The company’s methods for identifying gunshots aren’t always guided solely by the technology. But the company guards how its closed system works as a trade secret, a black box largely inscrutable to the public, jurors and police oversight boards.
ShotSpotter’s proprietary algorithms are the company’s primary selling point, and it frequently touts the technology in marketing materials as virtually foolproof. Judges in a number of cases have thrown out the evidence. Forensic reports prepared by ShotSpotter’s employees have been used in court to improperly claim that a defendant shot at police, or provide questionable counts of the number of shots allegedly fired by defendants. ShotSpotter’s website says it’s “a leader in precision policing technology solutions” that helps stop gun violence by using “sensors, algorithms and artificial intelligence” to classify 14 million sounds in its proprietary database as gunshots or something else.īut an Associated Press investigation, based on a review of thousands of internal documents, emails, presentations and confidential contracts, along with interviews with dozens of public defenders in communities where ShotSpotter has been deployed, has identified a number of serious flaws in using ShotSpotter as evidentiary support for prosecutors.ĪP’s investigation found the system can miss live gunfire right under its microphones, or misclassify the sounds of fireworks or cars backfiring as gunshots. ShotSpotter evidence has increasingly been admitted in court cases around the country, now totaling some 200. Nowhere is this more apparent than in law enforcement, which has turned to technology companies like gunshot detection firm ShotSpotter to battle crime. Williams’ experience highlights the real-world impacts of society’s growing reliance on algorithms to help make consequential decisions about many aspects of public life. Williams sat behind bars for nearly a year before a judge dismissed the case against him last month at the request of prosecutors, who said they had insufficient evidence. “I kept trying to figure out, how can they get away with using the technology like that against me?” said Williams, speaking publicly for the first time about his ordeal.
Prosecutors said technology powered by a secret algorithm that analyzed noises detected by the sensors indicated Williams shot and killed the man.
But the key evidence against Williams didn’t come from an eyewitness or an informant it came from a clip of noiseless security video showing a car driving through an intersection, and a loud bang picked up by a network of surveillance microphones. Williams was jailed last August, accused of killing a young man from the neighborhood who asked him for a ride during a night of unrest over police brutality in May. He made plans to take his life with a stash of pills he had stockpiled in his dormitory. His three daily calls to her had become a lifeline, but when they dwindled to two, then one, then only a few a week, the 65-year-old Williams felt he couldn’t go on. CHICAGO (AP) - Michael Williams’ wife pleaded with him to remember their fishing trips with the grandchildren, how he used to braid her hair, anything to jar him back to his world outside the concrete walls of Cook County Jail.
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