Mau v. City and County of Honolulu
U.S. District Court, District of Hawaii (Senior Judge Curiel sitting by visiting designation from S.D. Cal.) · D. Haw. · Hawaii bar guidance
Conduct
Tanaka's counsel cited four nonexistent cases plus five misrepresented holdings in motion to dismiss and reply.
Consequence
OSC issued 1/30/26; Feb 24 follow-on orders pending RECAP retrieval; counsel moved to withdraw same week as OSC response.
Lesson
First D. Haw. AI-citation OSC; Curiel sat by visiting designation but applied the same Rule 11 inventory standard.
Verified May 7, 2026
- Citation
- Mau v. City & Cnty. of Honolulu, No. 1:24-cv-00253-GPC-WRP, ECF Nos. 194, 221, 222 (D. Haw. Jan. 30 / Feb. 24, 2026) (Curiel, S.J., sitting by designation)
- Filing date
- February 24, 2026
Summary
Defendant Sheri Jean Tanaka filed a motion to dismiss the second amended complaint on November 14, 2025, and a reply on January 6, 2026, both drafted by her counsel Eric R. Maier and Crystal Gail K. Glendon and Kelli K. Lee Ponce. Senior District Judge Gonzalo P. Curiel, sitting by visiting designation from S.D. Cal. for this specific case under 28 U.S.C. § 292(b), issued a January 30, 2026 Order to Show Cause finding that Tanaka's counsel had cited four cases that "are not identifiable by their Westlaw citations and for those with case numbers, the Court is unable [to] locate them in the respective court's local Electronic Court Filing System" (Kekona v. Abastillas, In re Facebook Inc., Ritchie v. Hawaii, and Kema v. Pentagen Techs.). The OSC also documented five additional cases that were real but cited for propositions they did not support (Au v. Au; Ramirez v. Cnty. of San Bernardino; Hoang v. Bank of Am.; Kendall v. Visa U.S.A.; Levitt v. Yelp! Inc.). Tanaka's counsel filed declarations responding to the OSC on February 13, 2026.
- AI tool:
- Implied (court cited Wadsworth v. Walmart for the proposition that 'AI Hallucinations occur when an AI database generates fake sources of information')
What is the current procedural posture?
The Order to Show Cause directed Tanaka's attorneys to (1) provide true and accurate copies of the four nonexistent cases or, failing that, "a detailed explanation for how the fake citations/cases were generated and each attorney's role in drafting, checking and verifying case citation or supervising the motion"; (2) explain the citation of the five real but mis-applied cases; and (3) show cause why sanctions should not issue under Rule 11(b), (c) and the court's inherent power. Two further orders entered February 24, 2026 (ECF Nos. 221 and 222) addressed the matter; the substantive disposition of those orders is pending PACER retrieval. Counsel Eric R. Maier and Glendon & Ponce LLLC moved to withdraw as Tanaka's attorneys on February 13, 2026, with hearings set for March 27, 2026 before Judge Curiel.
Why does Mau v. City and County of Honolulu matter for law firms using AI?
Mau is the first published Order to Show Cause for AI-fabricated citations on the District of Hawaii docket, issued by Senior Judge Curiel of the Southern District of California sitting by visiting designation under 28 U.S.C. § 292(b). The OSC’s value is in its specificity: the court itemizes four citations that are wholly nonexistent (no docket, no Westlaw record, no opinion file in the cited court’s ECF system) and a separate five real cases cited for propositions they do not support. That two-track inventory is rapidly becoming the standard form for AI-citation OSCs across federal district courts, and Curiel’s January 30, 2026 order is now part of the canonical example set.
The procedural posture is unusual in two ways. First, the case sits on the District of Hawaii docket because Mau, a former Mitsunaga & Associates employee turned government witness in the Kaneshiro corruption trials, sued in Honolulu; but every Hawaii district judge recused, leading to Curiel’s designation in June 2024. Second, Tanaka was represented by both Maier and Glendon & Ponce LLLC, and both teams responded to the OSC. Within two weeks of the OSC, both teams moved to withdraw as Tanaka’s counsel, with hearings scheduled before Judge Curiel on March 27, 2026. The February 24, 2026 orders (ECF Nos. 221 and 222) appear to address the OSC’s outcome, but their text is PACER-only as of this verification pass and the substantive disposition (sanction amount, bar referral, or no-sanction) is not confirmed from a primary source. For Hawaii practitioners, the OSC alone establishes the AI-citation framework Curiel will apply; the disposition will determine whether Hawaii joins the monetary-sanction tier or remains in the warning-and-cure tier.
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.
- The OSC's enumerated list (four fake cases plus five misrepresented holdings) is the template for how D. Haw. (and Curiel personally, when sitting elsewhere) frames AI-citation findings: name the citations, name the misrepresentations, demand a per-attorney accounting.
- Tanaka's counsel withdrawing the same week as the OSC response is itself a data point: AI-citation OSCs trigger conflict and supervisory-failure review that can fracture the representation team.
- Visiting-judge designations under 28 U.S.C. § 292(b) keep the home-judge's procedural reflexes; firms should not assume D. Haw. cases drawing a non-Hawaii judge will follow Ninth Circuit AI-citation patterns more leniently than the home circuit.
Sources
Primary sources
- The substantive content of the February 24, 2026 orders (ECF Nos. 221 and 222) is not in the RECAP collection as of 2026-05-07; both are PACER-paywalled. The conduct findings, including the four nonexistent citations and five misrepresented citations, are confirmed from the January 30, 2026 OSC (ECF No. 194), which is in RECAP. The disposition (sanction yes/no, against which attorney, what amount, what bar referral if any) is pending RECAP upload or PACER retrieval.
- Whether the February 24 orders are the operative sanctions ruling or instead set further proceedings is not confirmable without the order text.