Legal Tech · 5 min read
Citations, neutral citations, and Latin: what AI dictation gets right
Irish and UK legal vocabulary is the unforgiving test for any voice tool. Here's what works, what doesn't, and how to test a tool before you trust it with a fee note.
If you want to test a voice dictation tool quickly, dictate this: "Donegan v Dublin City Council [2012] IESC 18; cited in argument with reference to res judicata and Henderson v Henderson principles."
A general-purpose speech-to-text tool will mangle "Donegan" into "Donnegan," miss the year-bracket convention, write "I E S C" instead of "IESC," and either spell "res judicata" phonetically or replace it with something nonsensical.
What a legal-trained tool gets right
- Neutral citation format: [2012] IESC 18, [2024] EWCA Civ 472, [2023] UKSC 11 — bracket year, court abbreviation, sequence number.
- Case names with fadas: Ó Domhnaill, Ní Bhriain, Mac Gabhann.
- Latin terms: res judicata, ultra vires, in limine, ex parte, nolle prosequi.
- Statute references: section 11 of the Civil Liability Act 1961, Order 19 Rule 2 of the Rules of the Superior Courts.
- Court abbreviations: SC, HC, CCJ, CA, SCt, IECt, EWHC, KBD.
How to test before you commit
- Dictate three real fee-note descriptions from last week. Read them aloud naturally.
- Dictate a one-paragraph attendance note that mentions two case names and one statutory reference.
- Photograph a handwritten note from a consult and have the tool convert it.
- Time the whole exercise: should be under five minutes.
If the tool gets the citations right and produces a structured document — not a wall of text — it's a tool worth trying for a week.