Chicago police are using an algorithm to detect the likelihood that someone
will become the perpetrator or victim of the stubbornly high gun violence that
has plagued the city.
The Illinois
Institute of Technology has developed software that weighs a variety of
factors, such as a person’s arrest history, gang affiliation and social
network, to decide whether someone will go on the Strategic Subject List (SSL).
Each person is assigned a number from one to 500, with higher scores indicating
greater danger.
According to police,
it has proven remarkably accurate so far in 2016. The majority of people
involved in the city’s violent crime have been on the list: over 70 percent of
people arrested for murder, more than 80 percent of people arrested for
shootings and more than 74 percent of shooting victims. Furthermore, over 60 percent
of murder victims had an SSL score of more than 201.
The Illinois
Institute of Technology has developed software that weighs a variety of
factors, such as a person’s arrest history, gang affiliation and social
network, to decide whether someone will go on the Strategic Subject List (SSL).
Each person is assigned a number from one to 500, with higher scores indicating
greater danger.
“There’s about 1,400
individuals that are driving most of Chicago’s violence, and they score in the
top numbers of the SSL,” Anthony Guglielmi, director of communications for the
Chicago Police Department, said in an interview with Yahoo News.
According to police,
it has proven remarkably accurate so far in 2016. The majority of people
involved in the city’s violent crime have been on the list: over 70 percent of
people arrested for murder, more than 80 percent of people arrested for
shootings and more than 74 percent of shooting victims. Furthermore, over 60 percent
of murder victims had an SSL score of more than 201.
People gather for a
candlelight vigil against gun violence in the Englewood neighborhood in Chicago
on July 3, 2015. (Photo: Jim Young/Reuters)View photos
People gather for a
candlelight vigil against gun violence in the Englewood neighborhood of Chicago
on July 3, 2015. (Photo: Jim Young/Reuters)
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Police say the
“person-based predictive model” does not take race, sex, age or neighborhood
into account, but it has still drawn the ire of some civil libertarians. Some
have voiced concern over the use of lists of people likely to commit a crime in
the future — somewhat (though not exactly) like the scenario in the dystopian
science-fiction film “Minority Report.”
Karen Sheley,
director of the Police Practices Project for the American Civil Liberties Union
of Illinois, takes issue with what she calls the program’s lack of
transparency.
“There’s a police
database that’s populated with secret information, and people can’t challenge
the accuracy of it. That’s where our concern is,” Sheley told Yahoo News. “What
we have now is a list based on information that isn’t made public, and we know
that people can’t protest being on it in any way.”
The SSL subjects,
authorities said, are ranked on an interactive dashboard available to the
department that allows cops to pull up details about the person’s criminal
history, parole status, last district of residence and other information
quickly.
Police are feeling
pressure to do whatever is necessary to clamp down on soaring murder and
shooting rates. USA Today reports that in 2015 there were 468 murders in
Chicago and 2,900 shootings – a 12.5 percent and 13 percent increase,
respectively, over the previous year. There were 52 homicides in January 2016,
which is the highest in a single month since at least 2000, according to the
newspaper.
Last week, the
Chicago Police Department could confidently point to the SSL as instrumental in
helping the force carry out its largest gang raid in recent memory.
On Friday, police
superintendent Eddie Johnson announced the arrests of 140 people on drug and
weapon charges. Of those, he said, 95 are documented gang members and 117 are
on the SSL.
“Today, the Chicago
Police Department is sending a clear message,” Johnson said at a press
conference. “If you choose this lifestyle that fuels the engine of violence in
our city, you will feel the full weight of our department and our partners in
law enforcement. You will be held accountable for your actions.”
Eight of those
arrested were admitted to the department’s diversion program, which provides
drug treatment as an alternative to arrest and jail time, he added.
In proactive
attempts to prevent violence, Chicago police reach out to people on the SSL to
offer assistance and guidance for escaping a life of crime, Guglielmi said.
These interventions often include social services, such as job training or
educational opportunities.
“The way we do it is
twofold. We do personal home visits where we literally knock on your door, and
we do what is called a call-in, where it’s a group setting for individuals
typically on parole or in a gang,” Guglielmi said. “We try to educate this
population on the lifestyle that they’re in and warn them. We’re giving them a chance
to turns their lives around.”
But not everyone
cooperates.
For instance,
Guglielmi said, earlier this month officers visited a teen at his house to
inform him of his high probability of being a victim of gun violence, but he
slammed the door in their faces. On Saturday, the teen was injured in a
shooting.
yahoo News
