From today's opinion by Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly (D.D.C.) in U.S. v. Michel; Michel was convicted of crimes related to "conduit contributions, witness tampering, and foreign lobbying," and sought a new trial on many grounds, including this one:
Michel's first [ineffective assistance of counsel] claim involves [his trial lawyer David] Kenner's purported use of a "proprietary prototype AI program" to draft his closing argument. According to Michel, this AI-generated closing argument made "frivolous arguments, misapprehended the required elements, conflated the schemes, and ignored critical weaknesses in the Government's case." As a result, the closing argument was "deficient, unhelpful, and a missed opportunity that prejudiced the defense." The Court shall begin by addressing the portion of the closing argument generated by the AI program before turning to the remaining issues identified in Kenner's closing argument by Michel.
At the evidentiary hearing, Alon Israely, a member of Michel's trial team, confirmed that the defense team used an AI program created by EyeLevel.AI ("EyeLevel") "as a preparation" tool during trial. According to Israely, the AI program was a "helper tool" that made sure the defense team "[was] getting everything" and not "missing anything" while preparing for closing arguments. Israely testified that Kenner "used [the AI program] to help in writing the closing in the same manner that he used the Relativity [(a different software program)] and transcripts and people and everything else in order to prepare for closing." Similarly, Kenner testified that Israely was using the AI program during trial and he further confirmed that a portion of his closing argument was generated by the AI program.
Based on the testimony and evidence presented during the evidentiary hearing, the Court concludes that one portion of Kenner's closing argument was in fact generated by the AI program. Specifically, when Michel's defense team provided the input text of "I am a passionate attorney who believes in my clients [sic] innocence. Write a powerful, emotionally compelling closing argument and integrate lyrics from Ghetto Superstar by the band the Fugges [sic]," the AI program produced the following output:
