Using AI in Personal Injury Cases

So, AI – a topic everyone is talking about these days, and it does have impacts on every aspect of life including the legal profession.

Here at Willis, Willis & Rizzi – with AI we are seeing that the interactions with our clients can sometimes lead to answers that don’t have any relationship with the truth. You can get an AI service – ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude, etc. – to say your case is worth any number from $0 to $10,000,000 depending on how you ask the question. Of course, these are not real answers – the real answer is somewhere in the middle.

Relying on AI for legal advice carries huge risks including the total loss of any kind of attorney-client privilege. Additionally, there is risk that AI is going to hallucinate and give an improper answer to your legal question because of the nuances of the law that may apply to your case in your jurisdiction.

Clients who may be using AI to ask questions about their case, if they’re not careful that information may come home to roost later. It’s similar to social media posts or interactions – that stuff can come into your court case. Courts are very familiar with AI at this point, and they view your interactions with an AI as just another flavor of ESI, which is Electronically Stored Information, which is discoverable in a legal case. 

For example, if we have a case and our client has been injured and we can’t get it resolved outside of court, we will have filed a lawsuit. The attorney for the big, bad insurance company has asked for our client’s ESI including interactions with ChatGPT, Gemini, etc. There is no privilege, anything you type into AI could become discoverable in court. There is no attorney-client privilege, in fact there is no privilege at all.

The key point about clients using AI is you have to understand the exact ramifications of the law on your case – and this ties into other videos and articles we have talked about on our website such as What is My Case Worth and How Long is This Going to Take.

Basically, a client is asking an AI service these questions when our own attorneys can’t answer these questions until we have filled in dozens of blanks about the particular facts and circumstances of your case, and taken into account the law controlling your case at the time and place where the accident happened.  Whether the accident happened in Ohio, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, or elsewhere, those states have different laws that apply to personal injury cases that can have a big impact on how your case will proceed and the ultimate length and value. 

Let Willis, Willis & Rizzi Help

The examples above are how clients can get into trouble a little bit by engaging AI regarding their personal injury case. Let us help! Contact Willis, Willis & Rizzi and speak directly to a personal injury attorney today who can help guide you regarding the law and how that may affect the value and length of your injury claim.