The Problems with Pretrial Risk Assessment Tools

Risk assessment tools are billed as objective predictors of human behavior critical for reducing jail populations. But instead of providing an antidote to discrimination, pervasive human error, and mass incarceration, risk assessment tools perpetuate racial and economic bias, junk science, and the criminalization of poverty. 

People are complex individuals with their own circumstances, motivations, and choices - and no tool can accurately predict human behavior.