Khan v. Howard County Board of Appeals
Appellate Court of Maryland · Md. App. Ct. · Maryland bar guidance
Conduct
Appellant's briefs cited 148 cases; at least 40 had irregularities, including five non-existent citations and many misquotations.
Consequence
Affected portions of the briefs struck; with nothing left of her argument, the court did not reach either question and affirmed.
Lesson
Here, once the defective citations were struck, the court found nothing left of the argument, a failure it held fatal under Maryland's briefing rule.
Verified September 30, 2026
- Citation
- Khan v. Howard Cnty. Bd. of Appeals, Nos. 968 & 1060, Sept. Term 2025 (Md. App. Ct. July 20, 2026) (unreported) (Zic, J.)
- Decided
- July 20, 2026
Summary
Lubna Khan brought two consolidated appeals arising from a 2022 noise complaint against a neighboring pet day care and kennel in Clarksville, Maryland: a petition for judicial review of the Howard County Board of Appeals' ruling, and a civil suit against the Board, its members, and county officials that the circuit court dismissed on quasi-judicial immunity grounds. The Appellate Court of Maryland found that "[o]f the 148 cases cited in Ms. Khan's filings to this Court, at least 40 contained a citation irregularity," and listed them. Five cited cases, the court found, do not exist, and it identified the different real case at each principal citation: for example, "Rodriguez v. Mayor & City Council of Balt., 387 Md. 1, 26 (2005)" led to Johnson v. Mayor & City Council of Balt., a firefighter-benefits case, and "Smith v. McCullough, 141 U.S. 589 (1891)" led to Marshall v. Holmes. Many others, including U.S. Supreme Court decisions such as Mathews v. Eldridge and Tumey v. Ohio, did "not contain the language that Ms. Khan purports to quote" or did "not stand for the proposition asserted." The court also noted table-of-authorities errors and quoted its rule that "[n]o different standards apply when parties appear pro se."
- AI tool:
- Unidentified (the opinion catalogs at least 40 citation irregularities, including non-existent cases and misquotations, but does not mention AI or name a tool)
- Sanction amount:
- Non-monetary: portions of the appellant's briefs struck; remaining arguments not reached
What sanction did the court impose?
In an unreported opinion by Judge Zic, the court struck the portions of Ms. Khan's briefs pertinent to each argument that depended on a defective citation, in four groups: the zoning-interpretation and evidence arguments; the arguments on jurisdiction, immunity, standing, her Fourteenth Amendment rights, ex parte communication, and civil conspiracy; defamation per se and false light; and claim splitting. It then held that nothing usable remained: "Once we strike the citations that misstate the law, misquote the cases, or cite cases that do not exist, nothing remains from which we can discern what she was arguing. This is a failure of argument, not a failure of citation form, and it is fatal under Rule 8-504(a)(6)." The court declined to reach either question presented and affirmed both circuit-court judgments, with costs to the appellant. No fine, fee award, or filing restriction was imposed.
Why does Khan v. Howard County Board of Appeals matter for law firms using AI?
Khan v. Howard County Board of Appeals shows the Appellate Court of Maryland’s strike-and-affirm approach taken to its logical end. The court counted 148 case citations across Ms. Khan’s filings and found irregularities in at least 40, then listed each one by brief and page, copied “without alteration” from her briefs. Five were cases the court found do not exist, each paired with the different real case found at the principal citation. The rest were real authorities that did not contain the quoted language or did not support the stated proposition, including Mathews v. Eldridge, Tumey v. Ohio, and a string of Maryland appellate decisions.
Rather than impose a monetary sanction, the court struck the portions of the briefs tied to each defective citation and then explained why that ended the appeal: “Ms. Khan’s citations stood in for her argument. Once we strike the citations that misstate the law, misquote the cases, or cite cases that do not exist, nothing remains from which we can discern what she was arguing.” It characterized the result as “a failure of argument, not a failure of citation form,” fatal under Maryland Rule 8-504(a)(6), and declined to reach the two recast questions presented.
The opinion does not mention artificial intelligence, and the AI attribution for this entry rests on the tracker. What it does show is that the court applied the rule that “[n]o different standards apply when parties appear pro se,” and that, once the defective citations were struck, it decided the appeal without reaching the questions presented. Firms documenting compliance may wish to consider the same risk for represented filings: where a brief’s reasoning is carried by its citations, the loss of those citations can take the argument with them.
Implications for your firm
Operational steps a firm reading this case may wish to consider documenting. Strategic and rule-application calls belong to your firm's attorneys.
- Review how a brief's argument would read with any unverified citation removed. The court held that once the defective citations were struck, the remaining text did not state an argument under Rule 8-504(a)(6).
- Verify quotations attributed to well-known authorities as closely as obscure ones. Several of the flagged misquotations were attributed to U.S. Supreme Court decisions such as Mathews v. Eldridge and Logan v. Zimmerman Brush.
- Consider that here the court identified the citation irregularities itself and disposed of the appeal on briefing grounds, without reaching the questions presented.
Sources
Primary sources
- AI attribution is a Charlotin tracker inference ('Implied'). The court's opinion does not mention artificial intelligence. The Charlotin copy is a Westlaw print whose Westlaw editor's note describes the citations as 'likely generated by AI tools'; that note is Westlaw's, not the court's.
- Pro se status on appeal is inferred: the opinion records that Ms. Khan appeared pro se at the circuit-court motions hearing and, in discussing her appellate filings, quotes the rule that 'No different standards apply when parties appear pro se.' It does not list appellate counsel, and neither the court's PDF nor the Westlaw print lists counsel for any party.