US prisons mull AI to analyse inmate phone calls

A file photo of a death row inmate using a phone from his cell in the East Block during a media tour of California’s Death Row at San Quentin State Prison in San Quentin, California. — Reuters

WASHINGTON/LOS ANGELES: For people like Heather Bollin, a 43-year-old woman in Texas engaged to a man who is currently incarcerated, constant surveillance is a fact of life: the three daily phone calls they have together are subject to monitoring by prison officials.

“We are never able to communicate without being under surveillance,” she told the Thomson Reuters Foundation in a phone interview, asking that the prison her fiance is in remain anonymous because she fears retaliation.