Chief Justice touts AI for quicker, more efficient disposal of cases

By Racquel Porter 

   

Chief Justice Bryan Sykes wants to leverage artificial intelligence as a game changer in the disposition of cases in Jamaica's highest court, through the provision of timely judgments and efficient services.

 

Questioning how the judiciary can provide roles, practices and procedure that are relevant to the courts in the shortest possible time, Justice Sykes stated that judges are unable to accomplish the task.

 

Justice Sykes, speaking at the launch of the Pro-Jam III (3) Project in Kingston on Tuesday morning, asserted that judges just do not have sufficient time.

 

He explained that it is a matter of obtaining the data to support the use of artificial intelligence in the Court of Appeal. 

 

"I think the decisions from the Court of Appeal, if you look at them, you will see that very few of them really break new ground. And I always like to use the example of the Gun Court cases, and in fact, our gun murders [where] 99.9 per cent of the issue is identification. The law in relation to identification is now well settled. It's hardly anything new that can be said, it has been heavily litigated for about three decades. So we now know what the law says. It's a matter of identifying the evidence, and to see whether the evidence matches or comes up to the legal standard. AI can assist with that," he reasoned. 

 

Observing that artificial intelligence relates to pattern recognition, Justice Sykes suggested that AI can be trained to work in the Jamaican legal environment. 

 

"So it can be taught how to go through a transcript and to pick up the evidence in relation to identification and then match it to the legal standard. So technologically, that is not beyond us, it's something that can be done. It's not a substitute for the human beings to read, but it can aid and even make us more efficient in the handling of appeals in the Court of Appeal."

 

The Chief Justice contended that inefficiencies in the legal system negatively affect Jamaica's economy. 

 

"Persons who have started to study these things have indicated that inefficient courts can cost up to 2 per cent of GDP annually. So our GDP is about US$17 billion. The 2 per cent works out roughly $332 million annually. So that is the impact that inefficiency in our legal system can have on an economy." 

 

"So what that means is that every activity that we engage in must be taking us in the direction of net backlog under 5 per cent, gross backlog under 10 per cent, regardless of court - whether it's Court of Appeal, Supreme Court, Parish Court, it doesn't matter. That's the standard," Justice Sykes charged.