Left: Porcha Woodruff and her family (Law&Crime has opted to blur the faces of the minor children). Right: Porcha Woodruff. (Images via court filing).
A woman who says she was wrongfully arrested after facial recognition technology misidentified her as a suspect in a carjacking and robbery — while she was eight months pregnant — is suing the police department that detained her.
Porcha Woodruff, 32, has filed a lawsuit against the city of Detroit and Detective LaShauntia Oliver with the Detroit Police Department over her Feb. 16 arrest and detention. According to a federal lawsuit, police showed up at Woodruff’s home at around 7:50 a.m. that day, as she was getting her kids, ages 12 and 6, ready for school.
She was told that she was being arrested for an alleged robbery and carjacking that took place days earlier, on Jan. 29, at a gas station. Surveillance video showed a woman returning a stolen cellphone to the gas station, and facial recognition technology returned an identification of Woodruff. That woman on the surveillance video, however, did not appear pregnant, according to the complaint.
The robbery and carjacking victim apparently also identified Woodruff out of a “six-pack” picture lineup, which featured a photo of Woodruff from a 2015 arrest — and not, her lawyers note, her 2021 driver’s license, to which police purportedly had access. According to the lawsuit, Detective Oliver deliberately left out the fact that the facial recognition photo was eight years old and that a more recent driver’s license picture was available because a magistrate would have otherwise possibly denied the arrest warrant for Woodruff’s arrest.
At the time of her arrest — and just days after the alleged crime — she was eight months pregnant, a fact she says was visibly apparent at the time of both her arrest and the robbery.
“Are you kidding, carjacking?” Woodruff asked the officers at the time of her arrest, according to the complaint. “Do you see that I am eight (8) months pregnant?”
After her arrest, while speaking with Oliver, Woodruff asked if the victim — who allegedly engaged in sexual intercourse with the woman who was the alleged accomplice to the carjacking — said the suspect was in the same condition as her.
“Did the victim say the female was 8 months pregnant?” Woodruff asked, according to the complaint.
“No,” Oliver replied.
After she was booked into Detroit police custody, Woodruff, who had developed gestational diabetes from her pregnancy, says that she “was not able to consume the foods or beverages offered because of her diagnosis.” The complaint also says that she was forced to either sit on a concrete bench or stand upright because “there were no beds or chairs available.”
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She was released from custody around 11 hours after her arrest, after being arraigned on robbery and carjacking charges, according to the complaint.
“Once released, [Woodruff] was taken to St. John’s Hospital by her fiancé because she was suffering from stomach tightness and pain, whole body pains, headaches, and body weakness,” the complaint says. She was diagnosed with “a low heart rate because of dehydration, and given two bags of fluid intravenously.”
She also “learned that she was having contractions due to stress from that day’s events,” according to the complaint.
When Woodruff appeared in court around a month later, prosecutors dismissed her case for lack of evidence, the complaint says.
In addition to claims of malicious prosecution and intentional infliction of emotional distress, Woodruff, who is Black, is suing Detroit and the detective under a state law that prohibits race-based denial of access to public services, and false arrest and imprisonment.
“Defendant Detroit allowed Detective Oliver and others to engage in a pattern of racial discrimination of Plaintiff and other Black citizens by using facial recognition technology practices proven to misidentify Black citizens at a higher rate than others in violation of the equal protection guaranteed by [state law],” the complaint says.
The Detroit Police Department has said it is looking into the matter.
“I have reviewed the allegations contained in the lawsuit,” Chief James E. White said in a statement emailed to Law&Crime. “They are very concerning. We are taking this matter very seriously, but we cannot comment further at this time due to the need for additional investigation. We will provide further information once additional facts are obtained and we have a better understanding of the circumstances.”
You can read the complaint, below.
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