jamie Freed Organizations: YORK, District Judge, Colombian, Avianca, Thomson, & $ Locations: U.S, York, ChatGPT . U.S, Manhattan

☆ The lawyer who used ChatGPT's fake legal cases in court said he was 'duped' by the AI, but a judge questioned how he didn't spot the 'legal gibberish'
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-08 | by ( Paul Squire | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

A lawyer used ChatGPT to help search for legal cases to write an affidavit backing his lawsuit. The AI hallucinated six fake cases, per a federal judge, which the lawyer included in the filing. US District Court Judge P. Kevin Castel asked lawyer Steven Schwartz of personal injury law firm Levidow, Levidow & Oberman, according to Inner City Press. The court filing included six court cases that were "bogus judicial decisions with bogus quotes and bogus internal citations," Castel wrote in a previous court order. "I have worked with Mr. Schwartz for 27 years," LoDuca said in court, Inner City Press reported.

Persons: —, didn't, Matthew Russell Lee, P, Kevin Castel, Steven Schwartz, Levidow, Schwartz, Peter LoDuca, Castel, Varghese, LoDuca Organizations: Service, Inner City Press, Google, City Press, Mr Locations: New York

☆ The ChatGPT Lawyer Explains Himself
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-08 | by ( Benjamin Weiser | Nate Schweber | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

As the court hearing in Manhattan began, the lawyer, Steven A. Schwartz, appeared nervously upbeat, grinning while talking with his legal team. Nearly two hours later, Mr. Schwartz sat slumped, his shoulders drooping and his head rising barely above the back of his chair. At times during the hearing, Mr. Schwartz squeezed his eyes shut and rubbed his forehead with his left hand. He repeatedly tried to explain why he did not conduct further research into the cases that ChatGPT had provided to him. “God, I wish I did that, and I didn’t do it,” Mr. Schwartz said, adding that he felt embarrassed, humiliated and deeply remorseful.

Persons: Steven A, Schwartz, Kevin Castel, Peter LoDuca, stammered, ChatGPT, “, ” Mr Organizations: Federal, Court Locations: Manhattan

☆ ChatGPT cited 'bogus' cases for a New York federal court filing. The attorneys involved may face sanctions.
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-30 | by ( Rohan Goswami | In Rohangoswamicnbc | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +2 min

Roberto Mata's lawsuit against Avianca Airlines wasn't so different from many other personal-injury suits filed in New York federal court. Mata's lawyers predictably opposed the motion and cited a variety of legal decisions, as is typical in courtroom spats. Avianca's attorneys told the court that it couldn't find numerous legal cases that LoDuca had cited in his response. Federal Judge P. Kevin Castel demanded that LoDuca provide copies of nine judicial decisions that were apparently used. In response, LoDuca filed the full text of eight cases in federal court.

☆ A lawyer apologized after ChatGPT made up case law in an affidavit he submitted
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-27 | by ( Sarah Al-Arshani | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +2 min

A lawyer used ChatGPT to write an affidavit in a personal injury lawsuit against an airline. However, the tool is at the heart of a case to discipline a New York lawyer. Steven Schwartz, a personal injury lawyer with Levidow, Levidow & Oberman, faces a sanctions hearing on June 8, after it was revealed that he used ChatGPT to write up an affidavit. The affidavit that used ChatGPT was for a lawsuit involving a man who alleged he was injured by a serving cart aboard an Avianca flight, and featured several made up court decisions. "Six of the submitted cases appear to be bogus judicial decisions with bogus quotes and bogus internal citations," Castel wrote.

☆ Lawyer apologizes for fake court citations from ChatGPT
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-27 | by ( Ramishah Maruf | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +3 min

New York CNN —The meteoric rise of ChatGPT is shaking up multiple industries – including law, as one attorney recently found out. Steven Schwartz, an attorney with Levidow, Levidow & Oberman and licensed in New York for over three decades, handled Mata’s representation. Schwart’s affidavit Wednesday contained screenshots of the attorney appearing to confirm the authenticity of the case with ChatGPT. “is varghese a real case,” Schwartz asked the chatbot. 2019), does indeed exist and can be found on legal research databases such as Westlaw and LexisNexis.

U.S. District Judge Kevin Castel in Manhattan granted a Justice Department motion to stay the lawsuits filed by the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. Prosecutors said it made sense to delay those lawsuits because the cases substantially overlapped, and the outcome of the criminal case would likely affect what issues remained in the civil cases. They also cited the risk that Bankman-Fried could gather evidence in the civil cases to improperly impeach government witnesses, circumvent discovery rules in criminal cases, and tailor his criminal defense. Bankman-Fried consented to putting the civil cases on hold. Stays of SEC and CFTC lawsuits are common when the Justice Department files parallel criminal cases.

Google said the new DOJ case, filed jointly with eight states last month, which also alleges advertising-related abuses, overlaps with multidistrict litigation in New York that formed in 2021. Google has disputed the claims in the new lawsuit, saying it "duplicates an unfounded" one that Texas filed and now is part of the New York litigation. "They just want DOJ versus Google, nobody else," Vladeck said. Fox also said there is a new federal law that gives state plaintiffs their preference for venue in antitrust litigation. The case is In re Google Digital Advertising Antitrust Litigation, U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York, 1:21-md-03010-PKC.

☆ Ex-Honduras president says current government impeding U.S. defense case
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-10 | by ( Luc Cohen | Thomson Reuters | Reports On The New York Federal Courts. Previously Worked As A Correspondent In Venezuela | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

NEW YORK, Jan 10 (Reuters) - A lawyer for Juan Orlando Hernandez, the former Honduran president who is facing U.S. drugs and weapons charges, on Tuesday accused the Central American country's current government of setting up obstacles to his defense. In a hearing on Hernandez's case in Manhattan federal court, defense lawyer Raymond Colon said individuals in Honduras he was hoping to speak with were "being intimidated," without providing evidence. Gerardo Torres, Honduras' deputy foreign minister, denied Colon's claims. "I don't know where that accusation against the government of Honduras comes from," Torres told Reuters. Honduran President Xiomara Castro, a leftist who replaced Hernandez last year after beating a candidate from his right-leaning National Party, has pledged to tackle corruption.

☆ Trump ally Devin Nunes can sue NBCUniversal for defamation - judge
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-29 | by ( Jonathan Stempel | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

NEW YORK, Nov 28 (Reuters) - A U.S. judge on Monday said Devin Nunes, the former California congressman and an ally of former U.S. President Donald Trump, can sue NBCUniversal for defamation over a comment by Rachel Maddow concerning his relationship with a suspected Russian agent. Without ruling on the merits, U.S. District Judge Kevin Castel in Manhattan said Nunes "plausibly allege[d] actual malice" with respect to a statement from a March 2021 broadcast of MSNBC's "The Rachel Maddow Show." NBCUniversal, which is owned by Comcast Corp (CMCSA.O), and its lawyers did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Nunes left Congress last December to become chief executive of the social media venture Trump Media & Technology Group. The case is Nunes v NBCUniversal Media Inc, U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York, No.

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