{"id":160846,"date":"2026-08-18T16:20:07","date_gmt":"2026-08-19T00:20:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/2026\/08\/18\/judicial-immunity-still-applies-even-if-the-judge-let-ai-decide-the-case\/"},"modified":"2026-08-18T16:20:07","modified_gmt":"2026-08-19T00:20:07","slug":"judicial-immunity-still-applies-even-if-the-judge-let-ai-decide-the-case","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/2026\/08\/18\/judicial-immunity-still-applies-even-if-the-judge-let-ai-decide-the-case\/","title":{"rendered":"Judicial Immunity Still Applies Even If The Judge Let AI Decide The Case"},"content":{"rendered":"

To be clear, the judge probably did not let AI decide this case. The plaintiff sued Nevada family court judge Mari Parlad\u00e9, accusing her of farming out her opinion to AI based on the judge reading from a prepared script, stumbling over a word while reading it, and accidentally uttering \u201cappearance of any impartiality\u201d when reading \u201cappearance of impropriety.\u201d<\/p>\n

That\u2019s not particularly robust gruel. <\/p>\n

But in any event, Judge Gloria Navarro of the District of Nevada dismissed the case<\/a>, determining that the federal court doesn\u2019t even need to reach the substance of Judge Parlad\u00e9\u2019s alleged AI use because judicial immunity would apply even if the judge relied \u201cwholly on artificial intelligence\u201d to issue a ruling. A judicial act is a judicial act.<\/p>\n

\"\"
<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Professor Eugene Volokh flagged the decision<\/a>, noting that while even complete AI reliance can become an issue on appeal or give rise to disciplinary proceedings, this case stands for the proposition that it cannot escape the fact that choosing to use AI \u2014 even if that happened here \u2014 would be a judge\u2019s decision and therefore shielded from federal liability.<\/p>\n

The four-factor test asks if the act is a normal judicial function, if the events occurred in the judge\u2019s chambers, if the controversy centered around the case pending before the judge, and if the events at issue arose out of confrontation with the judge in his or her official capacity. Nothing about that test precludes a judge from deciding that it\u2019s reasonable to schedule a Claude cron job to clear the docket. It would be ill-advised, just as it\u2019s professionally suspect to hand over the entire civil docket to clerks<\/a>, but it\u2019s still a choice within the scope of the judge\u2019s\u2026 well, judgment.<\/p>\n

When two federal judges issued orders with fabricated quotes<\/a>, it took a Senate Judiciary Committee inquiry<\/a> to shake loose the admission that an intern used ChatGPT and a clerk used Perplexity. That triggered professional embarrassment, but it did not open the judges up to a collateral lawsuit.<\/p>\n

But, again, there\u2019s not much to suggest the judge in this case actually used AI \u2014 much less delegated the whole case to the wisdom of the bots. From the complaint<\/a>:<\/p>\n

\n

Notably, on Aug. 15, 2023, the judge read aloud from a prepared script\u2014which tends to suggest A.I. use. More notable still, while reading aloud, the judge stumbled over the words\u2014which suggests the judge is not the author of the prose read aloud in court that day, which again, tends to suggest A.I. use.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Judges have read from prepared remarks since before the invention of movable type. And they\u2019ve botched those dramatic readings for just as long.<\/p>\n

The complaint characterizes the misspoken \u201cappearance of any impartiality\u201d as \u201ca classic, Freudian slip-of-the-tongue, A.I. style.\u201d But since AI is not saddled with an Oedipal complex \u2014 as far as we can tell \u2014 anything \u201cFreudian\u201d would tend to point to a human author. AI can hallucinate, but it would not screw up impropriety and impartiality in that context.<\/p>\n

There are more allegations and they\u2019re all equally dubious. <\/p>\n

This is not the first time the plaintiff \u2014 a California-licensed attorney appearing pro se here \u2014 brought a federal suit against the people running his state family court case. According to Magistrate Judge Nancy Koppe\u2019s report, it\u2019s at least his tenth challenge<\/a>, with a record of \u201csuccess in none of them.\u201d <\/p>\n

In any event, of all the reasons not to hand over judicial rulings to AI, fear of a lawsuit isn\u2019t one of them.<\/p>\n

P.S. I still think Justice Roboto was robbed in our Law Revue contest.<\/em><\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n
\n

\"Headshot\"Joe Patrice<\/a>\u00a0is a senior editor at Above the Law and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer<\/a>. Feel free to\u00a0email<\/a> any tips, questions, or comments. Follow him on\u00a0Twitter<\/a>\u00a0or Bluesky<\/a> if you\u2019re interested in law, politics, and a healthy dose of college sports news.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

The post Judicial Immunity Still Applies Even If The Judge Let AI Decide The Case<\/a> appeared first on Above the Law<\/a>.<\/p>\n

To be clear, the judge probably did not let AI decide this case. The plaintiff sued Nevada family court judge Mari Parlad\u00e9, accusing her of farming out her opinion to AI based on the judge reading from a prepared script, stumbling over a word while reading it, and accidentally uttering \u201cappearance of any impartiality\u201d when reading \u201cappearance of impropriety.\u201d<\/p>\n

That\u2019s not particularly robust gruel. <\/p>\n

But in any event, Judge Gloria Navarro of the District of Nevada dismissed the case<\/a>, determining that the federal court doesn\u2019t even need to reach the substance of Judge Parlad\u00e9\u2019s alleged AI use because judicial immunity would apply even if the judge relied \u201cwholly on artificial intelligence\u201d to issue a ruling. A judicial act is a judicial act.<\/p>\n

\"\"
<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Professor Eugene Volokh flagged the decision<\/a>, noting that while even complete AI reliance can become an issue on appeal or give rise to disciplinary proceedings, this case stands for the proposition that it cannot escape the fact that choosing to use AI \u2014 even if that happened here \u2014 would be a judge\u2019s decision and therefore shielded from federal liability.<\/p>\n

The four-factor test asks if the act is a normal judicial function, if the events occurred in the judge\u2019s chambers, if the controversy centered around the case pending before the judge, and if the events at issue arose out of confrontation with the judge in his or her official capacity. Nothing about that test precludes a judge from deciding that it\u2019s reasonable to schedule a Claude cron job to clear the docket. It would be ill-advised, just as it\u2019s professionally suspect to hand over the entire civil docket to clerks<\/a>, but it\u2019s still a choice within the scope of the judge\u2019s\u2026 well, judgment.<\/p>\n

When two federal judges issued orders with fabricated quotes<\/a>, it took a Senate Judiciary Committee inquiry<\/a> to shake loose the admission that an intern used ChatGPT and a clerk used Perplexity. That triggered professional embarrassment, but it did not open the judges up to a collateral lawsuit.<\/p>\n

But, again, there\u2019s not much to suggest the judge in this case actually used AI \u2014 much less delegated the whole case to the wisdom of the bots. From the complaint<\/a>:<\/p>\n

\n

Notably, on Aug. 15, 2023, the judge read aloud from a prepared script\u2014which tends to suggest A.I. use. More notable still, while reading aloud, the judge stumbled over the words\u2014which suggests the judge is not the author of the prose read aloud in court that day, which again, tends to suggest A.I. use.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Judges have read from prepared remarks since before the invention of movable type. And they\u2019ve botched those dramatic readings for just as long.<\/p>\n

The complaint characterizes the misspoken \u201cappearance of any impartiality\u201d as \u201ca classic, Freudian slip-of-the-tongue, A.I. style.\u201d But since AI is not saddled with an Oedipal complex \u2014 as far as we can tell \u2014 anything \u201cFreudian\u201d would tend to point to a human author. AI can hallucinate, but it would not screw up impropriety and impartiality in that context.<\/p>\n

There are more allegations and they\u2019re all equally dubious. <\/p>\n

This is not the first time the plaintiff \u2014 a California-licensed attorney appearing pro se here \u2014 brought a federal suit against the people running his state family court case. According to Magistrate Judge Nancy Koppe\u2019s report, it\u2019s at least his tenth challenge<\/a>, with a record of \u201csuccess in none of them.\u201d <\/p>\n

In any event, of all the reasons not to hand over judicial rulings to AI, fear of a lawsuit isn\u2019t one of them.<\/p>\n

P.S. I still think Justice Roboto was robbed in our Law Revue contest.<\/em><\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n
\n

\"Headshot\"Joe Patrice<\/a>\u00a0is a senior editor at Above the Law and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer<\/a>. Feel free to\u00a0email<\/a> any tips, questions, or comments. Follow him on\u00a0Twitter<\/a>\u00a0or Bluesky<\/a> if you\u2019re interested in law, politics, and a healthy dose of college sports news.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

The post Judicial Immunity Still Applies Even If The Judge Let AI Decide The Case<\/a> appeared first on Above the Law<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

To be clear, the judge probably did not let AI decide this case. The plaintiff sued Nevada family court judge Mari Parlad\u00e9, accusing her of farming out her opinion to AI based on the judge reading from a prepared script, stumbling over a word while reading it, and accidentally uttering \u201cappearance of any impartiality\u201d when […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":160847,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-160846","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-above_the_law"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/xira.com\/p\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/Headshot-300x200-Lh8H4n.jpg?fit=300%2C200&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/160846","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=160846"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/160846\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/160847"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=160846"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=160846"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=160846"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}