Facial recognition software sent an innocent man to prison

To get out of prison husband Alonzo, Carronne Sawyer took a week off. Police accused him of assaulting a bus driver near Baltimore, Maryland, and then stealing his smartphone, but she knew he was sleeping on the couch with her at the time. Nonetheless, through a software of Facial recognition an intelligence analyst had pointed to a possible correspondence between Alonzo and the suspect caught in CCTV footage of the bus, which was also confirmed by an officer, according to police records.

The case of Alonzo Sawyer

At the police station and during a meeting with her husband’s former probation officer – the person who had confirmed the match suggested by the software – Carronne called attention to the details of some photos photos on her phone, taken by her daughter. Her husband was taller than the suspect in the video – explained the woman – had a beard and gaps between his teeth. When she walks, then, her right foot protrudes, a detail that she had not seen in the video of the attack.

“I said my husband is 54 years old. This boy could be our son“, says Carronne. Alonzo was released later nine days in prison, missing out on a show by his wife and whole days of work. The Calvary of Sawyer, which dates to spring 2022, has only surfaced in the last few days.

Around the same time Alonzo was released, the victim of the bus crash has identified another man like the suspect in the video, Deon Ballard, nearly seven inches shorter than Sawyer and twenty years youngeraccording to the prosecution documents. Ballard’s mother and the police officer who arrested the man confirmed the identification, the document reads, and his trial is scheduled for April.

The Maryland transit administration police, which deals with public transportation in the US state, did not respond to repeated requests for comment from Wired USwhile Baltimore County Assistant Attorney John Cox declined to confirm whether Ballard and Sawyer were arrested for the same crime. Wired US he was unable to speak to Alonzo Sawyer, who is serving time in a Maryland jail on a charge unrelated to the bus crash.