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Man sues Florida cops over arrest spurred by "93% match" in facial recognition (arstechnica.com)
submitted 3 months ago by to c/technology@lemmy.world
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[–] 120 points 3 months ago (10 children)

The lawsuit faulted Jacksonville Beach Police for hiring and putting O’Connell on a sensitive case despite his own legal history.

“O’Connell is an officer with a documented history of volatility and poor judgment, having previously been terminated from the St. Johns County Sheriff’s Office for threatening to ‘blow up’ the agency, later reinstated, then arrested for domestic battery before resigning under the weight of those charges,” the lawsuit said. “Jacksonville Beach PD hired him anyway, assigned him as lead investigator on a sensitive child-luring case, and later promoted him to corporal after his investigation resulted in the wrongful arrest and prosecution of an innocent man.”

So, a shit cop who has no business having a badge and a gun does a shit job. Who'd have figured? In my opinion, all settlements of claims against improper policing should come from police retirement funds, not public funds. Put the liability on those capable of making the changes necessary to correct the situation.

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  • [–] 45 points 3 months ago (6 children)

    I've seen it proposed that cops should have to start carrying essentially malpractice insurance that they pay for out of their own pocket and that would cover payouts in the event that they get sued. This would have the added advantage that all those "bad apples" that somehow always seem to end up transferred to new precincts instead of fired and banned for life wouldn't be able to get anyone to insure them effectively banning them.

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  • [–] 2 points 3 months ago (4 children)

    While that's the hope, if an insurance agent refused to cover a cop (even if for good reason) that agent would spend the next six months to a year having to buy new headlights every time they drive.

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  • [–] 3 points 3 months ago (2 children)

    That's stalking and illegal. I also don't think I've ever known the full name of any insurance rep but i didn't use local ones.

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  • [–] 3 points 3 months ago

    The agent is a local, usually small business, and acts as a buyer on your behalf. They guide you on coverage to get, and the options available to you.

    Those quotes come from the major insurance companies you always see advertised. They are the ones underwriting your coverage. These are almost invariably faceless corporations, with decisions by faceless computers.

    The local agent can't do anything but recommend coverage elsewhere.

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    • [–] 34 points 3 months ago

    Well hell, I look 93% identical to Frank Zappa.

    If that's all it takes to be somebody else, I might be movin' to Montana soon...

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    [–] 19 points 3 months ago (15 children)

    Aren't all humans 99.9% similar already?

    If 93% is enough you could just take any ape at that point.

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  • [–] 18 points 3 months ago (7 children)

    That's DNA, not facial structure

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  • [–] 9 points 3 months ago (6 children)

    Yes that was the joke

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  • [–] 8 points 3 months ago (5 children)

    That was a joke?

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  • [–] 2 points 3 months ago (3 children)

    Yes. You take something out of context to make it look stupid. A 93% DNA match is extremely stupid, just like a 93% AI facial match.

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  • [–] 5 points 3 months ago (2 children)

    You take something out of context to make it look stupid

    TIL that I'm a joke

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  • [–] 4 points 3 months ago* (3 children)

    There’s no objective measure for quantifying similarity. We can measure relative similarity, though—but that scale will vary depending on what it’s relative to.

    We could measure genetic similarity relative to a typical unrelated person, or relative to the nearest non-human animal, or relative to the most distantly-related living organism, or relative to random noise. (And you can do the same for facial similarity.)

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    • [–] 13 points 3 months ago

    This should be the response in every incidence of false arrest (a lawsuit), especially when involving these dystopian Big Brother surveillance systems.

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    [–] 12 points 3 months ago

    won't take long anymore for the US to be a less free country than China lol

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    [–] 8 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (1 child)

    If the cops are unhappy I will make them an “AI” that only spits out 100% matches.

    It may never spit out any results though. Or maybe it’ll always say 100

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    • [–] 5 points 3 months ago

    Good luck to him

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    [–] 3 points 3 months ago (1 child)

    Pro: Now he can jerk off anywhere. Anyone catches him he can be like "it's the AI again" and the judge have to let him off.

    Lucky bastard getting of and letting off repeatedly while the rest of us over here aren't jerking it.

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    • [–] -4 points 3 months ago (6 children)

    I think this cop can only be condemned if it can be proven that he was knowingly doing something illegal ?

    So essentially, he will just say he trusted the recognition software to be accurate and that he isn't liable for that.

    As long as that kind of immunity is there it's incredibly difficult to sanction cops for stuff like that.

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  • [–] 12 points 3 months ago (2 children)

    The suspect just doesn't look like him. I get what you mean but I think it's expected of the cop to at least review whatever it gives him. He didn't even give it a glance.

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  • [–] 2 points 3 months ago

    My point is that it's not about competency of the cop it's about his intent. Qualified immunity can be brought down if and only if you can prove ill intent which is a very high bar to pass.

    I'm no lawyer or prosecutor though so that's just my understanding of the qualified immunity in the US. It's an extremely strong shield for even the most incompetent cop that has ever existed.

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  • [–] 7 points 3 months ago

    I love this world where we can be arrested and jailed and have our lives ruined because cops can’t be arsed to verify whether somebody was anywhere else at the time because a machine said ”It’s him…I guess.”

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  • [–] 0 points 3 months ago (1 child)

    What’s with the downvote barrage lemmings? Tetsuo didn’t endorse the situation, they just stated reality.

    Some people really will jump off a bridge just because the person in front of them did, huh.

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  • [–] 4 points 3 months ago

    Don't shoot the messenger ;p

    I indeed don't endorse how qualified immunity works and I commiserate with victims of police abuse that ends up losing their case because of it. It's not my fault if the system favors so heavily the cops :/

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