Jamaica: Practice Direction No. 1 of 2025, generative AI in court proceedings

Status

• 17 Sep 2025Dated, signed and in effect. Remains in force “until otherwise varied or revoked”. Subject to periodic review, para 9.1.
• ReachAll divisions of the Supreme Court of Judicature of Jamaica, the Revenue Court, the High Court Division of the Gun Court and the Circuit Court Division of the Gun Court, para 1.1.

Who and what it covers

• PeopleAttorneys-at-law, parties, self-represented litigants and other persons involved in proceedings.
• HallucinationDefined in the instrument, para 2.4: output “that contains information that is fabricated, inaccurate, or misleading, despite being presented in a linguistically coherent and seemingly credible manner”. Few practice directions define the word.
• GenAISoftware or tools that produce text, images, code or other content in response to human input, open-source and proprietary, including large language models, para 2.3.

What it requires

• ReviewPara 3.1: documents generated in whole or in part with GenAI “must be thoroughly reviewed, verified, and approved by the party or attorney submitting them”.
• AccuracyPara 3.2: must be fact-checked and legally accurate; must not contain fabricated case law, misapplied authorities or hallucinations; must not include confidential or privileged material submitted to unsecured platforms.
• Not alonePara 3.3: no reliance solely on GenAI for legal analysis or citation without confirming the validity of the authorities. Para 3.4: outputs must not be “relied upon blindly”.
• No AI evidencePara 4.1: GenAI must not draft or alter affidavits or witness statements, generate expert evidence, create or modify material to be tendered in evidence unless the Court authorises it, generate documents purporting to be originals, or generate images unless expressly requested, explained and approved by the Court.
• No invented lawPara 4.1.vi: GenAI must not generate invented case law, statutory provisions, legal principles, facts or “any information that is not independently verified”.
• No false likenessPara 4.1.vii: GenAI must not “generate images or avatars that falsely present or imply an accurate likeness of the user or any other person for the purpose of joining any virtual conference, meetings and/or hearings before Judges, Masters, Registrars, and Deputy Registrars”. An identity rule inside a court direction.
• Due diligencePara 5.1: understand the tool’s capabilities and limitations, keep processed data confidential, maintain professional responsibility for everything filed. Para 5.2: GenAI does not relieve the duty of candour and diligence to the Court.
• DeclarePara 6.1: where any part of a document was prepared using GenAI, the party or attorney shall include the Appendix declaration. Para 6.2: the Court may direct further particulars of the use.
• The formThe Appendix, in full: “I confirm that the following portions of this document were prepared with the assistance of [Name of Tool] (version [ ]), a Generative Artificial Intelligence application. I further confirm that all information, citations, and representations made therein have been independently verified by the undersigned.” Signed and dated.
• JudgesPara 8.1: judicial officers may consider AI-assisted materials only to the extent they meet the Court’s evidentiary and procedural standards.

What non-compliance costs

• The documentPara 7.1: refusal to admit it into evidence, or disregarding the submission in part or in whole.
• CostsAny order as to costs or other sanction the circumstances warrant.
• ContemptPara 7.2: non-compliance “may constitute contempt of court”.
• The licenceReferral of an attorney-at-law to the Disciplinary Committee of the General Legal Council.

Why it is on this list

The Appendix is the closest form on this record to a verification record. It names the tool, names the version, identifies the portions the tool touched, and has a named person confirm independent verification over a signature and a date. That is four of the facts an outsider needs. What it still cannot show is what the person checked, against what, and when, because a form records a promise and not the work.

Two provisions are unusual enough to note on their own. The direction defines “hallucination” in its own text, so the word carries a fixed meaning before the Court. And para 4.1.vii treats a generated likeness in a virtual hearing as a distinct prohibited act, which makes it an identity provision inside a court rule rather than a privacy statute.

Read with the Caribbean Court of Justice direction of February 2025, which reserves the power to require court users to demonstrate how their verification was conducted, the region now has the duty, the declaration and the reserved right to see the proof. The layer that would let anyone see it is the subject of its own page.

Sources

• Supreme Court of Jamaica, Practice Direction No. 1 of 2025, the Court’s own PDF, six pages
• Supreme Court of Jamaica, the direction’s page, dated 17 September 2025

Related

• The law library · AI rules by country · The Caribbean
• Caribbean Court of Justice, Practice Direction No. 1 of 2025, the reserved right to see how the verification was done
• Ireland, Practice Direction HC 142, the declaration on affidavits and expert reports
• Verification is becoming a duty. Evidence of verification is the missing layer.
• The sanctions record

Checked against the source 7 September 2026: the Court’s own PDF on supremecourt.gov.jm, SHA-256 b75ef908…202ba75, read in full. Information, not legal advice.