Photo: Getty Images
The Detroit Police Department is changing its policies on facial recognition technology after a Black woman said she was falsely identified as a suspect and arrested while pregnant.
Porcha Woodruff said she thought police officers were joking when they showed up at her doorstep in February with an arrest warrant for robbery and carjacking. According to a lawsuit she filed against the city of Detroit and a police detective, Woodruff was wrongly “implicated as a suspect” from a photo lineup shown to the carjacking victim following an “unreliable facial recognition match."
Chief James White said he's setting new policies after facial recognition technology produced leads in the case, prompting "very poor" police work, per NBC News.
“We want to ensure that nothing like this happens again,” White said Wednesday (August 9).
White said officers won't be allowed “to use facial-recognition-derived images in a photographic lineup. Period.” Two captains will be required to review arrest warrants in which facial recognition is used under the new policies. Other evidence outside of the technology will have to be present for police to believe a suspect had the “means, ability, and opportunity to commit the crime," the chief added.
“It’s particularly difficult when you’re talking about someone who was eight months pregnant, so we empathize with that,” White said. “We recognize we have to do better and there will be accountability on this mistake.”
The new policies are expected to be presented to the Detroit Police Board of Commissioners.
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