Casetext is launching an AI driven drafting tool called Compose. Compose does not promise to replace lawyers – it
offers to make lawyers more efficient by automating the first draft of a motion or brief. It can also function as a tutorial for a new lawyer who is assigned with drafting a motion for the first time. Casetext is currently working with a group of law firm “partners” who will help them develop an expanded library of motions. According to Pablo Arredondo, Co-Founder and Chief Product Officer they hope to have 50 motions available by the end of the year.

The press release positions Compose as being “poised to disrupt the $437-billion legal services industry and fundamentally change our understanding of what types of professional work are uniquely human.” Caetext is certainly the first company I know of to successfully automate the drafting of substantive documents such as  motions and briefs.   Several years ago Ross was rumored to be building a brief drafting tool LegalMation has automated the production of responsive pleadings in specific practice areas. Compose is a major breakthrough in using AI for more complex work:  researching and drafting motions.

In a recent presentation showing  Compose, Casetext’s CEO and co-founder Jake Heller focused  how Compose can help  lawyers by freeing them to focus on high level analysis. Automation will eliminate the drudge work and free lawyers to focus on higher level work. “After automation, what’s left are the most interesting, substantive, strategic parts of legal practice, without the drudgery, the expense, and the inefficiency,We’re making space for lawyers to make new arguments, pursue new strategies, and experiment with new business models. But what’s maybe most exciting about this, and any truly innovative technology, is that we don’t know exactly what the impacts will be. Automation allows for imagination.”

Compose And Real ROI

There is no doubt that partners worry about associates research abilities and clients object to  being charged for the time of few associates who are “learning on the job.”  Compose promises to dramatically reduce the drafting time for a motion which according to the press release “often takes 10-80 hours of billable work: searching case law databases, consulting treatises, digging through brief banks, etc. Compose enables an attorney to construct a compelling, well-supported legal argument in 20 minutes.” Although not highlighted in the press release – I see Compose as offering a powerful tutorial component, by guiding a lawyer through the issues they need to consider based on the specific facts of their motion.

The Compose process is remarkably straight forward. After selecting the motion type, a lawyer indicates whether they are representing the plaintiff or defendant. They select the jurisdiction and then the lawyer selectes the issues to be addressed in the motion based on the facts and the motion is built through a series of clicks where the lawyers selects the best arguments supported by precedent..

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Casetext’s Compose AI Powered Drafting of Briefs and Motions – Lawyers Still Required