Connecticut: A Family/Matrimonial: High Net Worth Overview

Artificial Intelligence and Connecticut Family Law in 2026: What Litigants and Counsel Should Know

Generative artificial intelligence has moved quickly from novelty to habit, and matrimonial litigation is not exempt from this phenomenon. The same tools that might answer a question in seconds for a client, or draft a motion for their attorney, can also introduce unexpected complications into the matter.

There are two issues that should be considered by anyone facing a divorce or a complex matrimonial dispute in Connecticut. The first is confidentiality. When a client feeds sensitive information into a consumer AI platform, the law may stop protecting it and privilege may be lost. The second issue is candour. When a lawyer files a brief built on authority that AI invented, the lawyer is going to face serious consequences. Both problems have already surfaced in Connecticut courtrooms and in the federal courts whose rulings govern cases tried here.

Consumer AI and the loss of privilege

Does the attorney–client privilege protect information a client types into a public AI platform? On 10 February 2026, Judge Jed S. Rakoff of the Southern District of New York said no. His opinion in United States v Heppner treated the question as one of first impression. Heppner was a criminal case, but the reasoning also applies to civil litigation.

In Heppner, the defendant expected to be indicted. On his own initiative, he used a consumer AI tool to gauge his exposure. He entered information his lawyers had given him and shared it with them. The court found none of the information was protected and privilege did not attach. The court reasoned that an AI platform is not a lawyer. The platform’s privacy policy said it could keep and share whatever users typed, which erased any expectation of confidentiality. Additionally, the defendant was not seeking legal advice from the tool to begin with. The court also found that the work-product doctrine did not apply, since a client’s own unsupervised research is not the lawyer’s mental process.

The court also made it clear that privilege cannot be created after the fact. If a communication was exposed when it was made, forwarding it to an attorney later does not seal it back up.

This applies in matrimonial litigation more than the original criminal setting might suggest. Cases built on closely held companies, trusts, executive pay or hard-to-value investments generate mountains of confidential material, and the clients with the most to protect are often the most comfortable using technology to manage it. Upload a forensic accounting report, a sworn financial affidavit or an email from your lawyer, and under Heppner you may have handed that material to a company whose terms let it store and reuse the data. That can be a waiver of privilege.

There was one important qualification in Heppner. The court suggested the result might change where a lawyer directs the client’s use of the tool, so that the platform acts as the lawyer’s agent. That places a premium on speaking with counsel first.

Fabricated citations reach Connecticut’s courts

If Heppner shows what damage a client can do to their own case, a recent Connecticut case demonstrates how lawyers can also sustain self-inflicted damage. In June 2026, the Connecticut Supreme Court took up the problem for the first time. It ordered a Wallingford firm and one of its attorneys to explain why they should not be sanctioned for putting AI-generated misstatements of law in front of the justices. The bad citations sat inside appellate briefs the firm had filed on behalf of a client. The errors were brought to the court’s attention. The lawyers admitted they had failed to check their citations, and the court told them to set out exactly how the software was used and what, if anything, they had done to verify what it produced. The final outcome has not yet been determined as of the publication date of this article.

Connecticut’s state courts have already responded with a new rule governing the use of AI in submissions to the court. Practice Book Section 4-9, entitled “Generative Artificial Intelligence (‘Generative AI’) Compliance”, went into effect in June 2026. This amendment states, in relevant part:

“Due to the risk that generative AI can create inaccurate factual and legal information, including, without limitation, faulty citations to legal authority, fabricated quotations from such authority, and inaccurate or fabricated evidence, any person who uses generative AI in the creation or editing of any document filed with the court shall independently verify all citations, legal authorities or evidence produced by generative AI.

The failure to do so may result in court-imposed sanctions, including, without limitation, the entry of a nonsuit or default judgment.

(c) Any person who files documents with the court represents that they have reviewed this rule and, by filing the document, represents that they have made good faith, diligent efforts to ensure compliance with their obligations under this rule, all other rules of practice, the Rules of Professional Conduct, and any applicable provision of Connecticut law regarding the use of or reliance on generative AI.”

While attorneys were already implicitly responsible for fact-checking AI before submitting documents to the court, the new rule leaves no room for doubt.

What this means for 2026

The practical lessons are not complicated. For a client, start with three facts. A consumer AI platform is not your lawyer. Its privacy policy may decide whether anything you type stays private. And material you generate without your lawyer’s involvement probably enjoys no protection at all. The best practice is to avoid using consumer artificial intelligence to analyse your divorce.

For the lawyer, the duty has not changed but is now explicitly stated. You are responsible for every word you file. Your duty of candour to the court cannot be delegated to software. AI will reshape family practice the way the internet did a generation ago. Getting there safely, in 2026, takes care from client and counsel alike.

The information provided here is general in nature and is not intended as legal advice. Reading it does not create an attorney–client relationship with Parrino|Shattuck, PC.