Should Law Enforcement Punish You For What You Might Do In The Future?

The Intersection Of Blackness, Criminal Justice, And AI Technology

As a Black man, chills ran down my spine the first time I saw Minority Report. The movie was based in the year 2054, where police used technology to arrest and convict people before they commit a crime.

Lost in all the action and dystopian screenplay was the answer to the fundamental question posed by the story:

Is it right to punish a person based on what they might do in the future? And if so, what factors determine who is most at risk?

American Apartheid

Jim Crow was America’s answer to the question of what to do with Black slaves once it’s Civil War was won. Whites were both unwilling to live in shared communities with Blacks and refused to elevate them to the same social and economic status of whites.

To prevent both from happening, a caste system of racial segregation was codified. This aggregate of laws, policies, procedures, and customs drew boundaries around where Blacks could live, work, and how they…