Did You Know Maine Police Reports Could Soon Be Written By AI?

It's one of the most grueling and time-consuming parts about being a police officer- paperwork. You weren't expecting that answer, were you?

Well, it's true. For every incident that police officers respond to there is often a mountain of paperwork that goes along with it. While necessary for documenting incidents and crime, this paperwork is often cumbersome and can be, in some cases, incredibly time consuming.

According to an article published by the Kennebec Journal, one Maine county could soon see those police reports being penned by artificial intelligence. The newspaper goes on to report that the Commissioners for Somerset County Sheriff's Office have given the initial OK to make the move to AI.

The KJ is reporting that the overall cost of the AI supported software and body cameras has come in a lot higher than expected, the five commissioners in Somerset County still gave their unanimous approval of the $840,000 contract.

Officials believe that the cost is well worth the amount of time that this switch will save their deputies in doing paperwork and will allow much more time for them to focus on actual police work in the community.

The expenditure is set to include new AI powered body cameras for all the county's detectives, patrol deputies and even some corrections officers. Additionally, these new cameras will use AI software to help draft a 'template' of a police report. Deputies can go in after-the-fact and make edits and add-on as necessary.

While there has been some national pushback on these new systems, primarily about the accuracy of the automatically generated reports, Somerset County still seems poised to make the move.