Marketplace All-in-One Police departments quietly disable AI-generated report safeguards
Sep 4, 2025
Takendra Parmar, an investigative journalist for Mother Jones, dives into the controversial use of AI software Draft One by police departments. The tool, designed to summarize body camera footage into incident reports, raises serious questions about transparency and accountability. Many departments are quietly disabling safeguards, potentially leaving defense attorneys in the dark about the origin of these reports. Parmar sheds light on the ethical implications of this technology and its impact on the justice system, highlighting a worrying trend in law enforcement.
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AI Writes Police Incident Reports
- Axon created DraftOne to turn police camera recordings into AI-written incident reports.
- The tool can produce reports with little or no human intervention, raising transparency concerns.
Departments Disabled Built-In Safeguards
- Takendra Parmar FOIA'd departments and found many had disabled Axon's human-edit and disclosure safeguards.
- Departments turned off headers/footers and minimum-edit requirements that signaled AI use.
Company Added Disclosure Then Showed How To Turn It Off
- Axon emailed departments that it added a transparency header/footer but also explained how to disable it.
- Lafayette police received that email and were told they could easily turn the feature off in settings.