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Santa Cruz, California bans predictive policing in U.S. first

reuters.com

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Re: Santa Cruz, California bans predictive policing in U.S. first

#131

Post by kortilla »

tehjoker wrote: post #45
rickyplouis wrote: post #32

Thought it would be relevant but a few years back California was also in the news for building a gang database of children as young as one year old (for which they've since acknowledged as a mistake). https://www.cbsnews.com/news/calgang-california-gang-databas... The phrasing of "predictive policing" sounds fairly harmless, but in practice it is a way of finding out which kids are going to be future criminals, thus…

In practice, it's a method of entrenching racist practice. Certain groups are profiled and criminalized, and therefore have criminal records so more police are sent to predicted "hot zones" which results in a feedback loop. What is never said is that crimes are socially determined. Which is more harmful? Shoplifting by a poor person or wage theft by a business owner? Clearly the latter as an actual person who can't a…

Wage theft is treated as a civil issue because it’s not actually “theft” despite its name. It’s not a business taking money away from someone, it’s the business failing to pay money for a contractual obligation.

Do you want a failure to pay your plumber to be prosecuted as theft?

Re: Santa Cruz, California bans predictive policing in U.S. first

#132

Post by treis »

godelski wrote: post #69
jimbob45 wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Edit: This was not a well-thought out post lol and I'm deleting it.

Except we are [0]. Here's the breakdown of why people are in jail (numbers rounded) - Drug offenses: 46% - Weapons, Explosives, Arson: 20% - Sex Offenses: 11% - Extortion, Fraud, Bribery: 6% - Immigration: 5% - Burglary, Larceny, Property Offenses: 5% - Robbery: 3% - Homicide, Aggravated Assault, and Kidnapping Offenses: 3% So drugs vs (WEA + BLPO + R + HAAKO) is 46% vs 39%. Last I checked 46 > 39, so yeah we are tal…

These are federal offenses only. Most crime is prosecuted at the state level and the majority of that isn't drug offenses.

And the people in federal prison for drugs don't get there by smoking pot on their front porch. They're mostly there for trafficking.

Re: Santa Cruz, California bans predictive policing in U.S. first

#133

Post by throwaway894345 »

brchr wrote: post #27
indigochill wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm curious what your source is for that, because that's pretty remarkable, especially given the outcry about out-of-control military spending.

There are some semantic issues, e.g., the distinction between "mandatory" and "discretionary" expenditures, but the data is pretty easy to explore. Essentially you are "both right". > 50% of total spending is Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. Whether that is "social services" is another semantic question. And > 50% of the discretionary budget is defense. But have a look for yourself: e.g., https://en.wikipedia.…

> Whether that is "social services" is another semantic question.

This is puzzling to me. I don't think I've ever heard anyone argue that social security, medicare, and medicaid aren't social services. As far as I'm aware, everyone agrees that these are all social services. I would be curious to hear arguments for excluding it from the "social services" rubric.

Re: Santa Cruz, California bans predictive policing in U.S. first

#134

Post by riazrizvi »

fsckboy wrote: post #102
riazrizvi wrote: post #63

> Used by police across the United States for almost a decade, predictive policing relies on algorithms to interpret police records, analyzing arrest or parole data to send officers to target chronic offenders, or identifying places where crime may occur. The promise of the software made in a sales pitch or on the website, is a far cry from the reality of what such software delivers. That's fine when it's business, t…

> This is a premature application of software. maybe, but you have no idea yourself so your fear does not carry enough weight to carry that statement. It's basically like you are saying "it's too early to try Bayesian policing" when in fact Bayesian policing might be a great idea, and it was a great idea 10 years ago too. Conditional probability, if there have been a lot of rapes in a 2 block radius, do you think it…

Why not take your Bayesian decision theory and make a trading system? Invest your farm, and you'll make millions with ideas like, if a stock just had two upticks, isn't it a good idea to put a little money into an upward trending stock. Not only will you come to understand decision theory better, behavioral prediction better, you'll get paid to do it, and nobody else will get hurt!

Re: Santa Cruz, California bans predictive policing in U.S. first

#135

Post by seaish »

phkahler wrote: post #51

One way to preventing such positive feedback (more policing means more crime) may be to use only reported crime or calls to the police when allocating resources to an area.

This is not the answer. People are just as likely to be biased as police, and when this system is known, it can be used by malevolent citizens to influence where police go, not just in racial ways either.

Re: Santa Cruz, California bans predictive policing in U.S. first

#136

Post by basch »

MikeAmelung wrote: post #109
godelski wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except we are [0]. Here's the breakdown of why people are in jail (numbers rounded) - Drug offenses: 46% - Weapons, Explosives, Arson: 20% - Sex Offenses: 11% - Extortion, Fraud, Bribery: 6% - Immigration: 5% - Burglary, Larceny, Property Offenses: 5% - Robbery: 3% - Homicide, Aggravated Assault, and Kidnapping Offenses: 3% So drugs vs (WEA + BLPO + R + HAAKO) is 46% vs 39%. Last I checked 46 > 39, so yeah we are tal…

Don't even know why I'm going to bother, but most of those drug offenses are trafficking crack/cocaine and meth, a large percentage of them also involve weapons. It's not people who were smoking weed on the porch. https://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/dofp12.pdf

Back to the preventive vs reactive. If you legalize all drugs, sell the harsh drugs in a controlled setting, the existing black markets would be destroyed. This argument will continue to be a circle, if we are saying "x people arrested" but "y shouldnt be a crime in the first place" "well y has to be illegal, look how much x we have."

All of the money put into cops, lawyers, prosecution, sentencing, prison, parole, etc could be put into tackling the consequences of legal use.

All of the money currently flowing into the black market, into gangs, into crime and violence causers, would try up.

Re: Santa Cruz, California bans predictive policing in U.S. first

#137

Post by godelski »

MikeAmelung wrote: post #109
godelski wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except we are [0]. Here's the breakdown of why people are in jail (numbers rounded) - Drug offenses: 46% - Weapons, Explosives, Arson: 20% - Sex Offenses: 11% - Extortion, Fraud, Bribery: 6% - Immigration: 5% - Burglary, Larceny, Property Offenses: 5% - Robbery: 3% - Homicide, Aggravated Assault, and Kidnapping Offenses: 3% So drugs vs (WEA + BLPO + R + HAAKO) is 46% vs 39%. Last I checked 46 > 39, so yeah we are tal…

Don't even know why I'm going to bother, but most of those drug offenses are trafficking crack/cocaine and meth, a large percentage of them also involve weapons. It's not people who were smoking weed on the porch. https://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/dofp12.pdf

You're being very selective. Federal prison only accounts for 22.3% of drug offending inmates[0]. Specifically in jails -- where 74% of occupants are not currently charged -- possession accounts for 56% of drug related offenses. Drugs accounts for 21% of occupants, (23% of convictions, 25.5% of non-convicted). In state prisons possession accounts for 25.5% of drug related offenses and 3.5% of the total state prison.

Jails, County, State, and Federal prisons are all different. It would definitely make sense that the more serious convictions, especially with harder drugs, goes to federal. That's kinda the point of federal...

[0] https://www.prisonpolicy.org/reports/pie2020.html

Re: Santa Cruz, California bans predictive policing in U.S. first

#138

Post by erichocean »

jeffbee wrote: post #128
erichocean wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Literally every city in America, regardless of their approach to policing, has experienced a massive drop in crime rates from 1990 forward. I've never heard of anyone arguing that policing did not increase nationwide in the 90s. All of the data we have suggests otherwise, and pushing back on that is basically the entire point of the recent BLM protests. One simple way we know crime was more aggressively enforced in…

I'm not sure that your conclusion of universality can be supported by the evidence. For example Middlesex County, Massachusetts has had roughly flat incarceration rate for decades. https://github.com/vera-institute/incarceration_trends

The median household income in Middlesex is over $100K (that's where Harvard is located, right next to MIT). Incarcerations were also flat in Martha's Vineyard, but so what?

My priors say Middlesex wouldn't show increased rates of incarceration regardless of the amount of policing, the passage of three-strikes laws, the passage of the Clinton crime bill, etc. due to the demographics of the area. What do your prior's say?

Universality (to me) means "more criminals were incarcerated everywhere we expected them to be (based on demographics) and regardless of changes in local policies or funding, because there was a nationwide push to increase incarceration rates in the 90s." Do you mean something else by "universality"? Maybe we just disagree over definitions or something.

Re: Santa Cruz, California bans predictive policing in U.S. first

#139

Post by MikeAmelung »

wonderwonder wrote: post #117
MikeAmelung wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't even know why I'm going to bother, but most of those drug offenses are trafficking crack/cocaine and meth, a large percentage of them also involve weapons. It's not people who were smoking weed on the porch. https://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/dofp12.pdf

4 in 10 arrests are marijuana related of those "As has long been the case, around nine-in-ten U.S. marijuana arrests are for possessing the drug, rather than selling or manufacturing it." How many of those that graduated to crack/meth etc. started out with simple marijuana arrests? https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2020/01/22/four-in-ten...

I don't know, I was just pointing out the fact that people in federal prison are not there for smoking weed on the porch. I don't have the numbers handy, but I would guess that a vast majority of the marijuana arrests in your article result in a fine or probation at the very most.

Which I happen to agree is a waste of resources and probably does more harm than good by getting people started "in the system".

Re: Santa Cruz, California bans predictive policing in U.S. first

#140

Post by godelski »

treis wrote: post #132
godelski wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except we are [0]. Here's the breakdown of why people are in jail (numbers rounded) - Drug offenses: 46% - Weapons, Explosives, Arson: 20% - Sex Offenses: 11% - Extortion, Fraud, Bribery: 6% - Immigration: 5% - Burglary, Larceny, Property Offenses: 5% - Robbery: 3% - Homicide, Aggravated Assault, and Kidnapping Offenses: 3% So drugs vs (WEA + BLPO + R + HAAKO) is 46% vs 39%. Last I checked 46 > 39, so yeah we are tal…

These are federal offenses only. Most crime is prosecuted at the state level and the majority of that isn't drug offenses. And the people in federal prison for drugs don't get there by smoking pot on their front porch. They're mostly there for trafficking.

That's a good point. I did address the other levels here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23655174 but it was harder to find more of a breakdown in the data.
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