An Arizona appeals court has overturned a 10-and-a-half-year manslaughter sentence after a judge relied on an artificial intelligence-generated video portraying the dead victim speaking during the sentencing hearing.
The conviction of Gabriel Paul Horcasitas for the 2021 shooting of Christopher Pelkey was upheld, but the Arizona Court of Appeals ruled on Wednesday, September 30, that he must be sentenced again because the video made the proceedings fundamentally unfair.
Pelkey, 37, was shot during a road-rage confrontation at a traffic light in Chandler, a suburb of Phoenix. Prosecutors said he had got out of his truck and approached Horcasitas’s vehicle before being shot. Pelkey was unarmed.
AI video described as unreliable
The video was shown during a victim-impact hearing in May 2025 after Pelkey’s sister, Stacey Wales, struggled with what she believed her brother would have said in court.
Using his image and voice profile, the video depicted Pelkey addressing his family, the judge and Horcasitas. It included messages about forgiveness and faith, as well as the suggestion that the two men might have been friends in different circumstances.
The appeals court said the footage did not record an actual event or preserve Pelkey’s own words. Instead, it presented an interpretation of his thoughts created by his sister as though they had come directly from him.
The court said the video “erases the interpretive distance” between the family’s belief about what Pelkey might have said and the victim’s own voice and opinions. It ruled that the AI-generated sections were not reliable evidence, although real video footage embedded within the presentation could be used.
Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Todd Lang had described the video as genuine and said he “loved” it. He also said Pelkey’s apparent forgiveness reflected the character described by his family.
Horcasitas was ultimately given the presumptive 10-and-a-half-year term for manslaughter, despite prosecutors asking for a nine-year sentence. The appeals court said the record showed the video had played a role in the decision, even though it could not determine precisely how much weight the judge had given it.
The new hearing will reconsider only the manslaughter sentence. Horcasitas’s conviction remains in place, as does his concurrent conviction for endangerment arising from a bullet that struck another vehicle during the confrontation.
