Generative AI Legal Assistance from Thomson Reuters CoCounsel

Introduction

On a recent Lunch and Learn session sponsored by TIPS, PL’s Policy Committee, the Law Practice Management Task Force, and Thomson Reuters, a significant discussion unfolded around the topic of generative AI in the legal assistance landscape. The event, hosted by Christine Foresight from the Foresight Law Firm in Atlanta, Georgia, featured Ryan Grath, the Senior Solutions Consultant at Thomson Reuters. With over 150 participants registered, the relevance of the topic highlighted the growing interest legal professionals have in AI technology.

Ryan Grath, a licensed attorney and experienced lecturer, gave a comprehensive overview of CoCounsel, an AI Legal Assistant developed by Thomson Reuters in collaboration with CaseText, which has been a leader in leveraging AI for legal applications. CoCounsel stands out by utilizing GPT-4, the latest language model from OpenAI, designed particularly to cater to the legal community.

What is CoCounsel?

CoCounsel serves as a sophisticated AI Legal Assistant, well-equipped to handle various substantive legal tasks. It has undergone extensive testing, resulting in widespread trust and satisfaction among its users. Achieving this level of reliability has been a crucial goal for the developers, emphasizing the importance of ease of use and effective customer support when adopting new technologies.

CoCounsel is positioned alongside other innovative AI-driven products by Thomson Reuters, including Westlaw’s AI-assisted research and Practical Law AI for guidance, to offer an integrated approach to legal technology in practice.

CoCounsel’s architecture is designed to enable attorneys to remain in control, requiring them to verify all outputs before filing documents or communicating with opposing counsel. Thus, it acknowledges the critical role lawyers have in overseeing the work that AI performs.

Capabilities of CoCounsel

Grath emphasized that CoCounsel performs several substantive legal tasks, including:

Summarizing legal documents,
Conducting legal research,
Drafting legal documents,
Reviewing contracts,
Managing databases.

One key feature of CoCounsel is its ability to understand requests made in plain language, thereby simplifying the interaction process for legal professionals. In each instance, CoCounsel provides support by showing its sources and pointing to relevant content, contributing to the attorney's competence and ensuring no ethical issues arise.

While CoCounsel can perform exceptional tasks, it also shows its limitations, ensuring users are aware of what it can and cannot do. This transparency fosters an environment where attorneys can comfortably verify the technology’s outputs.

Practical Applications

Throughout the presentation, Ryan provided live demonstrations of CoCounsel's capabilities. By showcasing various scenarios, he highlighted how users can work with the AI to draft letters, summarize medical records, review contracts, and perform database searches.

After receiving inputs from users, CoCounsel can offer tailored responses, combining data from multiple tasks to provide coherent, actionable outputs. Ryan illustrated how CoCounsel can generate structured content like tables and correspondence and how users can further refine the responses obtained, making it an essential tool in a legal professional's toolkit.

Closing Remarks

The conversation extended into the ethical implications of using generative AI in legal practice. Grath reassured attendees that CoCounsel was built with attorneys' responsibilities in mind, facilitating their work rather than replacing essential roles.

As this technology continues to evolve, the integration of AI tools like CoCounsel could transform how attorneys and legal assistants manage their workflows, driving efficiency while maintaining ethical standards. Participants were encouraged to explore the possibilities of implementing CoCounsel in their practices through free trial requests.

Keywords

AI Legal Assistant
CoCounsel
Thomson Reuters
GPT-4
Legal research
Document drafting
Database management
Ethical considerations

FAQ

Q1: What is CoCounsel?
A1: CoCounsel is an AI Legal Assistant developed by Thomson Reuters in collaboration with CaseText, utilizing the GPT-4 model to assist legal professionals with various tasks.

Q2: What capabilities does CoCounsel offer?
A2: CoCounsel can summarize documents, conduct legal research, draft correspondence, review contracts, and manage databases.

Q3: How does CoCounsel handle user requests?
A3: CoCounsel can understand plain language requests and generates tailored responses based on the input provided by users.

Q4: Are the outputs from CoCounsel always reliable?
A4: Attorneys are still responsible for verifying the outputs generated by CoCounsel before filing documents, ensuring accuracy and compliance with ethical standards.

Q5: Can CoCounsel create tables from gathered data?
A5: Yes, CoCounsel can analyze information and present it in a structured format such as a table, which can then be exported as a spreadsheet for further use.