After football practice Monday evening, 16-year-old Taki Allen was eating a bag of chips outside Kenwood High School when he was quickly surrounded by police officers with their weapons drawn, who ordered him to get on the ground.
The officers were tipped off by administrators, who received a warning from the school’s AI alert system that Allen was holding an object believed to be a gun, which turned out to be a bag of chips.
When asked about concerns over the technology at a press conference Thursday, Rogers rebuked the idea of a comprehensive evaluation of the system, suggesting that she and her staff regularly review it.
“It’s truly unfortunate — we never want any student, whether it’s during school hours or not, to be in a situation that is frightening,” Rogers said. “But it is important for us to remind everyone that the purpose of the system is to keep all of our schools safe, all of our students safe.”
Rogers added that the program “did what it was supposed to do” by sending an alert to school administrators and safety officers, who then worked to verify the alert’s validity.
Omnilert, the company that developed the security software, said in a statement that the alert was a “false positive” but that the system responded as it was designed.
In the days since the incident, community members and lawmakers have called for a review of the county schools’ use of Omnilert’s AI monitoring system.
“We understand how upsetting this was for the individual that was searched as well as the other students who witnessed the incident,” wrote Kenwood High School Principal Kate Smith in a statement following the incident, “our counselors will provide direct support to the students who were involved.”
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