MIDDLEBURG HEIGHTS, Ohio — Middleburg Heights Police are using facial recognition technology to assist them in shoplifting cases.
After one case, on March 30, police received surveillance footage from the BJ’s Wholesale Club on W. 130th Street.
Police say the man in a white jacket and red pants took PlayStation headsets out of their boxes, stuffed them into his jacket, and walked out the door with the nearly $500 in loot.
Loss Prevention didn’t stop the man.
“They didn’t realize it initially, I think it was after the fact,” Middleburg Heights Interim Police Chief Robert Swanson said.
An officer had two photos of the suspect’s face from the images provided.
“He ran them through a program called Clearview AI that we have,” Swanson said.
Clearview AI is a facial recognition software.
Swanson says they’ve also used it in felonious assault and human trafficking cases.
"It scrapes information from public databases, it goes through millions and millions of images, and it takes it from Instagram, Facebook, a lot of social media platforms, and news articles," Swanson said.
But Swanson says his officers only use it as a tool to help identify a person.
“We have to per our policy All Clearview AI does is generate an investigative lead. And that kind of points us in the right direction,” Swanson said.
The chief says the officers have a mobile version of the technology that lets them take a snapshot of someone while they’re trying to identify them in the field.
"It shows that this department is using the tool in kind of a broad range of cases, CSU Law Professor Jonathan Witmer-Rich said.
Witmer-Rich says there are real privacy concerns with facial recognition technology, as well as concerns about what happens if it doesn’t identify the right person.
“Because you’re looking through so many images, even very small error rates can result in very common false matches,” Witmer-Rich said.
Middleburg Heights police have a facial recognition technology policy. Officers must not use it to harass or intimidate anyone, but the policy offers considerable leeway.
“First of all this is a new technology and it’s always a good idea to take small steps instead of just diving into the deep end with a new technology so maybe you would restrict the kind of cases,” Witmer-Rich.
In the shoplifting case, police say they verified the man’s identity through a BMV photo and issued an arrest warrant.
Two weeks later, police say the guy returned to the same store wearing the same clothes and was arrested and charged.
Chief Swanson calls this case a success.
“I would say it’s a success. I mean, what used to take us weeks months in some cases we’d never get information now can be done in minutes,” Swanson said.
