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A man spent a year in jail on murder charge that hinged on disputed AI evidence

theregister.com

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Re: A man spent a year in jail on murder charge that hinged on disputed AI evidence

#11

Post by helsinkiandrew »

PragmaticPulp wrote: post #3

The article says that employees of the AI company (ShotSpotter) manually reviewed and classified the sounds as gunshots: > records showed that ShotSpotter actually initially picked up what sounded like a firework a mile away, and this was later reclassified by ShotSpotter staff to be a gunshot at the intersection where and when Williams was seen on camera. So the AI didn’t even make the call. The staff did, manually.…

It's scary that prosecutors thought that the ShotSpotter evidence is suitable for a court. It's amazing technology that can help police get to a crime scene quickly but is far too easy to spoof or get the wrong answer due to reflections and other sounds etc.

Hopefully cases like this will eventually stop the system being used in court.

Re: A man spent a year in jail on murder charge that hinged on disputed AI evidence

#13

Post by alias_neo »

yawaworht1978 wrote: post #5

Well that's still a failure on both the software programmed by humans causing a false positive and then doubled down by a wrong human review, based on a false alert. All involved stakeholders have failed.

The software didn't raise a false positive though, by my reading.

It identified it as a firework a mile away! The humans at the software company, REclassified it as a gunshot at Williams' location.

Interesting that there's no mention of the actual gun shot, which appears to have happened some time later?

Not only is this "tool" bullshit, it seems the employees of said org are morally bankrupt enough to falsify evidence in order to put an innocent man in jail.

The whole thing would be utterly unbelievable if it wasn't happening in America.

EDIT: typos

Re: A man spent a year in jail on murder charge that hinged on disputed AI evidence

#15

Post by SamoyedFurFluff »

helsinkiandrew wrote: post #11
PragmaticPulp wrote: post #3

The article says that employees of the AI company (ShotSpotter) manually reviewed and classified the sounds as gunshots: > records showed that ShotSpotter actually initially picked up what sounded like a firework a mile away, and this was later reclassified by ShotSpotter staff to be a gunshot at the intersection where and when Williams was seen on camera. So the AI didn’t even make the call. The staff did, manually.…

It's scary that prosecutors thought that the ShotSpotter evidence is suitable for a court. It's amazing technology that can help police get to a crime scene quickly but is far too easy to spoof or get the wrong answer due to reflections and other sounds etc. Hopefully cases like this will eventually stop the system being used in court.

I mean, drug dogs are still a thing even though we know they tend to respond to owners desires regardless of if there’s drugs present.

Re: A man spent a year in jail on murder charge that hinged on disputed AI evidence

#17

Post by nerdponx »

PragmaticPulp wrote: post #3

The article says that employees of the AI company (ShotSpotter) manually reviewed and classified the sounds as gunshots: > records showed that ShotSpotter actually initially picked up what sounded like a firework a mile away, and this was later reclassified by ShotSpotter staff to be a gunshot at the intersection where and when Williams was seen on camera. So the AI didn’t even make the call. The staff did, manually.…

> Crucially, Williams' lawyers – public defenders Lisa Boughton and Brendan Max – said records showed that ShotSpotter actually initially picked up what sounded like a firework a mile away, and this was later reclassified by ShotSpotter staff to be a gunshot at the intersection where and when Williams was seen on camera. ShotSpotter strongly insisted it had not improperly altered any data to favor the police's case, and said that regardless of the initial real-time alert, its evidence of the gunshot was the result of follow-up forensic analysis, which was submitted to the courts.

"Strongly insisted" links to: https://www.theregister.com/2021/08/02/nvidia_cuda_openai/

> One of the pieces of evidence against Williams claims ShotSpotter's sensors in Chicago identified gunfire where surveillance cameras had seen Williams stop his car by a south-side Chicago block, right when and where the cops said Herring was shot.

> However, Williams’ lawyer submitted paperwork [PDF] claiming ShotSpotter actually detected a firework a mile away from that location, and that ShotSpotter later reclassified the bang as a gunshot and the location as being where Williams was seen on camera, Vice first reported.

> Williams' lawyer demanded the court hold an inquiry into the ShotSpotter evidence, and the prosecutors simply withdrew it.

> ShotSpotter responded by denying at length it improperly altered any data or evidence, and hit back at any suggestion it had done so to help the police make a case. It said its software generates real-time alerts automatically, and staff later analyze the microphone readings to submit forensic reports for the courts, and these final reports can therefore differ from the initial alerts.

> "The idea that ShotSpotter 'alters' or 'fabricates' evidence in any way is an outrageous lie and would be a criminal offense," it said in a statement. "We follow the facts and data for our forensic analysis. Period."

> Update: The case against Williams was dismissed by the judge at the request of the prosecution, which admitted it now had insufficient evidence. Williams had spent the best part of a year in jail awaiting trial.

Re: A man spent a year in jail on murder charge that hinged on disputed AI evidence

#18

Post by jes »

tyingq wrote: post #8

It's interesting to me that there's no working process to introduce/accept new types of science in court. Polygraphs aren't allowed (though the police still find ways to use it to bully people). So, there's some process. But you still see stories about subsets of fiber, hair, arson, fingerprint, dna, etc, science, that shouldn't have been brought to court.

The legal system will, over time, also have to accept and adapt to the idea that free will is an illusion. (See “neuro-law” for more information on this.)

Re: A man spent a year in jail on murder charge that hinged on disputed AI evidence

#19

Post by yawaworht1978 »

SamoyedFurFluff wrote: post #15
helsinkiandrew wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's scary that prosecutors thought that the ShotSpotter evidence is suitable for a court. It's amazing technology that can help police get to a crime scene quickly but is far too easy to spoof or get the wrong answer due to reflections and other sounds etc. Hopefully cases like this will eventually stop the system being used in court.

I mean, drug dogs are still a thing even though we know they tend to respond to owners desires regardless of if there’s drugs present.

Wow i have never heard of that. Curious to see a link/article on the issue, if you can provide.

Re: A man spent a year in jail on murder charge that hinged on disputed AI evidence

#20

Post by DaftDank »

helsinkiandrew wrote: post #11
PragmaticPulp wrote: post #3

The article says that employees of the AI company (ShotSpotter) manually reviewed and classified the sounds as gunshots: > records showed that ShotSpotter actually initially picked up what sounded like a firework a mile away, and this was later reclassified by ShotSpotter staff to be a gunshot at the intersection where and when Williams was seen on camera. So the AI didn’t even make the call. The staff did, manually.…

It's scary that prosecutors thought that the ShotSpotter evidence is suitable for a court. It's amazing technology that can help police get to a crime scene quickly but is far too easy to spoof or get the wrong answer due to reflections and other sounds etc. Hopefully cases like this will eventually stop the system being used in court.

I started reading "Amazon Unbound" by Brad Stone, and in the part where he discusses the development of Alexa, my laymen self had never considered how difficult it would be to train that thing. I think the term was "far-field" speech recognition, and all the problems that come up when adding in real world variables. People talking from across the room while others are talking, or the TV is going, or as you said, reflections and other materials in the room.

I agree that it is disturbing they tried to use this as evidence.

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