In a World First, AI Lawyer Will Help Defend a Real Case In the US (interestingengineering.com) 68
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Interesting Engineering: A program trained with the help of artificial intelligence is set to help a defendant contest his case in a U.S. court next month, New Scientist reported. Instead of addressing the court, the program, which will run on a smartphone, will supply appropriate responses through an earpiece to the defendant, who can then use them in the courtroom. [...] In a new development, a company, DoNotPay, which has been training AI, has now claimed that its program will be able to defend a speeding case that is due to be heard in a U.S. court in February 2023. Identities of the individual and the court remain under wraps, but we do know that the defendant is contesting a speeding ticket.
Since this is the AI's very first case, DoNotPay is ready to take on the burden of punishment if the AI's advice does not help the client. Since it is a speeding ticket, DoNotPay will pay for the speeding ticket. If it wins though, it will have a massive victory to its credit. The real big question, though, is whether this is legal in the court of law. CEO Joshua Browder told New Scientist that it had found a court where listening via an earpiece was within the rules, even though it might not be in the spirit of the rules.
Since this is the AI's very first case, DoNotPay is ready to take on the burden of punishment if the AI's advice does not help the client. Since it is a speeding ticket, DoNotPay will pay for the speeding ticket. If it wins though, it will have a massive victory to its credit. The real big question, though, is whether this is legal in the court of law. CEO Joshua Browder told New Scientist that it had found a court where listening via an earpiece was within the rules, even though it might not be in the spirit of the rules.
I support this wholeheartedly (Score:3)
You might win less cases overall, but your net take-home win will be higher (on average) than if you use a lawyer.
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This is a speeding ticket. Your best scenario 'take-home win' is zero dollars, because losing means that you need to pay money for your civil infraction.
Though, yes, in any outcome, it will have been cheaper than hiring a real human.
Re: I support this wholeheartedly (Score:1)
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Worst case is you get contempt of court if the AI was accidentally trained on State of Georgia vs Denver Fenton Allen
"nothing more than revenue generation" (Score:1)
Some people think that in addition to that, speeding ticket fines (and other consequences, such as what they do to insurance premiums), provide a deterrence to speeding. i.e. these advocates' opinion is that people dislike the expenses. It's not just that the government generates revenue; it's that the speeder has to pay it! The revenue is at the speeder's expense rather than socialized/amortized over all driver
Coaching? (Score:2)
I am not a lawyer. However, this feels awfully akin to being allowed to coach a witness. What is the difference between this and having a real lawyer communicate with the defendant through an earpiece?
Re:Coaching? (Score:4, Informative)
The defendant is representing themselves.
Self Driving and Defending Cars (Score:4, Funny)
The defendant is representing themselves.
That might become truer than anyone expects as we start to roll out self-driving cars and we end up with AI lawyers defending AI drivers.
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If the glove won't fit (Score:3, Funny)
the fist inside could *not* have swung past where the next car's nose begins!
Most legalese is repeated boilerplate, but I still wouldn't mash up a bunch of successful opinions and arguments and hope for the best.
But Can It Bribe A Judge (Score:2, Funny)
Or jury tamper ?
Really you don't think the court system runs on the law or logic?
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Cynicism is not clever. It's not even realistic, because the reality is that most things work as intended, most of the time; that's why it's so grating when they don't. Blind cynicism is as stupid and self-defeating as blind optimism, and both are lazy, because they substitute a trivial pre-formed idea ("everything's rotten" or "everything's great") for any sort of honest analysis or critical thought.
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Say that after the first time you pay to have a ticket fixed.
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We aren't given any details, unfortunately, but that is a perfectly reasonable assumption. AI is, however, a very broad field. You might be interested in expert systems, which actually can make deductive and inductive inferences.
Courts follow the Law (Score:2)
Really you don't think the court system runs on the law or logic?
I always thought the court system was pretty good at following the law, or at least the empirical one that whoever has the largest bank balance generally wins.
Unless you have an overabundance of free time (Score:1)
It's not worth actually fighting speeding tickets. Unless it is vastly different in other states, here in Florida you can usually plead no contest, pay the fine and not get any points on your license. There's even lawyers who will do this process for you, which I guess only makes sense if your time is more valuable than what the lawyer is charging.
An even easier way to avoid having to deal with speeding tickets is simply to not speed, but I figure that's probably an unpopular opinion here on the interwebs
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An even easier way to avoid having to deal with speeding tickets is simply to not speed, but I figure that's probably an unpopular opinion here on the interwebs.
It's an unpopular opinion anywhere. Have you seen a highway? If everyone is below the speed limit, it means there's a traffic jam. (And you might be contributing to it!)
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Sorry, you can't prevent traffic jams by speeding like a selfish jerk with no regard for the safety of others.
Traffic jams can be prevented [popularmechanics.com] by even just a few people not acting like selfish jerks and keeping appropriate distance between the cars in front and behind them.
Speeding is not the answer. Stop breaking the law.
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Stop supporting immoral laws and pretending you are the good guy. Any knowledge you bring to the table is spoiled by your attitude.
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Speeding is an immoral law? Selfishness isn't a virtual, asshole.
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Have you ever tried being nicer to people during an argument (of any kind) and seeing what happened? Food for thought.
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Some trash doesn't deserve respect. If you think speed limits are "immoral", you're definitely a selfish asshole.
We had a kid in my neighborhood killed this past weekend by a selfish asshole. Like you, he thought it was his "right" to go as fast as he wanted and ignore stoplights.
So, no. No respect or common courtesy for you. If you want it, you're going to have to learn to extend it to others first.
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USA, right coast. Adult daughter and I have collected speeding tickets from many of the coastal states here. I always recommend a local attorney who specializes in traffic court. Every state / county has it's own path for the best outcome. Twenty years ago through good luck and a local attorney I was clocked at 115 in a 65 and eventually pled guilty to Improper Equipment, about $200 for the attorney and the fine, no points.
Re:Unless you have an overabundance of free time (Score:5, Insightful)
Are you trying to tell us you're an asshole, that what I'm getting out of your post.
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You could try not breaking the law.
115 in a 65? They should have locked you up and permanently revoked your license. You're going to get someone killed.
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It's always the same with tech research (Score:3)
The original goal was lofty, but over time, any new technology is used for purposes that are nefarious or bring no value to society.
Nuclear research for affordable power > atomic bomb
Internet for interconnected defense and academic research > TikTok
CD for better music on media that doesn't wear out > AOL CDs
AI to assist humans and cure diseases > killing jobs and automated lawyers
Silver lining: any case defended by an AI is lost income for a real lawyer. I'm all for that.
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All scientific advances have the potential for good or evil. However, your claim that nuclear research into beneficial uses of nuclear energy led to the atomic bomb is well off the mark. It lagged well behind the development of nuclear weapons. Indeed, the very first experimental small scale nuclear reactor for generation of electricity was started up a full six years after the first atomic bombs were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and even post-d
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If you consider the timing, research on weapons was very much the priority in the early 1940s for obvious reasons.
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Fine shmine (Score:2)
Back in the day, at least, no one worried about the fine except the uninsured. It was the insurance rate increase that was the actual deterrent. DoNotPay should be paying for that as well.
"I'd like to call my surprise witness now!" (Score:2)
Lol, we have to hope the AI wasn't contaminated with courtroom dramas.
And for some reason I can't get the AI Tailors from Woody Allen's Sleeper out of my mind.
"Murray for the defense, if it please the court. Oy vey, but I have a lot of questions for this witness."
AI? (Score:1)
If the defendant can do this (Score:2)
I’m all for technological progress. Maybe computational power could someday help make justice more just. But, we’re certainly not there yet. Maybe we should keep this part of our system entirely human for a while longer.
Worth considering.
Re:If the defendant can do this (Score:5, Interesting)
If the defendant can do this, so can the judge. And the prosecution. And the jury.
I do admit to being curious as to whether the end-game of all this (decades from now) is a legal system where everyone involved sits down for an interview with an AI, and then the AI cogitates for a while and finally spits out a judgement along with its legal reasoning, and everyone (mostly) agrees to abide by that judgement because the AI does a better job than any human judge or jury could.
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That sounds like the plot to a dystopian fiction novel.
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Doesn't sound too much different than binding arbitration. Corporations already believe the courts are obsolete and should be abolished.
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Maybe this will finally start to erode costs (Score:2)
Legal representation is so expensive these days, that most regular people can't begin to afford them. Justice that is unaffordable is no justice at all. If "AI" can give people a half-decent way to represent themselves in court, maybe those costs will start to come down, and more justice will be available to those who are less than wealthy.
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It's also that as far as speeding and parking tickets (and other small and very common things go), the system is set up to discourage you from seeking justice. In pretty much every country they offer you to pay a reasonable fee if you simply accept the thing, waive all your rights, and go away. The actual fee if you test it in court is much higher. This way, seeking justice comes with a cost and a risk.
Darrell Brooks show 2.0? (Score:2)
Darrell Brooks show 2.0?
Preemptive AI Required (Score:1)
Lawyers won't like this, (Score:2)
Unless politicians keep changing the laws, that is (which they tend to do to serve their corporate puppet masters).
Re: Lawyers won't like this, (Score:2)
Unless politicians keep changing the laws
I worked in a Reference Library at the turn of the Century. Part of our collection was the Consolidated Acts and Regulations (both Federal and for our State) There were more and more new Acts, amendments to existing Acts and more and more Regulations every year. The free shelf space was never enough, we had to shuffle other things around every year: National Standards, Bureau of Statistics publications, the parliamentary records. Nearly half the new stuff was legis
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but that is actually a useful and realistic application for AI, after all this nonsense of AI for scriptwriting or picture creating which in order to be useful needs creativity. AI has no creativity and can only reproduce a combination of applicable learning input, which is precisely what the application of law should be.
Unless politicians keep changing the laws, that is (which they tend to do to serve their corporate puppet masters).
A good solution for a very small problem space, but once you get into the real world lawyering does involve creativity on both the tactical and strategic levels. That being said I am all for AI doing more and more for lawyers on both sides. Judges too.
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I see no intrinsic problem with this.... (Score:2)
Re: I see no intrinsic problem with this.... (Score:2)
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The link you gave doesn't seem to load.
Did the article there address why it should objectively not be allowed, or why people only feel it should not be allowed?
Re: I see no intrinsic problem with this.... (Score:2)
OMFG (Score:2)
Overkill (Score:2)
You don't need an AI to know the following guaranteed winners:
1. Am I being detained?
2. Is this under colour of law?
3. I was travelling, not driving.
Law & Order (Score:1)
I hope Law & Order rips this from the headlines. I want to see Jack McCoy's reaction.
MR (Score:2)
But now, just imagine if we can replace judges with AI too?
And juries? Prosecutors and cops too!
Yes. And then we can finally use AI to implement predictive policing to prevent crime from ever even happening!
strictly being used as a funding device (Score:2)
How Would Courtroom Be Secure? (Score:2)
Do not train the AI on TV lawyers (Score:2)
Just a thought (Score:2)
It never ceases to amaze me how unable, or unwilling, some people are to accept that other jobs are complex as well. Nope, everything else
Alexa, get me out of paying this ticket. (Score:2)