FL 6th Circuit (Pinellas), Family Court Section 22 only: Sixth Judicial Circuit (Pinellas…
Judge William H. Burgess, III · Sixth Judicial Circuit of Florida, Family Court Division Section 22 (Pinellas County)
Verified July 27, 2026
- Citation
- Sixth Judicial Circuit (Pinellas) Family Court Section 22 Standing Order on the Use of AI in Legal Filings
- Order date
- January 19, 2026
Summary
Superseded as of 2026-06-15. While in force, Judge Burgess's Family Section 22 standing order required an AI Disclosure and Certification Form with all pleadings and submissions.
What does the order require?
- Superseded as of 2026-06-15. While in force, Judge Burgess's Family Section 22 standing order required an AI Disclosure and Certification Form with all pleadings and submissions.
- The order's own text is no longer retrievable from any source. The detailed requirements recorded during the 2026-04-27 verification are set out in the body under a historical heading rather than asserted here, because no accessible primary source supports them today.
Practice areas: state family
What the order required
Judge William H. Burgess, III, sitting in Section 22 of the Sixth Judicial Circuit’s Family Court Division (Pinellas County), issued this standing order on January 19, 2026. It was the most thorough AI standing order located in the Florida tracker, comparable in detail to Magistrate Judge Kang’s N.D. Cal. order but adapted to a family-court setting.
Sourcing caveat, read this before relying on the detail below
The order’s text is no longer retrievable. The circuit migrated jud6.org to WordPress and dropped its entire /LegalCommunity/ tree, and the Internet Archive holds no copy: its sole crawl attempt, on 2026-06-26, recorded HTTP 403 rather than the document. Confirmed again 2026-07-28.
What follows is therefore a record of what this entry captured when the PDF was live, verified 2026-04-27, and not something a reader can open and check today. It is retained because the order governed Section 22 filings from 2026-01-19 until the statewide rule displaced it on 2026-06-15, so filings from that window were judged against it. Treat the specifics as moderate-confidence history rather than citable text, and do not quote the certification language below as though it came from an accessible source.
The one live corroboration is Judge Burgess’s practice-preferences page, which still directs filers to “complete the AI Disclosure and Certification Form per Order’s instructions.” That page confirms the order existed, its subject, and its January 2026 timing. It supports none of the individual requirements below.
Requirements as recorded on 2026-04-27
- Mandatory disclosure when AI was used for legal research reflected in text, drafting any portion, or summarizing legal sources or facts. The filing had to include a “Disclosure of Artificial Intelligence Use” identifying each tool by name (ChatGPT, Lexis+ AI, Westlaw AI were the examples given), describing the manner of use, stating whether AI text appeared directly in the document, and affirming that no confidential or privileged information had been inputted.
- A No-Use Statement where AI was not used: “I certify that no generative artificial intelligence tool was used in the preparation of this filing or submission, or in conducting research for it.”
- An accuracy certification above the signature: “I certify that I have personally reviewed this filing or submission, verified the accuracy of all legal authorities and factual assertions through traditional methods, and conducted a reasonable inquiry into the truth and accuracy of all statements herein.”
- Reliance on AI was not treated as reasonable inquiry under Fla. R. Gen. Prac. & Jud. Admin. 2.515, with Fla. Stat. section 57.105 sanctions authority invoked.
- Prohibited uses: ad hominem attacks, fabricating legal authority, facts, or evidence, harassing or voluminous filings, and expert-like medical or psychological conclusions without a qualified human source.
- Pure proofreading tools (spelling, punctuation, word choice) that did not rewrite meaning and did not expose data to open AI systems were excluded.
Two design choices stood out. The order required a No-Use Statement when AI was not used, so silence did not satisfy the rule. And it categorically rejected AI use as reasonable inquiry, tying sanctions exposure to rule 2.515 and section 57.105.
Scope and caveat
This is a single-judge order applying only to Section 22 of Pinellas County family court. The Sixth Judicial Circuit (Pinellas/Pasco) has not issued a circuit-wide AI administrative order. Practitioners with other Section assignments in the 6th Circuit should not assume the Burgess framework applies.
No longer in force
This order is superseded. Effective 2026-06-15, Florida Rule of General Practice and Judicial Administration 2.515(d)(2) requires every filer to represent that “the legal authorities identified exist and are accurately cited,” and the Florida Supreme Court’s companion administrative order AOSC26-12 directs that Florida courts “may not impose” AI disclosure or certification requirements “whether through local administrative orders, court policies, judicial practices and procedures, or other means.”
The requirements catalogued above, including the disclosure form, the no-use certification, and the AI-specific accuracy certification, are recorded here as the historical position while the order was operative. Firms filing in Pinellas family court should work from amended rule 2.515(d)(2), not from this order.
Primary source
The order’s own text is no longer retrievable. The jud6.org PDF returns 404 and no Internet Archive capture exists, so the requirements above rest on the 2026-04-27 verification of the live document.