The passages in which the court addresses the fabricated authority, verbatim, by document. A bracketed ellipsis marks where a passage was cut for length; nothing else is changed.
Docket entry 60, 28 September 2026 · source · PDF · 3 pages
Docket text. ORDER supplementing our November 26, 2025 sanctions order and setting the dollar amount of the Rule 11 sanction against attorney Jason Castro. By December 31, 2026, attorney Jason Castro must file a notice of compliance confirming payment of $6,720 to Leafwell or its counsel, as Leafwell may direct. Leafwell's fee motion (Doc. 45) is denied as moot. Signed by Magistrate Judge Nicholas P. Mizell on 9/28/2026. (NPM)
37). In particular, he filed a motion that contained fabricated citations, citations that do not contain quoted language, and citations that do not relate to the purported proposition. (Doc.
2 Leafwell filed a twenty-page memorandum in response to the TRO motion. Six of its forty -seven paragraphs were devoted to discussing the fictitious citations; the rest (including six footnotes) responded to the substance of the motion and would have been prepared 2 Pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 636(b)(1)(A), setting the dollar amount of the Rule 11 sanction is referred to the assigned magistrate judge for resolution. 3 and filed regardless.
Docket entry 39, 5 December 2025 · source · PDF · 20 pages
Docket text. MOTION for Reconsideration re 37 Order on Motion for Leave to File Document, Order on Motion to Request Oral Argument, Order on Motion to Strike, Order on Motion for Sanctions by The Doc App, Inc.. (Castro, Jason) (Entered: 12/05/2025)
First, while the TRO contained inaccurate citations and mis -paraphrased language, all of the authorities invoked were, in fact, existing decisions of real courts. The motion did not rely on imaginary or wholly fabricated cases. The failure was in how existing cases were researched, transcribed, and checked—serious failures, but of a different character than inventing cases out of whole cloth or submitting AI - generated “opinions” that do not exist in any reporter.
Docket entry 37, 26 November 2025 · source · PDF · 16 pages
Docket text. ORDER denying as moot 32 Motion for Leave to File Document; denying as moot 33 Motion to Request Oral Argument; denying as moot 34 Motion to Strike; denying as moot 26 Motion for Sanctions. (1) Pursuant to Rule 11, Jason Castro is ORDERED to pay the attorneys' fees for defense counsel in this case for all time spent responding to the Motion for TRO. (2) If Jason Castro files any case in or removes any case to the Middle District of Florida within the next two years of the date of this Order, he must attach a copy of this Order to his Complaint or Notice of Removal. (3) Jason Castro is DIRECTED to attend an in-person Florida CLE concerning legal ethics and artificial intelligence by January 30, 2026. He must file a certificate of completion on the docket by February 20, 2026. (4) Jason Castro is DIRECTED to send a copy of this Order to Nick Garulay, Chief Executive Officer of Plaintiff The Doc App, Inc. By December 7, 2025, Mr. Castro must file on the docket a notarized affidavit from Mr. Garulay confirming he has read the Order. (5) Attorney Jason Castro is HEREBY REFERRED to the Florida Bar for appropriate discipline. (6) The Clerk is DIRECTED to transmit the entire record in this case to the Florida Bar. Finally, Plaintiff has filed a Notice of Voluntary Dismissal Without Prejudice (Doc. 31). The Notice is self-executing. See Fed. R. Civ. P. 41(a)(1)(A)(i). Accordingly, the Clerk is now DIRECTED to deny all pending motions as moot, terminate any deadlines, and close the case. SEE ORDER FOR DETAILS AND DEADLINES. Signed by Judge Sheri Polster Chappell on 11/26/2025. (SEJ) (Entered: 11/26/2025)
Worse, Mr. Castro included in the motion “two completely fabricated cases, four purported quotes to cases that do not contain anything resembling those quotes, and six instances where [Plaintiff] cites to cases that have nothing whatsoever to do with the stated proposition.” (Id. at 1). Two days later, Plaintiff withdrew the Motion for TRO.
Castro violated Rule 11(b) in filing the Motion for TRO and imposes sanctions. His motion contained fabricated citations, citations that do not contain quoted language, and citations that do not relate to the purported proposition . See Versant Funding LLC v.
1994)). “Citing imprecise, non-existent legal authority breaches [a litigant’s] duty of candor.” United States v. Stephens, No.
Docket entry 32, 11 November 2025 · source · PDF · 5 pages
Docket text. MOTION for Leave to File Reply Brief to Plaintiff's Response to Order to Show Cause (ECF No. 30) and Leave to Broaden Defendant's Prior Request for Sanctions by Leafwell, Inc. (Arenas Stafford, Jody) (Entered: 11/11/2025)
25 at 3. The same day, Leafwell filed a motion for sanctions, seeking sanctions – including dismissal with prejudice – as a result of MFG’s misconduct 2 related to, and arising from, the submission of false or fictitious citations. D.E.
The following examples illustrate MFG’s continued misconduct in bad faith: First, Mr. Castro is remarkably doubling down on his use of fabricated case law, claiming his misconduct is simply the result of “citation-formatting errors” and that the two hallucinated cases do exist and do support MFG’s assertions. D.E.
Docket entry 30, 10 November 2025 · source · PDF · 16 pages
Docket text. RESPONSE TO ORDER TO SHOW CAUSE re 25 Order to show cause filed by The Doc App, Inc.. (Attachments: # 1 Exhibit, # 2 Exhibit, # 3 Exhibit, # 4 Exhibit, # 5 Exhibit, # 6 Exhibit)(Castro, Jason) (Entered: 11/10/2025)
I own what is mine: two citation-formatting errors and two paraphrases that kept quotation marks. None of the authorities w ere fabricated; each exists . The challenged cases are referenced herein as Exhibits A, B, C, and D.
No ambiguity exists , as I respectfully and emphatically state: The suggestion of attorney Jody A. Stafford that I fabricated legal authority is false. Every case cited in Plaintiff’s motion exists.
3 1. Allegation: That two cases were completely fabricated cases. Court’s Concern: The OSC identifies Henson v.
07-80382-CIV. While the citation error is regrettable, it is not a fabrication . See, Exhibit A.
Pressley supports the proposition for which it was cited, and a true copy is referenced as Exhibit B. So, there is no ambiguity, undersigned counsel represents that neither case was fabricated. Both are verifiable and relevant .
The Court’s concern, understandably heightened by Defendant’s claims, was based on what now clearly appears to be a mischaracterization of the record. A clear result of a failure to meet and confer prior to making allegations of misconduct against a fellow member of the bar. ‘Troubling’ is the word I think that best describes the conduct of opposing counsel, who accused me of fabricating case law without once attempting to contact me or resolve the issue informally. This failure to confer, especially after I included a direct invitation to confer on whether Defendant’s conduct violates Plaintiff’s Response to Order to Show Cause pg.
That is transparent housekeeping, not evasion. Defendant’s filing was overly presumptive—treating an inability to locate authorities as proof they did not exist, grading the brief like a seminar exercise, and leaping to “lack of candor” accusations. That is not how the practice of law is supposed to work; verification and conferral come before accusations.
What is not acceptable is leaping from an inability to locate a case to an accusation that the Plaintiff’s Response to Order to Show Cause pg. 10 case does not exist, then grafting on bar -referral threats and demands for dismissal with prejudice. That rush to judgment says more about process than principle.