Bartholomew v. Public Utility Commission of Oregon (Mar. 6, 2026)

IN THE COURT OF APPEALS OF THE STATE OF OREGON

In the Matter of Portland General Electric Company, Petition for Certificate of Public

Convenience and Necessity.

Kelly Bartholomew,

Petitioner,

v.

Public Utility Commission of Oregon and Portland General Electric Company (PGE),

Respondents.

Public Utility Commission of Oregon No. Order No. 25-125

Court of Appeals No. A187294

By order dated March 6, 2026, the court directed petitioner to show cause why this judicial review proceeding should not be dismissed and/or monetary sanctions imposed on her given the inclusion of at least 10 fabricated case citations in petitioner’s opening brief. All parties have filed responses and, after the responses to the show cause order were filed, on March 25, 2026, petitioner also filed a motion to dismiss the judicial review proceeding.

As the court explained in Ringo v. Colquhoun Design Studio, LLC, 345 Or App 301, 303, 582 P3d 695 (2025), the submission of fabricated legal authority to the court—including fake authority that is likely the result of artificial intelligence (AI)—is sanctionable conduct under ORCP 17 C and ORAP 1.40(4). See also Powell v. Employment Dept., 347 Or App 55, 58-59, ___ P3d ___ (2026) (a pro se party submitting fabricated legal authority violates ORCP 17 C and ORAP 1.40(4) and the court may impose sanctions against the pro se party). Under ORAP 1.20(2), “[t]he court on its own motion or on motion of a party may strike, with or without leave to refile, any brief * * * that does not conform to applicable statutes or these rules.” See Ringo, 345 Or App at 306 (striking the respondent’s answering brief that contained two fabricated case citations and one false statement of law).

The relevant facts are as follows. Petitioner filed the opening brief in this judicial review proceeding on December 22, 2025. Then, on January 15, 2026, PUC moved the court to order petitioner to show cause why the opening brief should not be stricken based on the inclusion of fabricated authority. In its motion, PUC identified 10 cases cited in petitioner’s brief that PUC’s counsel “could not confirm the existence of.” PUC proposed that it was appropriate to strike petitioner’s opening brief. PGE joined in support of PUC’s motion requesting a show cause order.

In response to the motions, petitioner argued that no sanctions were warranted. In particular, she asserted that “[a]ny citation defects can * * * be addressed through less drastic means - such as disregarding the challenged references - without imposing the extraordinary sanction of striking the brief or dismissing the appeal” and that because “[r]espondents have shown neither prejudice nor misconduct, the Motion for Order to Show Cause should be denied, and the appeal should proceed on the merits.” Petitioner argued that “[a]ppellate practice does not treat good-faith, correctable citation issues as grounds for striking an entire brief where the authorities have been corrected, legal propositions are accurately stated, and the Court’s ability to resolve the merits is unaffected” and that those circumstances were present in her case, so as not to warrant sanctions. In particular, petitioner asserted that: she had “litigated this matter pro se against a state agency with extensive institutional support and a large public utility” and had “presented substantive legal arguments to the best of her ability as a self-represented litigant navigating a complex administrative and appellate process”; “[a]t no time did Petitioner act in bad-faith or intentionally mislead the Court”; and that “upon receipt of [PUC’s] motion, Petitioner undertook a comprehensive, citation-by-citation review of the challenged authorities.” According to petitioner, “[e]ven if the Court were to strike or disregard every disputed citation, the remaining authorities and the administrative record independently support Petitioner’s claims.” Petitioner further stated that she had attached an “appendix” to her response “[f]or the Court’s convenience” that “summarizes the challenged citations, the nature of the issue identified, and the corrective action taken.” Apparently, in petitioner’s view, the action of filing the response with the “appendix” should have been sufficient to remedy the problematic brief and allow the case to proceed without any sanctions against her.

The court entered its order striking the opening brief on March 6, 2026, and, in that order, provided petitioner another opportunity to address her conduct by ordering her to show cause why the judicial review proceeding should not be dismissed and/or monetary sanctions imposed on her.

Although petitioner now moves to dismiss this judicial review proceeding, she filed an initial response to the show cause order in which she opposed the imposition of sanctions, including dismissal. Based on the arguments raised in her motion to dismiss, as well as the fact that the court proposed to impose monetary sanctions, it remains appropriate to consider petitioner’s initial response to the court’s show cause order. In the response, petitioner argued that: (1) her conduct is not sanctionable under ORCP 17; (2) the “discrepanc[ies]” identified are “citation error[s]” that resulted from her use of “secondary sources”; (3) and she is “a self-represented member of the affected community” with “no experience preparing legal briefs or navigating appellate procedure”; (4) “[r]espondents have not identified any assignment of error that depends on a disputed citation for its viability”; (5) the court should accept a proposed amended opening brief, in which she cites only three cases instead of the more than 20 cases cited in her stricken opening brief; and (6) even with the omission of the cases from her brief, her arguments on judicial review remain adequate for the court’s review.

While petitioner’s position in her response to the show cause was nearly identical to the initial arguments she raised in opposition to respondents’ motions identifying the fabrications, it changed in one relevant way. Petitioner, for the first time, offered an apology: “Petitioner respectfully apologizes to the Court for the citation inaccuracies that appeared in the briefing and regrets any time the Court and the parties were required to spend identifying those errors.” Despite that apology, however, petitioner still failed to acknowledge the egregiousness of her conduct and, instead, continued to minimize it.

Nothing in petitioner’s response to the show cause order demonstrates, even an attempt at, transparency. Petitioner continued to avoid explaining how any of the fabricated case citations came to be, despite the fact that they are clearly the type of fake legal authority fabricated by artificial intelligence (AI) that the court has recently sanctioned. See Ringo, 345 Or App 301; Powell, 347 Or App 55. Petitioner attached to her response to the show cause order a copy of an email correspondence between herself and an assistant at the Law Library of Clackamas County, which demonstrate that petitioner had informed the library assistant that the case citations came from petitioner’s use of AI. Despite the emails, in her response to the show cause order petitioner maintained her vague argument that she used “secondary sources” to draft the brief. The court agrees with PGE that “to the extent that Petitioner’s non-existent citations resulted from the use of artificial intelligence (AI), she did not rely on a secondary source” and that petitioner’s “lack of transparency and candor should bear on the court’s decision” in this case. See Ringo, 345 Or App at 306-07 (the response to the show cause order “does not even supply a clear explanation as to how this happened” and “[t]he lack of a forthright explanation gives the court little reason to think that the conduct will not recur, absent sanctions”).

Further, regardless of how the fabricated authorities came to be, petitioner’s response to the show cause order is unsatisfactory. The response misses the entire reason the court issued the order: to address petitioner’s submission of materials to the court that do not exist. In response to the show cause order, petitioner maintained that her conduct in this case is not sanctionable under ORCP 17. In particular, petitioner asserted that “[s]anctions in Oregon appellate practice are reserved for circumstances involving bad faith, intentional misrepresentation, or abuse of the judicial process. None of those circumstances are present here.” Petitioner stated that “the brief was filed following what she believed to be a reasonable inquiry under the circumstances, consistent with ORCP 17, based on publicly available resources.” Despite petitioner’s contentions, in order to sanction a party under ORCP 17, the court need not find that the party acted in bad faith or with an intent to misrepresent or to mislead the court. See Ringo, 345 Or App 301; Powell, 347 Or App 55. Whether or not a party is self-represented on appeal, the party must still inform herself of and comply with court rules. See, e.g., id. at 59. Here, the court does not find that petitioner acted in bad faith or with intent to mislead or misrepresent, but that does not end the analysis.

Petitioner’s arguments in her response to the show cause order demonstrate not only a lack of acknowledgment of the egregiousness of her conduct, but also an attempt at minimizing it. Fake citations and untrue propositions of law permeated petitioner’s now-stricken opening brief. The brief originally contained citations to about 25 cases, at least ten of the case citations were entirely fabricated, fabricated cases were cited in support of multiple incorrect legal propositions, and each of petitioner’s three assignments of error relied on fabricated authority. Petitioner’s submission of a proposed, amended opening brief that omitted all but three of the cases demonstrates petitioner’s original position that deleting the citations would be sufficient to allow the appeal to proceed without other edits and without any sanctions against her. Similarly, petitioner argued that the strength of the merits of her case outweigh the submission of fabricated legal authority. Again, such an argument misses the point of the show cause order: to allow petitioner an opportunity to elucidate the court on her conduct and why the proposed sanctions should not be imposed based on that conduct. The court will not engage with the merits of the case when determining the level of sanctions to impose against petitioner. Further, petitioner’s suggestion that the court should place a burden on respondents, as the parties that identified the fabricated legal authority, to demonstrate how particular arguments “depend[ ] on a disputed citation” before considering the submission of the fabricated citations sanctionable is inappropriate.

Petitioner’s discussion of one of the fabricated cases illustrates her attempt to minimize her conduct. In the court’s show cause order, it had identified one of the false citations as “McKay Creek Valley Ass’n v. Washington County, 309 Or App 112, 124-25, 482 P3d 827 (2021).” In response to the show cause order, petitioner argued that she had actually intended to cite the existing opinion McKay Creek Valley Assn. v. Washington County, 116 Or App 299, 841 P2d 651 (1992), rev den, 317 Or 396 (1993). No citation to McKay Creek Valley Assn.—either the fake case or the real case— appears in petitioner’s proposed amended brief. Petitioner uses the citation as an “example” of the corrections she made to her opening brief, arguing that it is one of the cases that is “not necessary to the legal argument.” Petitioner contended that the “discrepancy reflects a citation error.” Petitioner’s argument is not plausible. As is clear, the citations in the fake case and the real case are entirely different, as are the years. Further, the real case, McKay Creek Valley Assn., 116 Or App 299, has nothing to do with the proposition for which petitioner relied on it in the stricken opening brief: That “bare assertions and generalized statements, without supporting factual evidence, do not constitute substantial evidence.” Petitioner’s attempt to cast her use of that fabricated law as a simple citation error is merely another example of her failure to truly address the issue outlined in the court’s order to show cause.

After submitting her response to the show cause order, on March 25, 2026, petitioner filed a motion to dismiss this judicial review and requested that the court “discharge its Order to Show Cause without monetary sanctions and without any finding that Petitioner acted in bad faith, engaged in misconduct, or intended to mislead the court.” As discussed above, the court does not find that petitioner acted in bad faith or intended to mislead the court. However, to the extent that petitioner’s motion is an

attempt to avoid having the court address the circumstances discussed above, it is not well taken. The conduct at issue in this case is sanctionable. However, the court observes that, in the motion, petitioner now appears to acknowledge that the issues in her filings were a result of using “AI-assisted research tools.”

Under the circumstances, the court agrees with petitioner that dismissal is appropriate here. Given that the judicial review is being dismissed, the court declines to impose monetary sanctions in this case.

Judicial review dismissed.

Theresa Kidd

Appellate Commissioner

4/6/2026

DESIGNATION OF PREVAILING PARTY AND AWARD OF COSTS Prevailing party: Respondents Costs: No costs allowed

c: Kelly Bartholomew

Jordan R. Schoonover

Jocelyn Claire Pease

Jordan R Silk

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