Top UK civil judge says AI could decide some court cases

In short: A senior UK judge says AI could eventually be used to decide some simpler civil court disputes, but the public and lawmakers need to set limits.

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Geoffrey Vos is retiring soon as Master of the Rolls, the most senior judge in England’s civil justice system. As he leaves, he is urging an open debate about whether judges should use artificial intelligence, and how far that use should go.

Current guidance in England tells judges to keep AI to administrative work, like handling documents. Vos told WIRED that he regularly uses Microsoft Copilot to find old files quickly and to summarize long text, like having a very fast assistant who can skim a pile of paperwork.

Vos says he recently visited a court in Shenzhen, China, where judges already get heavy help from AI when deciding civil disputes. After seeing that, he thinks courts in other countries should consider similar approaches.

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Vos also pointed to risks that are already showing up. Some lawyers have been caught citing court cases that AI tools invented, and at least one UK lawyer lost the right to practice in part due to misuse of AI. Vos says more people are now using chatbots like ChatGPT, Gemini, and Claude to prepare legal claims, which may be one reason courts are seeing about a 10 percent yearly rise in new county court cases.

Vos believes AI could eventually help decide certain lower-stakes cases, such as some personal injury claims, while areas like family custody and complex business disputes may still need human judges. The key question, he says, is where society draws the line, either through consent in individual cases or through laws.

Source: Wired