Facial recognition wrongly put a Black man in jail. He wants justice.

By James On Sep 25, 2023

Randal Quran Reid was driving to his mother’s house the day after Thanksgiving last year when police stopped and arrested him on the side of a busy Georgia highway.

He was wanted for crimes in Louisiana, they told him, before taking him to jail. Mr Reid, who prefers to be identified as Koran, is expected to spend the next few days in lockdown, trying to figure out how he could be a suspect in a state he says he has never visited.

A lawsuit filed this month blames the misuse of facial recognition technology by a sheriff’s detective in Jefferson Parish, Louisiana, for his ordeal.

“I was confused and angry because I didn’t know what was going on,” Mr. Quran told The Associated Press. “They couldn’t give me any information other than, ‘You have to wait for Louisiana to come get you,’ and there was no timeline for that.”

Mr. Quran is one of at least five black plaintiffs who have filed lawsuits against law enforcement in recent years, saying they were wrongly identified by facial recognition technology and then wrongfully arrested. Three of those lawsuits, including one by a woman eight months pregnant accused of carjacking, are against Detroit police.

The technology allows law enforcement agencies to feed video surveillance footage into software that can search government databases or social media for a possible match.

Critics say this results in a higher rate of misidentification of people of color than of white people. Advocates say it has been crucial in catching drug dealers, solving murder and missing person cases, and identifying and rescuing victims of human trafficking. They also claim that the vast majority of images searched are criminal mugshots, not driver’s license photos or random photos of individuals.

Still, some states and cities have restricted its use.

“The use of this technology by law enforcement, even when standards and protocols exist, raises serious civil liberties and privacy concerns,” said Sam Starks, a senior attorney at The Cochran Firm in Atlanta, who represented Mr. Quran represents. “And then we say nothing about the reliability of the technology itself.”

Mr. Quran’s lawsuit was filed on September 8 in federal court in Atlanta. It names Jefferson Parish Sheriff Joseph Lopinto and Detective Andrew Bartholomew as suspects.

Mr. Bartholomew used surveillance video and relied solely on a match generated by facial recognition technology to obtain an arrest warrant for Mr. Quran after a stolen credit card was used to purchase two wallets for more than $8,000 at a consignment store outside New Orleans in June 2022 , the lawsuit said.

“Bartholomew failed to conduct even a basic investigation of Mr. Reid, which would have revealed that Mr. Reid was in Georgia when the theft occurred,” the lawsuit said.

Reached by phone, Mr. Bartholomew said he had no comment. A spokesman for the sheriff’s office, Capt. Jason Rivarde, said the office does not comment on pending litigation.

In an affidavit seeking the warrant, Mr. Bartholomew still cited photos from the surveillance footage but did not mention the use of facial recognition technology, according to Mr. Quran’s lawsuit.

The detective said he was informed by a “credible source” that one of the suspects in the video was Mr Quran. A Department of Motor Vehicles photo of Mr. Quran appeared to match the suspect’s description on the surveillance video, Bartholomew said.

Mr. Starks believes the source Mr. Bartholomew cited was facial recognition technology, making the affidavit “misleading at best,” he said. A January email from Jefferson Parish Deputy Chief Dax Russo to the sheriff is further evidence of that, according to Mr. Starks.

In the email explaining the events leading up to Mr. Quran’s arrest, members of the force were again told that they would need additional evidence or clues when using facial recognition technology for an arrest warrant, the lawsuit said.

The lawsuit accuses Mr. Bartholomew of false arrest, malicious prosecution and negligence. Mr. Lopinto failed to implement adequate policies around the use of facial recognition technology, so he should also be liable, the lawsuit states. It is seeking unspecified damages.

While Mr. Quran was in jail, his family hired a lawyer in Louisiana who presented photos and videos of Mr. Quran to the sheriff’s office. The person in the surveillance footage was significantly heavier and did not have a birthmark like Mr. Quran’s, according to his lawsuit.

The sheriff’s office asked a judge to revoke the order. Six days after his arrest, sheriff’s officials in Georgia’s DeKalb County released Mr. Quran.

His car had been towed and the prison food had made him sick, he said. Mr Quran, who works in transport logistics, also missed work.