Full Opinion

DISTRICT COURT OF APPEAL OF THE STATE OF FLORIDA FOURTH DISTRICT KID INTERNATIONAL, LLC, a Florida limited liability company, LICHI, LLC, a Florida limited liability company, and YARON KATZ, an individual, Appellants, v. CITY NATIONAL BANK OF FLORIDA, and 2655 SW 25, LLC, a Florida limited liability company, Appellees. No. 4D2025-2599 [October 7, 2026] Appeal from the Circuit Court for the Seventeenth Judicial Circuit, Broward County; Jeffrey R. Levenson, Judge; L.T. Case No. 062024CA012184AXXXCE. Winsor Daniel Jr., of The Daniel Firm, Weston, for appellants. Christopher B. Spuches of Lynx Law PLLC, Coral Gables, for appellees. SHAW, J. The plaintiffs appeal from the final summary judgment entered for the defendants. This case boils down to one issue: whether the circuit court correctly determined that the plaintiffs’ claims were barred by the statute of limitations. The record and applicable case law establish the circuit court was correct. Accordingly, we affirm without further discussion. We now address the defendants’ motion for sanctions against the plaintiffs and their counsel. Therein, the defendants state that the plaintiffs repeatedly cited to fabricated case law, both in the lower tribunal and in their initial brief, misrepresented the holdings of actual cases, and included fictional quotations from actual cases. The defendants note that this conduct compelled them to waste valuable time and money searching for cases that did not exist or reviewing cases which had no bearing on the issues on appeal. As a result, the defendants request that we grant their sanctions motion and award their reasonable attorney’s fees and costs. Our opinion will focus on the plaintiffs’ initial brief filed here, not the plaintiffs’ conduct in the circuit court. 1 Our independent review confirms that the plaintiffs’ initial brief contained the following errors: (i) relying heavily on a federal case involving the same defendant bank, City National Bank of Florida v. Louisiana Apple, LLC, No. 24-CV-23285, 2024 WL 4212910 (S.D. Fla. Sept. 17, 2024), to falsely assert (including with fictional quotations) that the defendant bank made various admissions impacting this case; 2 (ii) citing a hallucinated case, Ogilvie v. Sebring Airport Authority, 841 So. 2d 529 (Fla. 2d DCA 2003), seven times and including a fictional quotation from this non- existent case; (iii) citing Mansolillo v. Parties by Lynn, Inc., 173 So. 3d 112 (Fla. 4th DCA 2015), for a legal proposition and including a quotation from that case, even though that case has a different citation, came from a different court, was entered in a different year, did not stand for the proposition cited, and did not include the quotation; (iv) attributing a quote to Seaboard Air Line Railroad Co. v. Holt, 92 So. 2d 169, 170–71 (Fla. 1956), which does not appear in the opinion; and (v) relying heavily on Silvestrone v. Edell, 721 So. 2d 1173 (Fla. 1998), for several propositions which are not accurately excerpted from the opinion. Because of these fabricated references to non-existent cases and inaccurately cited legal authorities, we issued an order to the plaintiffs to show cause why we should not strike the initial brief or impose other sanctions. See Order to Show Cause, Kid Int’l, LLC v. City Nat’l Bank of Fla., No. 4D2025-2599 (Fla. 4th DCA Aug. 7, 2024) (unreported) (citing Fla. R. App. P. 9.410(a) and In re Amends. to Fla. R. Gen. Prac. & Jud. Admin. 2.515, 435 So. 3d 5, 6 (Fla. 2026) (amending rule 2.515(d)(2) to provide that a court may impose sanctions after providing the signer with “notice and an opportunity to be heard[,]” and to specify that “sanctions may include . . . striking of the document . . . or other sanctions”)). The plaintiffs filed a timely response. Therein, the plaintiffs’ counsel 1 In the circuit court, the plaintiffs (proceeding pro se) commenced this action with a complaint that contained extensive citation errors, presumably from the use of artificial intelligence when drafting the complaint. The pro se complaint cited thirty-two cases total—fifteen were non-existent cases, two were accurately cited but misstated the holding, fourteen were inaccurately cited and contained misstated holdings, and only one of which was accurately cited with the correct holding. The defendants moved to dismiss the complaint, and the plaintiffs subsequently filed an amended complaint (through an attorney) which did not contain those hallucinated or inaccurately cited legal authorities. 2 The plaintiffs go so far as to argue that the federal case “is devastating to [the defendant bank’s] position.” 2 acknowledged the seriousness of the issues which we had identified and admitted that the initial brief “contained legal authorities, citations, quotations, and/or characterizations that were not adequately verified before filing.” He continued, “[c]ertain authorities did not exist as cited, while other citations or propositions attributed to authorities were inaccurate.” Ultimately, he fully accepted responsibility for these issues. The plaintiffs’ counsel also explained how the errors occurred. He stated that, in an effort to manage his work efficiently and control litigation expense, he accepted his client’s offer to assist by providing research materials and authorities for his consideration (unaware at the time of the citation issues in the plaintiffs’ initial complaint). Additionally, counsel’s law firm incorporated generative artificial-intelligence (“AI”) technology as one component of the legal research and drafting process. Ultimately, counsel concluded that the initial brief’s errors occurred because his “verification process failed to identify before filing that certain authorities did not exist, were inaccurately cited, or did not support the propositions attributed[.]” Counsel stated that after we brought the citation issues to his attention, he attempted to correct the problem. He sought permission to replace the initial brief with an amended brief (though, alas, as counsel admitted, the amended brief did not resolve all the citation issues). He also represented that he has changed his legal research and drafting procedures to ensure that legal authorities relied upon in court filings are independently located and checked against authoritative legal sources before filing. Based on counsel’s response to the order to show cause, we decided to proceed with the initial brief as filed, while disregarding the hallucinated citations and quotations, as well as the misrepresented holdings. See Friend v. Serpa, 425 So. 3d 51, 51 (Fla. 4th DCA 2025) (“Such phantom authority cannot assist any litigant and must be expressly disregarded by this court.”). As stated above, we affirm without discussing the merits. But there is still the matter of the defendants’ motion for sanctions. Recent cases have established that a party’s submission of hallucinated and inaccurately cited case law is sanctionable. See Francois v. Vive Fin., LLC, 433 So. 3d 795, 795 (Fla. 4th DCA 2026) (“The submission of fictitious or fabricated case law—whether the product of carelessness, misunderstanding, or reliance on generative artificial-intelligence tools— is sanctionable.”) (collecting cases); Eclectic Synergy, LLC v. Seredin, 435 So. 3d 1074, 1077–79 (Fla. 4th DCA 2026) (sanctioning attorney, who had filed a petition that misstated the law and cited to non-existent caselaw, with referral to The Florida Bar); Clerk of Ct. & Comptroller for 13th Jud. 3 Cir., Hillsborough Cnty. v. Rangel, 427 So. 3d 1069, 1071 (Fla. 2d DCA 2025) (deeming sanctions against attorney were proper where the answer brief contained one hallucinated case citation, fourteen fabricated quotations from real cases, and misstated court holdings in nine cited cases). While these cases involved an appellate court’s own authority to sanction a party under Florida Rule of Appellate Procedure 9.410(a), we conclude that their reasoning should be extended to cases such as this one, where a party moves for attorney’s fees as a sanction pursuant to Florida Rule of Appellate Procedure 9.410(b) (2026). As noted by Judge Matthewman in the United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida, “counsel who decide to enter a case to litigate must ensure that they carefully evaluate, elucidate, and advocate— not hallucinate.” Versant Funding LLC v. Teras Breakbulk Ocean Navigation Enters., LLC, No. 17-CV-81140, 2025 WL 1440351, at *7 (S.D. Fla. May 20, 2025). In Versant Funding LLC, the trial court awarded the plaintiff all reasonable attorney’s fees and costs incurred by its counsel for the time spent researching and replying to a response that contained one hallucinated citation. Id. Here, as admitted by the plaintiffs in their response to the order to show cause, the initial brief—which was drafted with the assistance of AI and input from the plaintiffs—contained hallucinated cases, fabricated quotations from real cases, and cases that did not stand for the proposition cited. Given the foregoing, we grant the defendants’ motion for sanctions and award defendants their reasonable attorney’s fees incurred in litigating this appeal. On remand, the circuit court shall set the amount of the reasonable attorney’s fees to be awarded for this appellate case. If a motion for rehearing is filed in this court, then services rendered in connection with the filing of the motion, including, but not limited to, preparation of a responsive pleading, shall be considered in computing the amount of the fees. The plaintiffs and their counsel shall be jointly and severally liable for the payment of this award. Affirmed; motion for sanctions granted; remanded with directions. GERBER, C.J., and LOTT, J., concur. * * * Not final until disposition of timely-filed motion for rehearing. 4