A Massachusetts courtroom overseeing litigation tied to the Harvard Medical School body-parts scandal has now become the latest battleground in the legal profession’s uneasy relationship with artificial intelligence.
A judge in Boston has refused to allow a senior attorney from powerhouse injury law firm Morgan & Morgan to participate in the ongoing lawsuits against Harvard Medical School after the lawyer was previously sanctioned for submitting court filings that included fabricated legal citations produced by AI.
Suffolk County Superior Court Judge Kenneth Salinger ruled that attorney T. Michael Morgan failed to demonstrate that he had corrected the practices that led to the earlier controversy. The judge described the incident as a breakdown of core professional obligations expected from attorneys appearing before the court.
Morgan had sought permission to appear in the Massachusetts litigation as an out-of-state lawyer. But the judge said the application offered no meaningful reassurance that safeguards had been put in place to prevent future submissions containing invented legal authorities.
The ruling intensifies scrutiny on how lawyers are using generative AI tools inside courtrooms across the United States. While attorneys are free to use AI for research and drafting assistance, judges nationwide have increasingly warned that lawyers remain fully responsible for verifying every citation, argument and filing submitted under their names.
A spokesperson for Morgan & Morgan said the firm hopes the court revisits the decision. According to the firm, Morgan previously acknowledged the earlier filing errors and introduced additional internal checks governing AI use inside the practice.
The Harvard-related lawsuits stem from a disturbing criminal case involving former morgue manager Cedric Lodge, who was accused of stealing and trafficking body parts taken from cadavers donated to the university’s medical program. Families have since filed multiple lawsuits accusing Harvard of failing to properly safeguard the remains of loved ones entrusted to the institution.
Lodge was sentenced late last year to eight years in prison after prosecutors said he sold stolen human remains through an underground network. Harvard has condemned his conduct but has denied civil liability in the lawsuits brought by victims’ families.
The controversy surrounding Morgan traces back to a separate federal lawsuit in Wyoming involving Walmart. In that matter, a judge fined Morgan and other attorneys after court filings referenced several legal cases that did not actually exist. The citations were later determined to have been generated by an AI platform.
Although another lawyer drafted the filings, the Wyoming court found Morgan failed to properly review the submissions before signing and filing them.
Judge Salinger sharply criticized that lapse, writing that senior lawyers carry the same responsibility as junior attorneys to ensure court papers are accurate and supported by legitimate legal precedent.
The judge also pointed to procedural mistakes in Morgan’s Massachusetts application, including filing issues tied to local court rules and incorrect fee submissions. According to the ruling, those additional errors reinforced concerns that the attorney had not fully absorbed the lessons from the earlier AI citation scandal.
The Massachusetts case continues as families pursue claims alleging mishandling of donated remains by Harvard’s medical program.
