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U.S. NEWS Thursday 13 June 2019
San Francisco prosecutors turn to AI

to reduce racial bias

With a blind police incident report displayed, San Francisco District Attorney George Gascon, left, and Alex Chohlas-Wood, Deputy
Director, Stanford Computational Policy Lab, talk about the implementation of an artificial intelligence tool to remove potential for
bias in charging decisions, during a news conference Wednesday, June 12, 2019, in San Francisco.
Associated Press
By JOCELYN GECKER with data scientists and to develop a model that out.” A 2017 study commis-
Associated Press engineers at the Stanford could be used elsewhere, sioned by the San Francis-
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — In Computational Policy Lab and the technology will be co district attorney found
a first-of-its kind experiment, to develop a system that offered free to other pros- “substantial racial and eth-
San Francisco prosecutors takes electronic police re- ecutors across the country. nic disparities in criminal
are turning to artificial in- ports and automatically “I really commend them, justice outcomes.” African
telligence to reduce racial removes a suspect’s name, it’s a brave move,” said Americans represented
bias in the courts, adopting race and hair and eye col- Lucy Lang, a former New only 6% of the county’s
a system that strips certain ors. The names of witnesses York City prosecutor and population but accounted
identifying details from po- and police officers will also executive director of the for 41% of arrests between
lice reports and leaves only be removed, along with Institute for Innovation in 2008 and 2014.
key facts to govern charg- specific neighborhoods or Prosecution at John Jay The study found “little evi-
ing decisions. districts that could indicate College of Criminal Justice. dence of overt bias against
District Attorney George the race of those involved. The technology relies on any one race or ethnic
Gascon announced “The criminal-justice system humans to collect the ini- group” among prosecu-
Wednesday that his office has had a horrible impact tial facts, which can still be tors who process criminal
will begin using the tech- on people of color in this influenced by racial bias. offenses. But Gascon said
nology in July to “take race country, especially Afri- Prosecutors will make an he wanted to find a way to
out of the equation” when can Americans, for gen- initial charging decision help eliminate an implicit
deciding whether to ac- erations,” Gascon said based on the redacted bias that could be trig-
cuse suspects of a crime. in an interview ahead of police report. Then they will gered by a suspect’s race,
Criminal-justice experts say the announcement. “If all look at the entire report, an ethnic-sounding name
they have never heard prosecutors took race out with details restored, to see or a crime-ridden neigh-
of any project like it, and of the picture when mak- if there are any extenuat- borhood where they were
they applauded the idea ing charging decisions, ing reasons to reconsider arrested.
as a creative, bold effort to we would probably be in the first decision, Gascon After it begins, the program
make charging practices a much better place as a said. will be reviewed weekly,
more colorblind. nation than we are today.” Lang and other experts said Maria Mckee, the DA’s
Gascon’s office worked Gascon said his goal was said they look forward to director of analytics and re-
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“Hats off for trying new came the first U.S. city to
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Policing Equity. “There are city agencies. The decision
so many contextual factors reflected a growing back-
that might indicate race lash against AI technology
and ethnicity that it’s hard as cities seek to regulate
to imagine how even a surveillance by municipal
human could take that all agencies.q