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Wisconsin's Prison-Sentencing Algorithm Challenged in Court (engadget.com)
"Do you want a computer to help decide a convict's fate?" asks Engadget, telling the story of a Wisconsin convict who "claims that the justice system relied too heavily on its COMPAS algorithm to determine the likelihood of repeat offenses and sentenced him to six years in prison." Sentencing algorithms have apparently been in use for 10 years.
His attorneys claim that the code is "full of holes," including secret criteria and generic decisions that aren't as individually tailored as they have to be. For instance, they'll skew predictions based on your gender or age -- how does that reflect the actual offender...?
[T]he court challenge could force Wisconsin and other states to think about the weight they give to algorithms. While they do hold the promise of both preventing repeat offenses and avoiding excessive sentences for low-threat criminals, the American Civil Liberties Union is worried that they can amplify biases or make mistakes based on imperfect law enforcement data.
The biggest issue seems to be a lack of transparency, which makes it impossible to determine whether convicts actually are receiving fair sentences.
[T]he court challenge could force Wisconsin and other states to think about the weight they give to algorithms. While they do hold the promise of both preventing repeat offenses and avoiding excessive sentences for low-threat criminals, the American Civil Liberties Union is worried that they can amplify biases or make mistakes based on imperfect law enforcement data.
The biggest issue seems to be a lack of transparency, which makes it impossible to determine whether convicts actually are receiving fair sentences.
If you think a computer is biased and unfair and makes decisions using secret criteria, wait till you meet a human!
Don't waste your vote! Vote for whoever you want, unless you live in a swing state it won't matter anyways
If the software is open source, transparent, and clear in how it functions, I'd rather have sentencing software than a judge in most cases.
The problem comes when you get politicians meddling in the software, writing in "zero tolerance" code and "mandatory minimum sentences" - they've done this already in the legislatures, tying judges hands in sentencing decisions. With the data available: prior convictions, credit scores, family ties, etc., software can determine probable outcomes of lenient sentences.
Yes, I'm saying credit score is a point for consideration in sentencing - not decision of guilt or innocence, but once guilt has been established, credit score tells about a person's history of making good on commitments, and should be a strong predictor of their likelihood of meeting terms of a suspended sentence, probation or parole.
While the idea of using an algorithm to sentence a human being is bone-chilling, you might be able to justify this as a "formula" for sentencing -- which, of course, merits its own debate.
What is unconscionable about this is the fact that it's a SECRET algorithm. As in closed source. Essentially a secret law.
This has no place in democracy.
(Also, any algorithm which ingests statistical and demographic data is bound to come up with unpalatable and/or spurious demographic correlations (since there is a causal link between poverty and crime and a historic link between race and poverty) which I wold rather have society refrain from codifying -- in law or in actual computer code).
It doesn't and it's not intended to.
It's statistics and probabilities, just like how insurance premiums work.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
Why don't they use the fundamentals used in developing the algorithm to identify and eliminate the root causes of crime (through rehabilitation/counseling) and thus reduce crime in highly prone areas?
Honestly enough they should, there are pushes to do so, it's just that funding is an issue, as always. Funny thing is, though, it's supposed to actually save money!
Okay, up here in Alaska low oil prices have resulted in a government crisis - the government's income has dropped drastically. One of the reforms being put in place, finally, is 'community corrections', which has been shown to save money by actually preventing repeat criminal occurrences. As they mentioned, locking people up for long periods actually increases the chance they'll reoffend, especially if you don't provide support after they get out.
So rather than locking somebody up for 12 years, you lock them up for, say, 4. You take the money for the next 4 years of prison and put it into rehabilitating the criminal, which is enough to cover extended services in prison, as well as at least 4 years outside, because, surprise, it's cheaper than keeping them in prison. The last 4 years of prison sentence avoided is pure savings, though they mentioned that they're putting half the money into what you mentioned - addressing the core situations causing criminality in the first place.
As for the op -
His attorneys claim that the code is "full of holes," including secret criteria and generic decisions that aren't as individually tailored as they have to be. For instance, they'll skew predictions based on your gender or age -- how does that reflect the actual offender...?
Secret criteria is a problem, but gender and age have clear differences on how likely you are to re-offend. If you're a first time offender at 40 odds are something very strange happened, and if you fix that problem the person is unlikely to offend again, while being a first time offender at 15 is a bad sign that it might become a habit.
I don't read AC A human right
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Y'all ever been to Texas?
Not only have I been there I have family that lives there. Outside of Austin they should ask for a passport for most of the state to go there. I make no apologies when I say many Texans have some seriously messed up ideas about what constitutes "justice".
Algorithmic sentencing is one way to move toward a more consistent system, less subject to the vagaries of individual jurisdictions.
Consistency isn't necessarily as valuable as you might be implying. The entire point of having a judge is, you know, to judge things and come to a reasoned opinion about how the law should apply to a particular case. I could see an algorithm being useful as an aid to advise a judge on possible options but there are WAY too many corner cases for it to be a good idea to put it front and center. Are judges imperfect? Yep! That's why we have appeals systems. But you literally cannot come up with an algorithm that will properly address all the corner cases. You are merely turning the programmer and lawmakers into the de-facto judge which is a terrible idea. See three strikes laws if you need an example of how stupid algorithmic sentencing can be.
Judgements still have to be made based on something, and credit scores (and, more specifically, the underlying data from which they are computed) are one of the strongest windows into personality and prediction of future behavior we have in today's society.
I reject your framing of the issue. You are presuming that credit scores have any meaningful relationship to criminality without presenting any actual evidence that such an assertion is backed by facts. You are extrapolating purchasing and financial management behavior to have some relationship to criminality without any basis. Even a correlation isn't adequate because there are all sorts of ridiculous correlations between completely unrelated things. You have to PROVE a causal relationship between an individual person's credit score and their likelihood to commit future crimes for your argument to have any basis at all. Good luck with that.