The sanctions record · Nova Scotia Court of Appeal, 2026
Arbuckle v. Tanner
Arbuckle v. Tanner, 2026 NSCA 62, CA 549893 (Halifax) · decision of Gogan, J.A., in Chambers, 12 August 2026; motion heard 6 August
Page verified 26 August 2026. Quotations are from the court’s written decision, linked below.
A self-represented appellant used AI tools to compile his appeal book, including the trial transcripts. The filed transcripts carried a real court transcriber’s certification: her name, her Nova Scotia registration number, her signature. She confirmed she had not transcribed or certified either one. The appeal was dismissed with $20,000 in costs.
The record
- CourtNova Scotia Court of Appeal, in Chambers
- JudgeGogan, J.A.
- FileCA 549893, Halifax
- Decision12 August 2026, written; motion heard 6 August
- RuleCivil Procedure Rule 90.29(5): transcripts must be prepared by a certified court reporter
- Discrepancies39, identified by opposing counsel against the transcriber’s actual certified transcript
- OutcomeAppeal dismissed
- Costs$20,000 on an indemnification basis, Rule 90.40(4)
What the court held
“Non-compliance well disguised as compliance.”
The appellant told the court he had not instructed the tool to do it: the AI platform, in his account, “pulled Ms. Loney’s certificate of court transcriber page and appended her name, NS registration number and signature”. The decision also quotes the court’s own policy, “Use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in Proceedings before the Nova Scotia Court of Appeal”.
Why it matters
Most matters on this record involve citations that do not exist. This one involves a court record that appeared fully compliant: a real person’s name, a real registration number, a real signature, attached to transcripts that person never made. The visible markers of certification were present. The certification itself was not.
Whether the appellant instructed the tool did not decide the outcome. The filed record did not comply with Rule 90.29(5), and the costs award followed the expense the other side incurred proving it.
The lesson for the next filing
A name, a number and a signature on a document are claims about who stood behind it. This record shows those markers appearing without the authorization they represent, and the cost of discovering that the hard way: 39 discrepancies found by hand, against the certified original. A sealed record made by the person who actually did the work answers the question before opposing counsel has to.
Sources
Related
- The full sanctions record
- Zhang v. Chen, the earlier Canadian citations matter
- Ko v. Li
- HumanMark: observed creation facts
Checked 26 August 2026 against the court’s written decision, read in full. Information, not legal advice.
Information, not legal advice. Every entry is verified against the court’s own document or contemporaneous reporting; where a source is reporting rather than the document, we say so.