FORT BEND COUNTY (Covering Katy News) — Texas' First Court of Appeals has denied a Fort Bend County judicial candidate's bid to remain on the November ballot — and the court's chief justice used the ruling to warn that her legal filing appeared to contain AI-generated "hallucinations" passed off as real court language.
Paula Maria Miller, a Democrat, won her primary race for Fort Bend County Court at Law No. 3 but was subsequently declared ineligible by the Fort Bend County Democratic Party after officials determined she did not comply with the residency requirement. Miller publicly challenged the ruling and vowed to remain on the ballot.
To fight her removal, Miller filed a mandamus petition — an emergency request asking a higher court to order election officials to restore her name to the ballot. The First Court of Appeals denied that request, and Chief Justice Terry Adams used a separate concurring opinion to flag a serious problem with how the petition was prepared.
Adams, joined on the panel by Justices Jennifer Caughey and Clint Morgan, said the petition contained attributions and quotations to caselaw that "strongly appear to be AI-fabricated hallucinations" — meaning language was attributed to real court decisions that those courts may never have written
Miller's campaign website says she would "bring experience, commitment, and integrity to the bench," touting more than 20 years as a Texas attorney and 16-plus years as a licensed realtor and investor.
"Filing a document in our Court with fictitious or misleading citations — whether generated by AI and not checked by a human, or otherwise — is a serious breach of candor that this Court cannot tolerate," Adams wrote.
Adams warned attorneys who use AI for legal research to always "trust and verify" — confirming that quoted language actually appears in the opinions cited and that those cases stand for the propositions attributed to them. Consequences for failing to do so, he wrote, could include having the offending brief stricken and referral of the attorney to the State Bar of Texas for disciplinary proceedings.
With Miller now exhausting her legal options, Fort Bend County Democrats say they will move to fill the vacancy on the ticket. Party Chairwoman Jennifer Cantu said in a statement this week that "the FBCDP County Executive Committee will hold a vacancy election to determine the party's nominee for the November general election on or after June 15, 2026."