Can computer profiles cut crime?
Analysis
BBC
4.6 • 1K Ratings
🗓️ 24 June 2019
⏱️ 29 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
David Edmonds examines how algorithms are used in our criminal justice system, from predicting future crime to helping decide who does and doesn’t go to prison.
While police forces hope computer software will help them to assess risk and reduce crime, civil rights groups fear that it could entrench bias and discrimination.
Analysis asks if these new computer tools will transform policing - and whether we need new laws to regulate them.
Contributors Archive from Cable-Satellite Public Affairs Network Jonathan Dowey, business intelligence manager, Avon and Somerset Police Hannah Couchman, Advocacy and Policy Officer, Liberty Professor Lawrence Sherman, Institute of Criminology, University of Cambridge Bryanna Fox, Associate Professor of Criminology University of South Florida Dame Glenys Stacey, The Centre for Data Ethics and Innovation Jamie Grace, Senior Lecturer in Law, Sheffield Hallam University
Producer: Diane Richardson Editor: Jasper Corbett
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Just before this BBC podcast gets underway, here's something you may not know. |
| 0:04.6 | My name's Linda Davies and I Commission Podcasts for BBC Sounds. |
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| 0:36.0 | BBC Sounds. |
| 0:38.0 | BBC Sounds, Music Radio Podcasts. |
| 0:41.0 | Thanks for downloading this edition of Analysis. |
| 0:44.0 | My name's David Edmonds, and in this program I'll be delving into the fascinating topic of police profiling. |
| 0:52.0 | In particular, what I want to find out is whether computer software |
| 0:56.3 | will transform the criminal justice system. |
| 0:59.7 | Bishan Abrahami complained to the police dozens of times about racial abuse, criminal damage and |
| 1:06.1 | threats to kill him. Often the police didn't even take a note of his cause. |
| 1:10.8 | In July 2013, 44-year-old Bijan Ibrahim was punched and kicked to death in South Bristol. |
| 1:19.0 | His killer, a neighbor, then poured white spirit over his body and set it a light on grass 100 yards from his home. |
| 1:27.0 | Ebrahimi had arrived in the UK from Iran around a decade earlier. |
| 1:32.0 | We've got a map outside my door. |
| 1:35.0 | Today's report says time and time again at different addresses over several years. |
| 1:40.0 | Bigjani Brahimi had on multiple occasions over an eight-year period reported that he'd |
| 1:45.5 | been the victim of racially motivated crimes. |
... |
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