Extract from George Socha’s article “Using AI to Prepare Complaints: Part 1, The Complaint”
Artificial intelligence tools can deliver great value at every stage of a lawsuit, something we discussed at a high level in AI Across the Life of a Lawsuit.
Today we begin to dig in more deeply, starting with how you can use AI technology to good advantage at one of the earliest steps in a new case, preparing the complaint. Because of the piece’s length, we are dividing it into two parts. Today’s part focuses on the complaint itself. The next part examines how you can use AI to do a better job of preparing the complaint.
Once again, we will use the US Federal system as our guiding framework.
In broad terms, the earliest days of a lawsuit typically can look similar to this:
- Something happens that, according to the potential plaintiff, harmed the plaintiff.
- The potential plaintiff approaches a lawyer (that’s you), hoping the lawyer will be able to deliver some form of satisfaction.
- You conduct an initial investigation to determine whether, among other things, (a) the potential plaintiff appears to have an actionable case, (b) at least one viable defendant can be sued, and (c) there is a realistic change of success.
- If the answers to these and similar questions are yes, you prepare a summons and complaint that gets served on the defendant.
- And the lawsuit begins.
There are many other steps you also will need to undertake. These include running a conflicts check, determining whether your potential client will be able to pay any necessary fees, decided whether representing this particular client could harm your representation, formally agreeing to represent the client, perhaps attempting to settle the matter before suing it out. Those are topics for another forum.
