A face search pointed police to Robert Williams. They arrested the wrong man.
Published
Detroit police arrested Robert Williams outside his home, in front of his family, over the theft of watches from a store. Months earlier, an examiner had picked him as a lead from the results of an AI facial-recognition search. After the arrest, a detective concluded Williams was the wrong man. [1] [2] [3]
The short version
- What happened: An AI facial-recognition system returned Williams among possible candidates. An examiner chose him as a lead; a store loss-prevention contractor then picked him from a police photo lineup, and a detective sought an arrest warrant. [3] [4] [5]
- Impact: Williams was arrested, held overnight and released the next day. The charge was later dismissed. [1] [2]
- Why it matters: The search report warned that its lead was not an identification or grounds for arrest. The steps that followed gave that lead much greater weight. [3] [4]
Context: Facial recognition · Police investigation · Detroit, 2018–2020
The incident
In October 2018, five watches were taken from a Shinola store in Detroit. Police sent a still from the surveillance video for a face search. Michigan State Police returned Williams as an investigative lead in March 2019. An examiner later testified that the software produced lists of candidates and she chose Williams after comparing the images herself. A supplemental report rated the still's quality “Poor.” [1] [3] [4] [6]
The report warned that the lead was neither a positive identification nor a basis for arrest on its own. Williams's photo nevertheless went into a six-person lineup. A store loss-prevention contractor picked it. She had seen the surveillance video, but had not witnessed the theft. [3] [5] [7]
In a July 2019 warrant request, a detective called the face-search result a “hit” and described Williams as the suspect. The request said the contractor had reviewed the video and identified him in the lineup. It did not plainly say she had never seen the theft firsthand. A warrant followed, though the public records disagree on its issuance date. Officers arrested Williams on January 9, 2020. [1] [5] [8]
The magistrate later said she thought the contractor had seen the suspect in person. Had she understood that the lineup choice rested on the same video used for the face search, she said, she would not have issued the warrant. This is her sworn account, not a court ruling on Williams's later lawsuit. [8]
What the AI did
The facial-recognition system compared a surveillance still with a photo database and returned possible candidates. An examiner chose Williams from those results as a lead for Detroit police. People then assembled the lineup, sought the warrant and made the arrest. The original lead report shows Williams's selection, but the complete candidate lists and scores are not in the public documents reviewed here. [3] [4]
Why it matters
A possible candidate became a police lead, then the basis for a photo lineup. The lineup choice appeared to add support for an arrest warrant. Yet the contractor who chose Williams knew the person in the store only from the video that started the search. The magistrate says that detail would have changed her decision. [4] [5] [7] [8]
The uncertainty attached to the original search became less visible as the lead moved through the investigation. Detroit police later concluded they had arrested the wrong person. The records do not show that the software malfunctioned, that it alone caused the arrest, or why Williams appeared among the candidates. [1] [3] [4]
What happened next
Williams was released on bond on January 10. Detroit's later review says the detective watched an interview video on January 13, decided Williams was not the person in the search lead, and contacted the prosecutor. The charge was dismissed on January 23 without prejudice, meaning it could be brought again. The department's memo cites a witness's failure to appear as the formal reason for dismissal; the dismissal was not an acquittal. [1]
Williams sued the city and the detective. In 2024, the case ended in a settlement requiring Detroit to use stronger rules for face-search leads, photo lineups and arrest requests, and to audit earlier cases. The agreement contains no admission of liability. It requires changes to police practice; it does not establish how well they have worked. [9]
Incident details
For readers who want to inspect the reconstruction
How it worked
Police sent a surveillance image to Michigan State Police for a face search. The software returned candidate photos; an examiner compared them and sent Detroit police one named lead. The later photo lineup gave investigators another apparent link to Williams. But the person who chose his photo had not seen the theft directly. The original warrant request did not make that limitation explicit. [3] [4] [5] [7]
What we know
The search report itself warned against treating the result as a positive identification. Original police records show the July 30 warrant request and an August 24 prosecutor form. Williams was arrested in January. Detroit's own review records that the detective later decided he was not the man sought. [1] [4] [5]
What remains unclear
The exact date the warrant was issued is unclear. Public records give conflicting dates between late August and early September 2019. They agree that a warrant was in place before Williams's January arrest. The signed warrant and criminal docket were not among the public materials inspected for this article. [1] [5] [8]
The full software candidate lists and scores are also unavailable here. We cannot determine from these records whether demographic bias caused this particular wrong lead. The settlement's policy commitments do not establish how well the later safeguards have performed. [3] [9]
Timeline
| Date | What happened |
|---|---|
| October 2018 | Watches are taken from the Shinola store. |
| March 8–11, 2019 | Detroit requests a face search; Michigan State Police sends Williams as an investigative lead. |
| July 30, 2019 | The contractor selects Williams from a photo lineup; a detective dates his warrant request. |
| August–September 2019 | Prosecutor review and the warrant process take place; the judicial issuance date is disputed in the available records. |
| January 9–10, 2020 | Police arrest Williams and release him the next day. |
| January 13–23, 2020 | A detective concludes Williams is not the person sought; the charge is dismissed without prejudice. |
| June 28, 2024 | The court enters the parties' settlement. |
The chronology comes from the original search and police documents, the department's later review, the magistrate's declaration and the settlement. [1] [4] [5] [8] [9]
Sources
Detroit Police Department, memorandum on the Shinola investigation, July 9, 2020. The department's account of the search, warrant, arrest and dismissal, including its later conclusion that Williams was not the man sought. ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎
Robert Williams, “I Did Nothing Wrong. I Was Arrested Anyway,” July 15, 2021. Williams's first-person account of the arrest and detention. ↩︎ ↩︎
Jennifer Coulson, sworn deposition, January 10, 2023. The examiner's account of software candidate lists and her selection of an investigative lead. ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎
Michigan State Police, investigative lead report, March 11, 2019. The original Williams lead and its warning against treating it as an identification or arrest basis. ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎
Detroit Police Department, initial disclosures in Williams v. City of Detroit, records dated 2018–2020. Original warrant request, prosecutor form and later arrest report; the signed judicial warrant is not included in the pages inspected. ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎
Michigan State Police, investigative lead supplemental information, undated. The examiner's image-quality assessment and feature notes. ↩︎
Detective Donald Bussa, sworn depositions, 2022. The investigator's account of the lineup participant, warrant request and what it conveyed. ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎
Magistrate Bari Blake Wood, sworn declaration, May 1, 2023. Her later account of the warrant decision and what she understood about the lineup. ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎
U.S. District Court, stipulated dismissal and settlement agreement, June 28, 2024. The parties' policy commitments, audit requirement and express absence of an admission of liability. ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎