Key Takeaways
- Artificial intelligence (AI) tools have become very useful in many different mediums, but they still have limitations, especially for providing legal advice, and should not be used as a replacement for a skilled trust or probate litigation attorney.
- A human lawyer provides several things an AI tool cannot, including emotional intelligence, personalized guidance, contextual understanding of your case, and reliability.
- Generative AI tools have several limitations for replacing an attorney, such as a tendency to fabricate untrue information, a lack of human emotion and sensitivity, and an inability to fully grasp the context of a case.
- You should consult a skilled trust or probate litigation attorney if you are facing disputes after the death of a loved one and during the administration of their estate.
Introduction
The use of artificial intelligence (AI) technology has been on the rise over the last several years and is continuing to spread across industries. From quick customer service on your cell phone provider’s website to use in finance and banking, AI offers many uses.
The legal field is now no exception, with people turning to Chat GPT and related generative AI tools for legal advice and guidance, even questioning the ability to use this advice to guide the management of a case. While the idea of receiving support in drafting complex legal documents or contracts or conducting a document review may sound helpful, relying on these tools for actual legal advice is likely crossing the line.
Despite the many potential benefits of AI for enhancing human productivity, it is no replacement for experienced legal representation in estate planning or estate administration. This guide covers everything you should know about ChatGPT’s potential role in trust and probate estate litigation and why you should only turn to an experienced attorney for your legal questions.
Quick Overview of Trust Litigation and Probate Estate Litigation
Trust and probate estate litigation are complex fields with serious nuances to consider. After a person passes away, their estate and its property must be administered and distributed. How these assets are ultimately distributed depends on the decedent’s estate plan.
If the decedent created a trust, then assets will be distributed to beneficiaries according to the instructions outlined in the trust instrument. In the case that the decedent left a will, then these assets will be distributed during the probate process, which involves validating the will, paying debts and expenses, and distributing assets to beneficiaries.
If there was no estate plan in place, then the decedent’s assets will need to be distributed following the process of intestate succession, according to the terms of state intestacy laws. These laws outline the appropriate line of succession for which legal heirs stand to inherit. State laws provide a helpful roadmap, but it can be difficult to interpret how these laws might apply in unique circumstances that are not the clear-cut nuclear family.
Trust litigation and probate estate litigation arise when there is a dispute during the administration process of either of these. This may involve a disagreement with the validity of the estate plan, concerns about how the estate plan is being administered, or a disagreement about the provided inheritance.
Ultimately, many factors can affect the trust or probate administration process, requiring the support of someone who has years of experience in the legal profession with handling a variety of situations, circumstances, and family dynamics.
The Role of an Attorney in Trust and Probate Litigation
An attorney is an invaluable resource for navigating trust and probate administration and any potential disputes that can arise throughout. A trust or probate litigation attorney offers all the following to their clients.
Legal Experience and Complex Problem Solving
An attorney uses their legal background and knowledge to provide personalized advice for every case. A trust and probate litigation attorney will have a strong understanding of legal precedent in similar cases and how established statutes may apply to your situation.
A skilled attorney must take all circumstances into account to address the unique issues of the case effectively. They will be able to respond to the evidence provided by the opposing side and understand the best possible course of action forward.
Ethical Responsibilities and Client Confidentiality
An attorney has deep ethical responsibilities and client confidentiality standards to uphold in their position. At all steps of gathering information during your consultation and the carrying out of your case, they will ensure valuable information is not shared unless you allow it to be. With their passing of the bar exam and their years in school, they will have a strong understanding of the value of holding up ethics and maintain a firm commitment to doing so.
An attorney has a fiduciary duty to act in your best interests as their client, meaning that they should take every action possible to support you in your case, protect your privacy, and remain loyal to you and your wishes throughout the process. If an attorney makes mistakes or misjudgments, they can also be held accountable for these mistakes, which is important to clients and offers a level of reassurance. Meanwhile, a generative AI tool offers no recourse if it offers faulty advice or otherwise leads you astray.
Personalized Judgment and Case Strategy
An attorney can offer their personalized judgment on how to proceed in your legal matter. Legal knowledge is only a percentage of the overall legal process. A party in a case must be able to take that legal knowledge and apply it to the unique circumstances of a given case to develop a winning case strategy for successfully navigating through mediation, negotiation, or litigation.
Unlike an AI tool that relies on data and informational inputs, a human can engage in critical thinking and problem-solving to guide effective legal strategy. An attorney will take a close look at all of the factors affecting the case, including family dynamics, the terms of the estate plan, local state laws, and an understanding of the best interests of the grantor. They will then use this analysis to guide their next steps and determine the appropriate legal mechanisms at their disposal.
Limitations of Generative AI Tools in Legal Settings
The legal setting must be taken very seriously, given the sensitivity of the matters that legal decisions and their consequences involve. AI tools have the following limitations in the legal world.
Inability to Navigate Intricacies of Legal Nuances
AI is a tool that may be able to provide simple overviews or explanations for the estate planning or probate processes, but will be unable to fully understand legal nuances, how they are interpreted in courts in a practical manner, and how they may be applied to various cases. However, interpreting nuanced statutes and applying them to unique cases is something that is crucial during any form of litigation or dispute.
Generative AI tools are also inherently limited in their ability to comprehend how probate law intersects with other areas of law, including civil law, tax law, trust law, property law, and more. While it may be able to provide factual information about each area of the law, it will likely struggle to explain how these varying laws interact with one another and how they will influence the recommended next steps.
At the same time, AI tools are only as knowledgeable as the data it was trained on and what’s on the internet, if it’s a model that has access to Internet searches. Laws may change and be updated with new legislation or new lawsuits establishing new precedents. If the change to the law is not information the model has been trained on and/or it’s not available in a general Internet search, AI may miss these changes. These limitations may make it difficult for AI tools to provide accurate information and reasonable advice for your nuanced legal questions.
Lack of Emotional and Ethical Intelligence
Emotional sensitivity and ethical intelligence are crucial components of being a lawyer beyond simply having legal knowledge. While AI tools may be able to provide a response to a brief question, they will be unlikely to understand the sensitivities of your case and provide the support needed to navigate each step of the process. AI tools, being unable to understand emotional nuance, may be unable to even guide you to the appropriate support that you may need through this process, or know when it’s time to direct you to additional services that may benefit your well-being. A lawyer with experience in this area will understand the emotional nuance and be able to know when it’s time to bring in other professionals for support.
Meanwhile, an attorney will be conscious of your situation and circumstances and provide you with personalized guidance based on your case. A skilled attorney will be able to provide legal support as well as emotional support to make navigating the difficulties of your case easier.
Challenges in Adhering to Legal Standards
While an attorney is bound to strict legal standards and a rigid code of conduct, AI tools are not. As a legal standard, an attorney has a fiduciary duty to act in your best interests and advocate for you and the interests of the estate as a whole. AI tools are in no way required to act in your best interests, nor do they understand how to use the factual information in their database to apply it to your case or provide guidance on how to carry out your interests in a real-world situation.
Legal standards may also vary by state and jurisdiction, so general advice from an AI tool is unlikely to factor in the unique aspects of the law where you live. Only a real attorney can offer advice within the unique context of your jurisdiction, given their deep knowledge of local statutes, how the courts apply them, and what legal processes are necessary to navigate your case.
When you engage with a skilled attorney, they will be able to understand the necessary legal standards and processes that apply to your case and will have tangible experience navigating them in previous cases. An attorney acts as your representative in the process, using their knowledge of legal standards to advance your best interests, which AI tools will be unlikely to duplicate.
Maintaining Truthfulness
Unfortunately, ChatGPT and other AI tools can often fabricate truths, and do so quite convincingly. According to ChatGPT developer OpenAI, “ChatGPT sometimes writes plausible-sounding but incorrect answers or nonsensical answers.” Codecademy also cites ChatGPT’s tendency to create “false information” and ability to create “deceptive content” as risks and limitations of ChatGPT. Even worse, we’ve seen instances where Chat GPT will not only give incorrect information, but then double down by confirming the lie to be true.
If you’re looking for information on your attorney, opposing counsel, or a judge, or investigating claims or looking for potential evidence against an opposing party, ChatGPT can and is likely to make up information. Where a technology has the ability to lie and affirm the veracity of its mistruths, you have to independently verify anything it says.
A notable example highlighting the dangers of relying on AI for legal work occurred in New York, where two attorneys faced court sanctions after citing fake cases generated by ChatGPT in their legal filings. The AI confidently provided fabricated case law and even assured the lawyers that the citations were real and could be found on legitimate databases like LexisNexis and Westlaw. This high-profile incident underscores the risks of using AI tools without independent verification.
A resource that provides false information that can cause a person more trouble than they began with is hardly a resource at all. ChatGPT’s ability to make up case citations makes it a dangerous weapon against the person who wields it. One would be better served hiring an attorney who will check any and all citations.
Importance of Human Oversight
Legal consequences can be life-altering and have significant impacts on family dynamics or your general life circumstances, so it’s likely best that you don’t place your future into the hands of a computer. Only humans can provide the oversight and sensitivity necessary for responsible decision-making.
Nuanced Understanding of Automated Processes
Every case is different, and you must be able to consider the context and unique nuances involved in each, which only a human can do. Automated responses from AI tools are designed to take the input and provide an output. This output is generated from learning from data provided from the internet and previous client inputs. However, there is only so much you can type into a text box to receive advice, limiting the tool’s ability to understand your case and provide adequate feedback.
AI particularly struggles with interpreting case law and past rulings and how they influence legal precedent, which could lead to faulty or incomplete advice. Meanwhile, a human has the true ability to analyze all of the factors of a case, the available evidence, legal precedent, and the unique personal circumstances at play, all within the full context of the situation.
Ethical Considerations in AI Usage
Artificial intelligence does not have a license to practice law, and it has certainly not passed the bar exam, which may create ethical concerns. While an attorney has a serious obligation to uphold and preserve the privacy of their patient, AI tools are specifically designed to do the opposite. Anything entered into the chat box is used as data to inform future machine-learning efforts.
Ultimately, using AI does not have the same expectation of privacy that you would receive from the attorney-client privilege when working with a real human. Providing your personal information to an artificial intelligence may be cause for hesitation for many people.
Even if confidentiality is not an issue, a data breach might be. According to Security Intelligence, OpenAI confirmed a data breach that allowed some users to see other users’ first and last names, email addresses, payment addresses, and some credit card information. Some companies are beginning to ban the use of ChatGPT, citing security risks to their data.
Even if you delete your data and history with OpenAI, at the moment, due to a pending lawsuit with the New York Times, OpenAI has been ordered to maintain all data, even chat output deleted by the user, and that data may be subpoenaed. So, what you tell and ask ChatGPT may be gathered by the opposing party, while communicating with an attorney ensures that the person you’ve discussed this with has a duty to maintain your confidences and cannot be subpoenaed to testify against you.
AI usage also has other ethical concerns, such as environmental concerns, with 10 to 50 queries estimated to consume about two liters of water, given the water needed to cool data centers. While the environmental impact may not influence your case, it may be a factor that makes it even more worthwhile to steer clear of using AI tools for legal representation, especially when an attorney will likely only drink one glass of water during your consultation.
Ensuring Comprehensive Representation
Ultimately, there is no substitute for an attorney and the detailed legal representation they offer. Real, human attorneys provide comprehensive guidance that entails the following advantages.
The Necessity of Professional Experience
An attorney’s professional experience means that they have encountered a variety of cases and scenarios before, which gives them even more valuable context and insight into how to approach your unique circumstances. An attorney has lived experience in the legal profession that will guide them in knowing what strategies have worked in the past and which ones may not be as effective.
They will be able to advise you on the best possible course of action and guide you through the most appropriate next steps based on what they have learned, unlike ChatGPT, which would likely be a shot in the dark, based solely on information available on the internet. Only an estate or trust litigation attorney can use their experience and knowledge, as well as apply it.
Strategic Case Management by Attorneys
ChatGPT and AI tools can answer questions and offer insights into various legal concerns, but they cannot manage a case like an attorney can. An attorney will be able to review and understand the context of your case and use this context to determine the best way to manage your case. For example, they will know what evidence to look for, what the family dynamics of your case involve, and how to structure an effective argument that takes all of this into account.
Trust the Experienced Attorneys at RMO
Although generative AI is a useful tool, it is not yet equipped to handle the responsibilities of providing representation or advice in the legal profession. You should turn to a skilled probate attorney for confidence in sound legal advice and strategy when navigating trust or probate litigation disputes.
The trust and probate estate litigation attorneys at RMO Lawyers have decades of experience in navigating the ins and outs of trust and probate law. Using this experience, our attorneys will develop a winning strategy for your case and seek the best possible outcome sooner. Meanwhile, we will offer the compassion, empathy, and sensitivity to your case that AI simply can not provide.
Schedule a consultation with the team at RMO Lawyers to discuss your case and gain real human insight.
Glossary
Intestate succession – The process in which assets from a deceased individual’s estate are distributed in accordance with state law. Assets from an estate with an omitted heir will pass through the intestate succession process to determine which beneficiaries will receive what shares of assets.
Trust litigation – The process of taking legal action in court to resolve disputes, including matters related to wills, trusts, and estates. Litigation can be complex and time-consuming, often requiring legal representation to navigate the court system and advocate for the parties’ interests.
Probate litigation – Legal disputes arising from the administration of an estate, including will contests, claims of undue influence, allegations of fraud, or disputes among beneficiaries.
Probate – The court process in which the assets of an estate are gathered, accounted for, and distributed to the heirs or beneficiaries after an individual passes away, either in accordance with the deceased’s wishes if they had a will or following local intestacy laws if there was no will.
State intestacy laws – Laws governing the distribution of a decedent’s estate when no valid will exists. Intestacy laws vary by state, but they generally prioritize close relatives, such as spouses and children, in the distribution of assets.