Hannah Payne gets chance for retrial because of AI citations, Georgia Supreme Court rules

Hannah Payne was sentenced to life in prison for the death of Kenneth Herring, who was involved in a hit-and-run crash. Payne shot Herring after an altercation when he tried to leave the scene.
Payne, who ignored 911 dispatchers’ instructions not to engage the suspect, was convicted in 2023 of felony murder and other charges and received a life sentence without parole plus an additional 13 years.
A motion for a new trial was filed by Payne, which was denied by the trial court citing the use of unsupported and non-existent legal cases in the prosecution’s brief.
State Supreme Court Justice Benjamin A. Land discovered that Deborah Leslie, the assistant district attorney, had mislabeled the citations in her brief, admitting to using AI software to draft them without proper verification.
The Georgia Supreme Court found Leslie’s conduct to violate its rules on legal citation and has thus vacated Payne’s prior sentence and sent the case back for reassessment. As a punitive measure, Leslie’s license to practice before the Supreme Court is suspended for six months, and she must complete additional ethics education.

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