Thomas v. The Quikrete Companies, LLC
U.S. District Court, Western District of Texas, San Antonio Division · W.D. Tex. · Texas bar guidance
Verified May 5, 2026
- Citation
- Thomas v. Quikrete Cos., LLC, No. SA-23-CV-00638-FB, 2026 WL 594760 (W.D. Tex. Feb. 26, 2026)
- Decided
- February 26, 2026
Summary
In a Report and Recommendation on cross-motions for summary judgment in an FLSA collective action, Magistrate Judge Elizabeth S. ("Betsy") Chestney called out plaintiffs' counsel (Trang Quoc Tran of Tran Law Firm L.L.P., Houston) for misrepresenting the Fifth Circuit's holding in Ash v. Flowers Foods and for citing hallucinated quotations that do not appear in the Ash opinion. The footnote states that plaintiffs "blatantly misrepresent the Fifth Circuit's holding in Ash" and "manufacture or cite hallucinated quotations not appearing in the opinion."
- AI tool:
- Unspecified generative AI
What sanction did the court impose?
No monetary sanction was imposed in this order. The magistrate judge recommended granting Quikrete's motion for summary judgment and denying plaintiffs' cross-motion. The hallucination finding was published in footnote 3 of the Report and Recommendation as part of the substantive analysis, putting plaintiffs' counsel's credibility on the public record pending district court adoption.
Why does Thomas v. The Quikrete Companies, LLC matter for law firms using AI?
Thomas v. Quikrete is notable because the hallucinated quotations were not in a brief that drew a separate sanctions order, they were called out in the merits ruling itself. A magistrate judge recommending summary judgment against the plaintiffs added a footnote saying plaintiffs’ counsel manufactured or cited fake Fifth Circuit quotations in their briefing on a controlling case. For a managing partner, the lesson is that AI fabrication in a brief can become part of the published merits decision, attached permanently to the firm’s name in the Westlaw record, even without a separate Rule 11 proceeding.
Sources
Primary sources
Further reading
Source PDF is a Westlaw printout mirrored from the Damien Charlotin hallucination database. We are working to add the underlying court docket (PACER, CourtListener, or court website) as a second source.