40 Futures

Jason Tashea
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  • TECHNOLOGY
  • UPDATED WEEKLY

40 vignettes about the future of criminal justice. www.justicetech.download

Episodes

  1. 05/05/2022

    40 Futures: v1.10 Metatentiary

    40 Futures is a speculative fiction series about the criminal justice system. Editor’s Note This is the final story in the first volume of 40 Futures. I can’t thank you enough for following along, reading and listening to these stories. The response has been tremendous, with thousands of downloads in dozens of countries. I’m already working on the next batch, and I don’t currently have a release date. Subscribe to the newsletter or follow the 40 Futures feed on Apple Podcasts or Spotify to know when the next volume will drop. As you know, the issues in these stories impact all of us, yet the “justice tech” community remains small. These stories are a part of my plan to fix that and grow the number of people that care about these topics. If you, like me, want to see that number grow, please share this series with colleagues and friends and leave a review on Apple or Spotify. We’ve got to grow this tent of ours if we want to build lasting change, and I appreciate your help in doing just that. Thank You,Jason Metatentiary Jay awoke in bed and was pleased with his new surroundings. It was clean and simple: a desk, a chair, a translucent screen for TV and movies, a couple of windows, and a door. Pretty good for virtual reality, he thought. It certainly beat the brick-and-mortar prisons he was used to. Jay was, in corrections parlance, a frequent flier. Having done multiple stints for armed robbery and burglary in the past, he was happy to wake up at Eastern State Metatentiary, a pilot program for the hard to correct.  He rolled over and looked out the window of his cottage to see sky, grass, and sun. Getting up, he moved toward the closet where semi-translucent boxes hovered, each a clothing option. The boxes had titles like, “Jumpsuit”, “Streetwear”, and “Professional”. They each accompanied images of Jay wearing the respective outfit. Having been provided by the prison, “Jumpsuit” was the only option with a “wear” button. The other boxes showed prices, how much Jay currently had in his CTA--his Commissary Trust Account--and a purchase option in bright red. Hoping to look more like himself when his son visited later that day, he bought the t-shirt and jeans “Streetwear” package and clicked “wear”. His body was immediately clad in the familiar outfit and his CTA shrank by 49 points. After a once over in the mirror, he stepped outside. Having spent most of his life in a city or prison, Jay was taken aback to see open space. There were cottages like his own spread out in front of him and rolling hills in the distance. With no walls or guard towers, he assumed that this is what Vermont must be like. “Good morning, Jay. Welcome to Eastern State Metatentiary,” said a disembodied voice from a screen that popped up in front of him. “I’m Michele and I have some updates for you, if you’d like.” “Uh, sure,” said Jay, as he glanced around to see if the other inmates could see and hear what he was witnessing. “Today is Tuesday, March 14. You have been at Eastern State Metatentiary for one day,” stated Michele. “You have 1,828 more days until you are eligible for release.” One thousand eight hundred and twenty four more days, the number rattled around Jay’s head as he looked around the verdant campus. Maybe this time will go by faster than the others, he thought. “Eastern State is a modern and humane place for reform,” Michele continued. “Records show that you completed high school. If you would like to enroll in a college degree program, please see Kayla at the education building. If we can provide you physical or mental health support, please visit Jenna at the medical pavilion. If you have any further questions, just say ‘Hey Michele,’ and I’ll appear. Have a good day.”  “Alright. What time is it?” he asked. Silence. Jay looked around and waited. Having never held an office job, he didn’t know how to troubleshoot IT. Waving his hands where the screen just was, he realized his error. “Hey Michele, what time is it?” “It is 9:06 in the morning.” I have almost a half hour, Jay thought. “Hey Michele, where is family visitation?” “Head due east past the residential area and the media shop and you will find the Visitation Center,” explained Michele. “Would you like me to project a map for you?” “No, I’ll figure it out,” said Jay, assuming the sun, even in virtual reality, rose in the east. He headed out through the residential area on a cobbled path. As he walked, he glanced into people’s cottages through crosshatched windows. He saw that posters and ephemera lined walls and shelves of fellow inmates that could not have been here much longer than him. At the boundary of the residential area was a rustic, white fence and the cobbled path turned to pavement. To the right, there were a few bicycles nestled under a metal hutch. With time to spare, Jay decided to walk.  After a few minutes, he came upon the media shop on his left. The building looked like the old Art Deco style theaters that used to dot his hometown of Baltimore. The building’s sign, in Atlas font, was framed by warm purple, green, and orange lights that ran up past the roof. The portico was a rounded half-moon, like an inverted wedding cake, with bright bulbs leading to a ticket box. His attention to the building’s nostalgic construction was obscured by more pop-ups, like what he saw around his closet earlier that morning. Instead of clothes, however, these promoted the newest TV shows, movies, and performances that Jay and the others could stream at their cottages. A single episode of a medical drama cost 15 points. Another 35 points and you can see an action movie that was still in theaters. They had live sports, too. He nodded his head and smiled with the acknowledgment that he would never watch a fight breakout over a TV remote again. Then, in a smash cut, he went from admiring the polychromatic theater to seeing only the color blue. “Hey!” a man yelled. Shocked from his reverie, it took Jay a moment to realize that he was not experiencing an error screen, but lying on the ground and looking at the sky. Propping himself up on his elbow, he saw a large man with a goatee and shaved head standing over him. His round scalp blocked out the morning sun. “Watch where you’re going, pumpkin,” the man said as he spat towards Jay’s splayed out avatar before taking a lumbering step over him. Dazed but relieved, Jay collected himself and went to wipe the spit off of his shirt, but there was nothing there. He replayed the scene in his mind. Looking at his dry t-shirt, he hadn’t detected the guy when he walked into him, he didn’t feel his push, he didn’t smell his breath, which, judging by the look of him, was awful. He didn’t feel the ground when he fell. Even his decade-old hamstring injury didn’t appear when he helped himself off the ground. He straightened his shirt and walked a little taller with a new confidence that he couldn’t be hurt in the Metatentiary. He arrived for his family visit a few minutes early. Sitting at a picnic table, he positioned himself so he could see the door where his son and girlfriend would enter with the other visitors. He was nervous, but excited. He last saw his family when he received his sentence, a terrible memory. His return to crime was a selfish act, jeopardizing everything he had built since his last bid, which had him two states away from his family. When the Department of Corrections gave him the option to take part in the Metatentiary Pilot Program, he leapt at the opportunity. While he couldn’t be with his family, at least they didn’t have to spend days traveling to see him. Now, at the designated time, they were a click away. A door leading to the visitor center opened, and a small boy came rushing onto the green.  “Ben!” Jay yelled. As the boy’s head jerked toward his father his mopish brown hair twirled. A smile broke over both their faces. He came running across the grass and stopped short of Jay, who had his arms out.  “Dad?” The boy looked skeptically at Jay. “Yes, it’s me!” said Jay bursting with excitement to see his son. “I probably just look a little different because we’re in that video game I told you about. But it’s me, I’m still your dad.” Ben inched closer. “What’s the password?” He whispered. “Yogi and Boo Boo,” Jay smirked. “Shaggy and Scooby too.” Ben’s eyes lit up as he leapt to hug his dad as tight as he could.  Jay opened his eyes and looked down to see the top of Ben’s head, his brown hair was shaggier, darker, than he remembered. He didn’t know if Ben had grown or if the avatar was just taller.  In his moment of solace, Jay breathed deep to take it all in. Exhaling, he felt something missing--that faint, comforting scent of detergent, home.  He pulled Ben closer and breathed in again, nothing. Jay took a step back and looked at his arms. He couldn’t feel Ben’s warmth either. He pumped his hands into fists a couple of times, as if improving circulation would fix the glitch. As if circulation existed at all. Disoriented, he looked at Ben’s expectant and cherubic face. Then, his stomach dropped. Pop-ups hovered above his son. “Multisensory Mask: Smells like the real world,” read one. “Haptic Vest: Upper body sensations never felt so good,” read another. Each was significantly more than what was in Jay’s CTA. Without enough money, the purchase buttons were disabled.  However, he saw a blue button he hadn’t seen earlier. It read, “Rent”. Not even two hours into his 1,829 days, he was ready to empty his virtual CTA for 15 minutes of reality. Pressing the blue button, the restraints on his incarceration loosened as he breathed in a more complex consciousness. While synthetic, the smells were adjacent enough to the real thing that Jay all at once noticed the grass beneath his feet, the su

    23 min

  2. 04/28/2022

    40 Futures: v1.09 Chipped

    40 Futures is a speculative fiction series about the criminal justice system. Chipped James looked down at his trembling left hand. There were burns on his wrist. The doctor, continuing the examination, moved his shackles to better assess his swollen ankles and feet.  “How’s it to walk right now?” asked the doctor. “Shaky. It doesn’t feel right,” James responded, “even when I’m not chained up.” Taking a second look at his wrists, the doctor took a step back. “It’s lithium poisoning.” James was visibly skeptical. “You seem confident for not taking blood or anything.” “I can take blood, but it’s just going to tell me you’ve got lithium pumping around in you,” she said. “I keep seeing this, it’s that cheap embed-tech the Department of Corrections requires—the batteries leak.” James looked at his arm and then back at the doctor. “So, what can I do about it? It’s killing me, right?” “Well, the good news is that you’ll most likely recover. The tremor, the swelling, the burn, it’ll all heal up once we remove the problem, which we’re going to do now.” She reached for an alcohol pad and a scalpel. “The bad news, however, is that I have to insert a new one in your other wrist. Fingers crossed this one isn’t garbage.”  “Wait, so you’re just gonna set me up to be back here in a month?” His face was sour. “It’s the law, James.” She paused. “Plus, how are you going to buy your Funions at the commissary or keep up on your remote medical evals without it?” “Didn’t you take some oath or something?” All the indignities of incarceration left James agitated. “Do no harm?”  “Well, I’m removing the harm and there’s a nine-in-ten chance you won’t be back here,” the doctor jocularly spat back. “So, give me your wrist.” Links from the podcast commentary 44,000 prison inmates to be RFID-chipped. (ZDNet) Prisoners “to be chipped like dogs.” (Independent) NY state senator proposes using GPS implants to track violent convicts. (CBS) Citizen reportedly plans to test a private security partnership in Chicago. (Verge) Witnesses didn’t say a bank robber had facial tattoos. So police digitally altered a suspect’s mugshot. (Washington Post) This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.justicetech.download

    16 min

  3. 04/21/2022

    40 Futures: v1.08 Sheriff squanders sensitive data to save budget

    40 Futures is a speculative fiction series about the criminal justice system. Sheriff squanders sensitive data to save budget Edensville– After an unexpectedly lively county council meeting last night, council members are left looking for answers and the sheriff is on the ropes.  A routine presentation of county department audit results at last night’s Union County Council meeting unearthed a previously unreported contract between the county sheriff’s office and a technology company that was costing the department millions of dollars. That is, before the sheriff traded away the county’s data. In a quid pro quo deal, the data was traded for lower payments to LightForce, LLC, a law enforcement technology company. This included “all data processed by LightForce,” according to the renegotiated contract. Going beyond publicly accessible information, like arrest records, the trade included data not accessible under public records law, like arrested people’s medical histories, information about children and confidential informants, and extensive human resources data about department employees. Insult to injury, Sheriff Richard Kelly, who was present for the meeting, indicated that his department did not tell the people identified in the data that it would be sold. It is unclear what legal authority, if any, the sheriff’s office had to make such a trade. “You gave away our citizen’s data, sensitive data,” said councilman Manny Lopez-Garcia to Kelly. “That wasn’t yours to trade!” Last night’s scene unfolded when County Auditor Darlene Hicks presented her routine audits for three departments, including the Sheriff's. Council members’ attention was piqued in the whitewashed room at the county courthouse when Hicks began to explain that, for years, budget overruns in the sheriff’s department were due to deputy overtime pay and a contract with LightForce. While there was little articulated concern about the overtime costs, Council Chairwoman Helen Garland latched on to the aggressive repayment terms the sheriff’s office originally agreed to six years ago. When the Chairwoman pressed Hicks on whether or not these terms were normal, Hicks responded that she had never seen such aggressive terms in her 17 years with the county. “That’s an awfully reckless way to play with taxpayer money during a recession,” Garland said. “We’ve been responding to crime in this country for a over century without computers, I don’t see why that needs to change now.” The Union Gazette obtained a copy of the original contract, which included terms for new computers in every department squad car in the county, a cloud-based records management system, improved cybersecurity measures, software that automated federal and state data reporting requirements, and a new suite of services to manage the human resources department. The contract also included software that automatically made transcripts of bodycam evidence. The Union County Sheriff’s Department does not currently deploy body cameras. Sheriff Kelly said that the costs were justified for the sake of public safety. “The ultimate goal of this contract was to improve public safety through a more efficient use of taxpayer dollars with the aid of technology,” said Kelly. “Before this contract, we were mostly paper-based, except what state and federal law required to be digital.” While the contract at issue has cost the county millions of dollars over the past six years, the most up-to-date FBI crime statistics for Union County indicate that property crime is up in the past two years and violent crime has held steady at historic lows. Kelly noted that when the contract was signed the Sheriff’s Department was bringing in significant revenue through a controversial tactic called asset forfeiture, which has been banned in some states. It wasn’t until the recession began and tax revenue dried up that Kelly needed to shrink the department’s overhead, including its payments to LightForce. “Through back-and-forth negotiations, the aggressive payment terms were done away with, saving the department over $250,000 in the first year alone while still allowing the department to modernize,” said Kelly.  “Sheriff, you’ve been in this community a long time,” started Councilwoman Cecily Anders, who was just reelected to an unprecedented eighth term on the council, “and you know people come here because they want to be left alone, raise their families, and tend to their land. They don’t want to be bothered by technology companies—I know I don’t.” Last night's meeting sparked council plans to further investigate the Sheriff’s Department’s contracting processes and the deal with LightForce. It seems that yesterday’s events might also have political implications. When reached for comment, Darryl Bryson, the union president which represents sheriff’s deputies, was outraged.  “The law is clear that a [law enforcement officer’s] discipline information is private information in our state, and here it is being bought and sold by our very own sheriff,” he barked over the phone while out-of-state on vacation. “As far as I’m concerned, if Sheriff Kelly can’t uphold the law in his own office and protect our deputies, then it’s time for a new sheriff to come to town.” Kelly is up for reelection in November. Links from the podcast commentary How private contractors are taking over data in the public domain. (Reveal) Trade secret privilege is bad for criminal justice. (ABA Journal) Exporting repression? China's artificial intelligence push into Africa (discussing how local governments trade data with Chinese companies for better contracts). (Council on Foreign Relations) This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.justicetech.download

    17 min

  4. 04/14/2022

    40 Futures: v1.07 Recode

    40 Futures is a speculative fiction series about the criminal justice system. Recode Alban sat on a stainless steel examination table in the back of a veterinary clinic closed for renovations. His legs dangled and his hands were in his lap, the childlike disposition amplified his nervousness.  “Yo, I keep going back and forth,” he hollered across the room, breaking the silence. A clinician with his back turned, lifted his head and looked over his left shoulder, “Give me a second.” He fiddled with something on the table for a moment and turned around. Alban could see small plastic vials standing in a red tray, a microscope, and clear cups, with and without liquid in them. “Like, you want the other procedure or you’re out completely?” The clinician was wearing a medical mask pulled down beneath his nose, glasses, and a white lab coat with the veterinarian’s embroidered logo. The coat was one size too big and belonged to someone named Brian.  “Just remind me the options,” Alban replied. “I’ve currently got you down for the ‘23&Free’ package. That’s the one that changes all but 23 of your DNA markers. It’s usually enough to throw the cops off and avoid an arrest.” Alban nodded. “Now, there’s also a premium service that can get you down to five original markers—that’s my ‘Five Alive’ plan.” The clinician put his hands in his pockets and rocked back on his heels. “You know the Feds can now make a match on six markers, right?” Alban continued to nod and leaned into the up-sell, until he remembered the astronomical cost of the platinum plan.  “Now, as I told you earlier, we don’t talk about why you are here or what trouble you are looking to avoid, so this isn’t a conversation. It’s a decision for you to make,” lectured the clinician. “But, if you are running across state-lines robbing banks or it’s the season for treason, then, I think, being alive is better than being free.” “Right, but how does it work?” asked Alban, showing a mix of hesitation and curiosity with a man who wouldn’t even share his name, not even a nom de whatever-this-is.  “It’s pretty simple, we’re just deleting some of your STRs,” explained the clinician. “You spend a lot of time around doctors, don’t you?” Alban was incredulous. “My ‘stars’?” “I’ve never told you who I work with,” the clinician’s easy demeanor vanished. “S.T.R. They are the markers of your DNA that allow the cops to turn your genes into something like a fingerprint.  “So, think of this as the genetic equivalent to burning your fingerprints off. But, instead of acid, we’re gonna remove some of your blood, isolate the DNA, edit it,” he pointed back to the workstation, “and reinject you with the final product. Voilà, new you.” He stared at Alban, waiting for a decision. “Don’t worry,” said the clinician worried the customer was getting cold feet, “unlike the fingerprint thing, this is painless.” Links from the Podcast Genealogy sites give law enforcement a new DNA sleuthing tool, but the battle over privacy looms. (ABA Journal) When the police can’t afford to solve cold cases using DNA databases, deep-pocketed donors can. (New York Times) What is CRISPR gene editing, and how does it work? (Conversation) This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.justicetech.download

    17 min

  5. 04/07/2022

    40 Futures: v1.06 Drive By

    40 Futures is a speculative fiction series about the criminal justice system. Drive By “Dude, what are you doing?!” Officer Chien punched his right arm forward as if ushering the police cruiser through the intersection. “Don’t stop!” Officer Reynolds bristled as he brought the car to a standstill.  “There’s a stop sign!” Reynolds indicated with a flip of his hand.  The red octagon sat just above Chien’s passenger side window, clear as day. Hovering above it were signs for Division and Wilson streets, from a bird’s eye view the signs’ X marked this spot in West Baltimore. Each side of the street was lined with century old row homes, red brick piled 30 feet high, skinny four-pane windows with white trim running up the front of each. “Are you new?” Chien asked his partner of 16 months. “You can’t brake like that and expect your performance raise next spring.” “Ugh,” protested Reynolds, “Is this more of that public safety score nonsense? Listen, the little chip in the engine picks up everything you do, and you get rewarded or punished for it. Stopping at a stop sign--literally following the rules--is the very thing that gets rewarded.” A car pulled up behind the cruiser and waited. A beat passed before Reynolds stuck his arm outside the window into the crisp fall air and waived the vehicle by. The driver was cautious, looking to avoid unwanted attention. He half waived, but didn’t linger. Neither officer noticed. “How have we not talked about this yet?” Chien asked, confounded. “That ‘little chip’ is dumb. It doesn’t know there’s a stop sign here, it just knows that you hit the brakes too hard. Just roll through stop signs and accelerate through yellow lights—it’ll make your life easier.” Reynolds gripped the wheel tighter and arched his wrists up as he considered how public safety had become a shell game. Instead of balls and cups, however, he played with reports and numbers. “OK, so say you are correct,” Reynolds rolled the cruiser into motion and took a left onto the 500 block of Wilson St. “What other ways can you play with the score?” “That’s the big one that I know of,” he paused. “Oh! Watch your ass in the bougie neighborhoods—Roland Park, Mount Washington.” Reynolds laughed and shook his head, “Why? Are the doctors and lawyers of this fair city setting their own speed traps?” “It’s an insurance thing--actual tables,” said Chien looking out the window as they rolled past a stoop sale, bright clothes twisted on plastic hangers next to old speakers and worn chairs. “You mean, actuarial tables?” Reynolds smugly asked. “Yeah, math,” Chien dismissed the correction. “A knocked over mailbox in Roland Park is going to be more expensive and more hassle than running over some poor schmuck’s barbecue in Sandtown. The lawyers and doctors are going to get more because they make noise. That creates headaches that you just don’t get in West Baltimore—unless someone actually gets hurt, of course.” “What does that have to do with the scores?” Reynolds asked. “The department doesn’t want to deal with some rich idiot thinking they’re owed,” Chien’s tone was irritated at explaining the obvious. “So, the powers-that-be make it worse for you, Mr. Peace Officer, if you get caught driving like a maniac in the nicer neighborhoods.” “Wait, I--,” Reynolds looked over at Chien. “But, it costs a rich family and a poor family the same amount of money to buy a new mailbox or get a grill.” Reynold’s comment hung in the cab as the patrol car crossed over the tree-lined demarcation between West Baltimore and Bolton Hill, a preserved 19th century gem populated with art students. “Sure, but all injuries being equal,” shrugged Chien, “a rich person’s is just worth more.” Links from the Podcast Runaway feedback loops in predictive policing. (Proceedings of Machine Learning Research) Algorithmic justice: Algorithms and big data in criminal justice settings. (European Journal of Criminology) Juking the Stats. (The Wire) Papers by Bryan Casey. (SSRN) This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.justicetech.download

    17 min

  6. 03/31/2022

    40 Futures: v1.05 Project 404

    40 Futures is a speculative fiction series about the criminal justice system. Project 404 Scrolling on his phone, a headline caught Keith’s eye: “Public records publisher doxxed, in hiding.” He clicked the link. The story was about Darren Williams, the founder of Red A Industries, a shady constellation of companies that operated sites like MugshotMemories and Evicted.com. The news article made him sound like someone liberating government data for the good of society. In reality, he runs an extortion racket where people’s worst moments captured in mugshots, evictions, or divorce filings are posted online in an easily searchable format. Being magnanimous, however, he would take down the posts—for a fee. Now, however, the internet had rebelled and published his home address, phone numbers, and Social Security information. Having pissed off tens of millions of people, Williams was now on the lam, hiding from the public’s view and unavailable for comment. Keith looked up from his phone in his muse-less, whitewashed apartment. His desk was a cluttered rainbow of post-it notes and a few pens. Even though it was a sunny day, the light in his room was flat, due to the new construction next door. His surroundings didn’t stop him, however, from relishing in the smug satisfaction that the internet was so good at providing.  Buried in the article was a passing reference to a hacktivist group that took credit for doxxing Williams. They called themselves “Project 404”. Having spent the past decade as a web development contractor, he wondered why a group publishing people’s records would use the error for when a webpage can’t be found as their nom de guerre.  A notification popped up on his screen, breaking him of his reverie. It was from a potential client. Work had been slow for a minute, and that wasn’t about to change. Clicking the popup carouseled his screen to his email. The message was short and automated: Thanks but no thanks and good luck. Letting out a sigh, he put his phone down and turned to his laptop. Beyond the day’s news coverage, searching “project 404”, true to form, unearthed nothing. He messaged a friend who’d spent time working on projects supposedly associated with Anonymous during Occupy Wall Street and the ragtag cyber militia that made life hell for Russia during the ultimately failed occupation of Ukraine. “Hey man, you see this project 404 dox today?” “hey     “just looked it up”  Ellipses pumped on the screen. “pretty funny” “Yeah, you think it’s just for the lulz, tho? “Seems ironic to be project 404 and make records found” “lol, i didn’t think about that “i remember bardo talking about them not that long ago ... seemed legit hold on” An hour passed before the friend sent over a jumbled alphanumeric link, which loaded pixelated, dancing graphics, like the GeoCities sites Keith made as a kid paying homage to the Sims, the Saturday Night Fever soundtrack, and other adolescent obsessions. In the middle of the page was a menu with names, like “The Federale,” “Ctrl/Alt/Delete,” and “The Works.” Dynamic crypto prices were next to each. A bare-bones midi track with a That-Thing-You-Do-vibe auto-played in the background.  Unable to scroll, he clicked on “Ctrl/Alt/Delete,” unfurling an accordion box of text. “Ctrl/Alt/Delete is what it sounds like: We scrub all the criminal record data a single state has on you, including arrest records, mugshots, and criminal filings. This is only for people with closed cases older than three years. “***Service not available in Mississippi***” Overwhelmed by such a brazen operation, he clicked the next box. “The Works is Ctrl/Alt/Delete plus we erase your recently expunged data from the most popular, private mugshot websites.” He clicked the last option.  “The Federale: We did what Congress wouldn’t and brought expungement to federal records. The higher price is due to higher risk.” The dynamic pricing box indicated that “The Works” cost .5 BTC, about $23,000 dollars at that moment. Satisfied, pseudo-anonymized customers left flattering reviews and five-star ratings. Keith’s face went soft and his eyesight blurred as he felt the track-wheel roll under his index finger. His arrest for a prank-gone-wrong was regularly flagged by background checks and type-A first dates. The dates usually didn’t care once they got the story about how an attempted chicken theft went sideways back in college. Automated hiring systems, on the other hand, were a different, humorless beast that kept him in a Kafkaesque churn of rejection. Forced into contract work, he was always chasing the next job, which had been a minefield of employers avoiding the cost and dignity reserved for salaried employees.  Keith’s vision focused in that dim room as he opened another tab. Navigating to his crypto wallet, Keith wondered about the value of a second chance. Links from the podcast commentary What is expungement? (ABA) More states consider automatic criminal record expungement. (Pew) Automated hiring software is mistakenly rejecting millions of viable job candidates. (Verge) Alleged owners of Mugshots.com charged in extortion scheme, face extradition to California. (ABA Journal) Powerful people pay to scrub their reputations online, it’s hindering criminal investigations. (Rest of World) This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.justicetech.download

    14 min

  7. 03/24/2022

    40 Futures: v1.04 Perp Walk

    40 Futures is a speculative fiction series about the criminal justice system. Perp Walk “Alright, walk on the mat as you’d normally walk,” commanded officer Trent. “One at a time, now. We can’t have more than one on the mat at the time.” In the back of the police substation, the officer took a seat behind a monitor with a split screen. The left side was looping a video of green, cartoonish outlines of feet walking a step at a time. The right side was blank. The six assembled men of similar height and weight looked with curiosity at the rubber mat laid out in front of them—yellow and black cords snaked on the cracked concrete floor to the officer’s desk. The buzz of fluorescent lighting droned in the background. As the first man walked across the mat, red feet lit up the right side of the officer’s screen. “Now, walk back across the way you came,” the officer ordered. The man did as he was told. The feet on the screen were still red. “Alright, you’re free to leave.” He didn’t look up from the screen as he waved the man away. “Next!” Another, and the man after him, all did the same. All producing red, cartoon feet on the right side of the officer’s screen. They too were excused. The fourth man took three steps on the mat before the cartoon feet turned green. Trent’s heart jumped and his eyes went big as he looked up from the screen at the man, making eye contact with him for the first time. “Do it again,” he said pointing at the man on the mat trying to hide his excitement, “walk back across the mat a few more times.” Dutifully, he marched back and forth, the feet on Trent’s screen remained green. He looked closer: the pronation of the right foot, the slight drag of the left heel--it all matched up. Could there be another person in the city with the same walk? Sure, but what were the chances they were leaving the convenience store at Franklin and Eutaw right after it was held up? Constitutionally insignificant, he thought. By his estimation, the city’s investment in smartcrete sidewalks gave him enough for an arrest. Trent dismissed the other two men in the lineup and looked at the man on the mat, who stared back blankly. He unhooked the cuffs from his belt and started to read the man his rights as he slowly walked him to his holding cell. Links from the podcast commentary Smart cities are surveilled cities. (Foreign Policy) Towards smart concrete for smart cities: Recent results and future application of strain-sensing nanocomposites. (Iowa State University) Forensic gait analysis. (NIH) A systematic review of gait analysis methods based on inertial sensors and adaptive algorithms. (Gait & Posture) A case in Florida demonstrates the problems with using facial recognition to identify suspects in low-stakes crimes. (Slate) Forensic Science in Criminal Courts: Ensuring Scientific Validity (PCAST) This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.justicetech.download

    14 min

  8. 03/17/2022

    40 Futures: v1.03 Bio-data & stolen art push EU-US relations to new lows

    40 Futures is a speculative fiction series about the criminal justice system. Bio-data & stolen art push EU-US relations to new lows Strasbourg – In another blow to EU-US cooperation, the world’s most allegedly infamous black market antiquities dealer will not be extradited to stand trial in the United States. Sofia Teixeira, a Portuguese national, was charged in the US with the distribution, purchase, and sale of dozens of stolen Iron Age artifacts from Africa, Asia, and Europe. However, in a first-of-its-kind case, her attorneys successfully fought her extradition by arguing that the technology used to collect evidence against Teixeira did not comport with EU privacy law, thus invalidating the request. “Today’s decision affirms that the EU stands for privacy and human rights of its citizens,” said Tiago Da Luz, one of Teixeira’s attorneys. In a story pulled out of a spy novel, the FBI found a cache of artifacts allegedly trafficked by Teixeira in the Washington, DC suburb of Reston, Virginia thanks to the use of a mesh router system installed by the home’s owner. The technique allowed investigators to track movement within the space by monitoring how the WiFi signals bounced around the house, according to the charging document. This brought the FBI’s attention to a false wall hiding the stolen antiquities.  By the time charges were filed in US federal court, Teixeira had already flown to Lisbon, where she resides. “The search we conducted of Ms. Teixeira was done so with a legal warrant and within the bounds of the US Constitution,” said Marta Dole, the US Attorney for Virginia’s Eastern District, in a written statement. “We will continue to work with our counterparts in Europe to ensure that individual rights are protected and criminals are correctly punished.” The tension leading to this outcome had been in the making for some time. “It’s a perfect storm, really,” says Liam McEnnereny, a scholar-in-residence at the Maynooth University School of Law in Ireland. “While the US has failed to pass comprehensive privacy legislation, the EU has continued to codify and affirm privacy protections for criminal defendants. The cleavage was there, this outcome was all but inevitable.”  Two major factors led to the failed extradition. A decade ago, the EU was sued by a Swedish privacy watchdog over its training of Kosovar and Moroccan police. The European Union Agency for Law Enforcement Training (CEPOL) trained local police on how to create fake social media accounts, track devices, and build biometric dossiers at border crossings--all techniques banned or highly regulated in the EU itself. The European Court of Human Rights put an end to the EU exporting these practices in a sweeping opinion. In response to the scandal, the EU Parliament passed the Biometric Data Protection Regulation (BDPR). The sprawling law requires data and privacy protection assessments for any novel investigatory technique used in a criminal trial of an EU citizen. Not only keeping EU law enforcement practices in check, the assessments essentially act as an import control against privacy-busting searches happening against EU citizens beyond the bloc’s borders.  The case revolved around whether or not the privacy protection assessment of the search technique used to find the stolen works was a valid basis to stop the extradition. The court said that it was. “The technique used to collect evidence linking Ms. Teixeira to the stolen artifacts runs counter to the BDPR’s protection of physical movement in a private residence,” read the court’s opinion, published Monday. “As previous cases have plainly laid out, EU member states can deny extradition of their citizens if the extradition would cause that citizen physical harm. We extend that principle to protect the rights of defendants, in some cases.”  As the court hinted, this is not the first time it has blocked an extradition to the States. In 1989, an extradition request to the US was at first denied because a guarantee against using the death penalty was not made by the US state where the trial would be held. A similar decision was made in 2012, which stopped a deportation to Jordan because of concerns regarding evidence obtained by torture.  While Teixeira will not face a trial in the US, she still may be charged in a number of EU countries where she allegedly conducted her black market business.  The media attention surrounding the extradition is a return to the public eye for Teixeira. The scion of a prominent Portuguese family that made their money in shipping, she rose to prominence in her late teens and early 20s as an adventurous socialite studying archeology at the University College London. The juxtaposition of her famous friends and archeological digs in remote regions of Asia’s subcontinent made her social media feed a tabloid favorite. However, she left the public eye and social media shortly before graduating from university, which, other outlets have reported, lines up with her alleged transition into antiquities smuggling using her family’s vessels. Even though the US response was conciliatory to the court’s opinion, experts expect outcomes like this to become more common as the US and the EU move further apart on privacy and criminal rights. “We’ve been saying it forever, but America is still the Wild West when it comes to digital privacy,” says McEnnereny in Ireland. “This has led to complications, failed re-negotiations, and a general devolution on other data sharing agreements between the two powers.” With that trajectory in mind, he says, “We shouldn’t expect Teixeira to be an exception. This case will likely become the rule.” Links from the podcast commentary Home security and health care using WiFi motion detection. (Embedded Computing Design) Linksys’ mesh router motion-tracking system can now work with other smart home gadgets. (Verge) The Court of Justice invalidates Decision 2016/1250 on the adequacy of theprotection provided by the EU-US Data Protection Shield. (Court of Justice) The war torn web. (Foreign Policy) This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.justicetech.download

  9. 03/10/2022

    40 Futures: v1.02 Duped

    40 Futures is a speculative fiction series about the criminal justice system. Duped It had been three days since Timothy Diallo was shot by police. Three days of grief, protest, and tear gas. The public’s vitriol was focused on the police headquarters downtown. In its vicinity, apartment building entrances, restaurants, and even the computer store with its all glass facade were now plywood, tagged with jagged lettering and black silhouettes of Timothy on white paper. The headquarters was barricaded, but those inside awaiting trial could still hear the muffled cries of protestors.  No one had been arrested for the 23 yearold’s murder. The bystander footage was unequivocal, though. Three nights ago, Timothy, visibly distraught and agitated, was yelling in a fourplex parking lot, walking in circles. He had a knife. As officers pulled up, they pinned him in and drew their weapons. Timothy’s neighbors bore witness from balconies and the lawn as he lunged toward the squad cars. The video picked up gasps from onlookers all too sure of what they were about to see. Calls for him to drop the knife came from behind the flashing lights.  “I can’t do that, man,” Timothy can be heard yelling, trying to hold back tears. Eyes glassy, his face was twisted. Timothy strained to make out the faces of the officers yelling, like a child unable to makeout his parents in the audience at a school play. Just then, two thunderclaps came from behind the patrol cars. Timothy slumped to the ground, the knife bounced on the concrete. Among the shrieks and crying, one bystander yelled, her voice cracking, “You killed him! You didn’t have to kill him.” The protests were international news, just as Ferguson, Baltimore, and Minneapolis had been years before. Videos of young people protesting Timothy’s death inundated social media. So did images of the police, who preached, but did not practice, restraint. The mayor came to speak the second night, while promoting calm and peaceful protest he was drown out by the pulsing and increasingly aggressive chants of “F**k you, May-or.”  On the third night, the protest had grown and the energy intensified. The hamfisted response from the city and the media coverage of the first two nights pulled otherwise apathetic people out of their homes and into the streets. As the sun set, thousands of people milled about the swollen park facing the police headquarters. The crowds’ aggitation increased during that hot and humid night, led by an impassioned speaker who artfully laid out decades of injustice met with an unrequited response. The late summer sun was setting, and people’s impotent frustration was begining to boil over. That’s when the crowd’s phones went off. It was the city’s emergency alert system warning that an area fifteen blocks away should be avoided. There had been another “officer involved shooting.” The speaker wasted no time mobilizing the pent up irritability of those assembled. Seen from above, the park drained like a burst pipe as people ran with their homemade signs fluttering behind them, like samaras caught in a draft. Arriving on the scene from the south, protestors saw police lights coming closer from the north, but there were no cops, no crowd, no body to avoid where the alert system warned. Confusion and conspiracy swept through the crowd.  The alert was a spoof, a false flag, an opportunity to sow chaos from a malevolent actor–and it had done its job. The police, responding to the same notification, drew closer to a distrustful, angry crowd tired of waiting for answers. Links from the podcast commentary The new "spoofing" scam: national emergency alerts. (Assoc. of American Universities) What went wrong with Hawaii’s false emergency alert. (CNN) Hawaii governor didn’t correct false missile alert sooner because he didn’t know his Twitter password. (Washington Post) “Chaos is the point”: Russian hackers and trolls grow stealthier in 2020. (New York Times) This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.justicetech.download

  10. 03/03/2022

    40 Futures: v1.01 Tasteless

    40 Futures is a speculative fiction series about the criminal justice system. Tasteless Jeff took a bite of his morning cereal and he sensed something was wrong. Chewing the milk-logged flakes, he couldn’t find the sweetness of the blueberries. Looking down at the bowl, he lazily watched the fruit bob in the milk as he prodded the blue morsels with his spoon. He lamented to himself that blueberries were being ushered to the flavor graveyard where tomatoes and avocados already rested.  That’s when it hit him. “No, no, no,” he said with increased panic in his voice as he dropped his spoon into the bowl. He rushed to the bedroom where his phone was plugged in. The screen was filled with texts and missed calls from his parole officer. At the bottom of the screen was a calendar reminder: “Parole Check-in.” His head hung low and he let out a sigh as he ran his finger along the state-issued computer-brain interface behind his left ear. As a condition of his release, the court ordered incremental sensory deprivation to swiftly punish any non-criminal violations, like missing a meeting with his PO.  “Last time, I couldn’t see the color green,” he muttered to no one in particular. “This time they took sweetness. “At least in jail, I could enjoy a blueberry.” Links from the podcast commentary When your freedom depends on an app. (Gizmodo, not The Appeal as I incorrectly said in the commentary) Chile: Pioneering the protection of neurorights. (UNESCO) Brain chip firm Neuralink lines up clinical trial in humans. (Guardian) Parole programs find benefit in swift-and-certain. (ABA Journal) This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.justicetech.download

  11. 02/24/2022

    40 Futures: v1.00 Read_Me

    tl;dr: I’m launching a speculative fiction series about the criminal justice system. It’s called 40 Futures. This email kicks off volume one. You’ll receive a short story, vignette, or fictional news article with a complementary podcast every Thursday for 10 weeks. If you want to know more, keep reading. For years, I’ve written about technology and its impact on people ensnared by the justice system. As a journalist, I wrote about stories as they happened. As an opinion writer and researcher, I tried to warn against or promote a particular future. However, writing over the past decade, I’ve watched a generation’s most troubling concerns, like algorithmic bias and consumer surveillance, go largely unheeded as our democratic institutions calcified and novel companies treated our rights and privacy with the abandon of a Bourbon Street reveler hunting for more beads. This is to say, my non-fiction writing has increasingly felt detached from—and sometimes irrelevant to—the reality and institutions it hoped to impact. Simply put: my writing was feeling more like fiction. With this realization, I had two choices: run away or embrace it. I chose the latter. Last summer, I started to write a speculative fiction series about the criminal justice system. This departure has helped me understand the far-off consequences of our actions and why it’s important for us to be bending that arc of history now. I hope it will do the same for you, while keeping you entertained. What’s coming is a collection of speculations about how technology and science will impact the criminal justice system in years to come. Packaged as vignettes, short stories, and fictional news articles, each is a glimpse at what’s over the horizon. Some of these guesses, I suspect, will be proven right or wrong before the decade is out. Others will take more time for the science to catch up with the application. However, as human trials of computer-brain interfaces are promised this year, countries argue over neurological privacy rights, and the datafication of the human experience intensifies, now is the time to talk about what these events will mean for our justice systems for generations to come. In total, I aim to write 40 different futures. This started as a small project where I wrote 40 one sentence provocations about where science and tech could take the criminal justice system and the people in it. After sharing that draft with friends, I was then pushed (h/t Keith Porcaro) to turn each into a story. So, with one published piece of fiction to my name, I thought, “Why not write 40?” I have two specific rules guiding this project. First, the science and technology I write about needs to have a root in the present. I did not want to create new tech from whole cloth or break the laws of science for any of these stories. I wanted our current scientific understanding to be a starting point, even if it is theoretical. Second, the ethics in each story, whether that of the characters or the society itself, need to track the bounds of right and wrong as they currently are. In both cases, these stories presume we are on a scientific and ethical trajectory without a significant rupture in the near future. This might prove to be the least correct assumption I make in this project. However, it was an important guardrail to provide focus and grounding. Ultimately, I hope this collection will expand the audience of people interested in these topics and inform the conversations we’re having. Many of the technologies in these stories already exist, but haven’t made it into our communities yet. Others, I strongly suspect, are just around the corner. In either instance, the stories I’ve written are each a reminder that, except in rare cases, technology exacerbates existing power dynamics in our society. If that is something we don’t like, then it is our job to provide adverse pressure to these seemingly inevitable trends. Otherwise, we will find ourselves alongside the characters in these stories. To start, I am releasing ten tales over ten weeks as volume one of this project. Each will publish Thursday mornings in written form and as a podcast where I read the story and provide commentary, which explains how today’s reality gets us to the future I write about. This will not interfere with Monday’s regular newsletter. I’m not sure what will come of this project, but I’m curious to know your reaction to it. I welcome you to reply to these emails or on Twitter to let me know what you think. Like anything else I write, I hope that this collection will add to discussions about technology and justice and increase the number of people who care about the doors we are opening today and where they may take us in the future. Thank you for reading. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.justicetech.download

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40 vignettes about the future of criminal justice. www.justicetech.download

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  • Creator
    Jason Tashea
  • Years Active
    2K
  • Episodes
    11
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © Jason Tashea
  • Show Website
    40 Futures