Police departments may frequently be requesting alterations to alerts generated by a gunshot-detecting artificial intelligence surveillance system called ShotSpotter, Vice News reports, citing court documents. The investigation raises questions of whether in some cases, law enforcement is using ShotSpotter to trawl for evidence to support their narratives.
While Vice looked at multiple incidents, the report went into detail about a shooting in Chicago that took place during May 2020. The victim was fatally shot in the head by a man who was subsequently charged with his murder. The suspect maintained that the victim was shot in a drive-by, but the prosecution relied on a key piece of evidence that placed the suspect at a location and time that matched gunfire picked up by ShotSpotter microphones.
But the sensors had initially classified the noise as a firework. Later, though, a ShotSpotter analyst reportedly manually overrode the algorithms and "reclassified" the sound as a gunshot. When the suspect's lawyer raised the issue in court and requested the judge examine whether the forensic evidence was scientifically valid, the prosecution withdrew all ShotSpotter evidence related to the case.
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
Vice reports that the case wasn't an anomaly and pointed to multiple testimonies in which a ShotSpotter employee named Paul Greene stated that alerts were changed after the company received requests from multiple police departments to re-examine audio. Greene, who often serves as an expert witness, did not say that the new evidence was fabricated, however. Read more at Vice News.
UPDATE AUG. 31, 2022: This article has been amended to remove a claim that the location of an alleged gunshot was changed by a ShotSpotter employee. Vice has now withdrawn that claim.
-
Australian woman found guilty of mushroom murdersspeed read Erin Patterson murdered three of her ex-husband's relatives by serving them toxic death cap mushrooms
-
Combs convicted on 2 of 5 charges, denied bailSpeed Read Sean 'Diddy' Combs was acquitted of the more serious charges of racketeering and sex trafficking
-
Sniper kills 2 Idaho firefighters in ambushSpeed Read A man started a wildfire, then fired a rifle at first responders when they arrived
-
Weinstein convicted of sex crime in retrialSpeed Read The New York jury delivered a mixed and partial verdict at the disgraced Hollywood producer's retrial
-
'King of the Hill' actor shot dead outside homespeed read Jonathan Joss was fatally shot by a neighbor who was 'yelling violent homophobic slurs,' says his husband
-
DOJ, Boulder police outline attacker's confessionspeed read Mohamed Sabry Soliman planned the attack for a year and 'wanted them all to die'
-
Assailant burns Jewish pedestrians in Boulderspeed read Eight people from the Jewish group were hospitalized after a man threw Molotov cocktails in a 'targeted act of violence'
-
Driver rams van into crowd at Liverpool FC paradespeed read 27 people were hospitalized following the attack
