West Midlands police chief quits over AI hallucination

https://www.theregister.com/2026/01/19/copper_chief_cops_it_after/

by YeGoblynQueenne • 6 months ago

109 113 6 months ago

theregister.com

bell-cot2• 6 months ago

A wonderful precedent. Now if only it could be applied to other professions, and lower-profile cases...

JanSolo• 6 months ago

Agreed. All humans need to learn to fact-check their sources. Especially those in decision-making roles.

Ylpertnodi• 6 months ago

"Trust but verify', very often equals 'fuck it, I'll do it myself'.

hamdingers• 6 months ago

I worry the precedent is backwards, the source of the error suffers no repercussions.

In areas where we move away from humans doing work into humans checking the work of agents, we should be worried about an arrangement where the human is present only as an accountability sink for the mistakes of the agent.

mattmanser• 6 months ago

It's not clear what happened from this news report.

His error in judgement may have been he hadn't investigated the problem sufficiently. Then falsely testified to the government. That's a big deal on its own.

The officer involved might have been fired or reprimanded, we don't know from that article.

phyzome• 6 months ago

I'd rather that the cops who actually used the AI slop had been reprimanded, and the chief had been kept...

I wonder if this was one of those Google AI "summaries" that people are so happy to trust.

embedding-shape• 6 months ago

I wonder if this was one of those Google AI "summaries" that people are so happy to trust.

"Microsoft Co Pilot" (sic) is being called out as the tool that was used.

Does Microsoft have anything similar to Google's AI summaries on Bing or inside other Microsoft products, like Windows?

nottorp• 6 months ago

With both MS and Google pushing "AI" on everything, it's possible no one realized they're reading an "AI" summary and the Copilot branding was what was on Word.

Hey btw, how do "AI" summaries on Google search look? Exactly like honest [1] results, like they did with ads?

[1] If there are any honest results left on a Google search. My impression is everything is from content mills, be it "AI" or human slop.

tetris11• 6 months ago

Same. The fact that he stepped down harkens back to a time when officials took responsibility for their gaffs. Given the current pedigree of public officials, I'd rather that he stayed on, instead of being replaced by someone worse

throwaway858252• 6 months ago

It wasn't because of the AI hallucinations but the intent of the document the hallucinations appeared in.

jaapz• 6 months ago

And the fact that he initially blatantly lied about AI being used

throwaway858252• 6 months ago

There were multiple failings.

chrisjj6• 6 months ago

We do not know he lied.

alistairSH2• 6 months ago

But the cop who generated the report is still on staff and free to do more idiotic things in the future?

bell-cot2• 6 months ago

Probably? But across a large org, "a worker bee doing X cost the previous CEO his job" is a far stronger lesson than "a worker bee doing X cost him his job".

mitchitized• 6 months ago

I'd say the exact opposite, "doing this will get YOU fired" is the strongest possible message.

alistairSH2• 6 months ago

It’s a strong message to senior management to insert proper oversight.

It’s not a strong message to line employees to use their brains.

jimnotgym• 6 months ago

An organisational administrator can stop their team using Copilot and tell them not to use other tools. If the officer had used tools after that then they should indeed be disciplined

spankalee• 6 months ago

A gen AI tool doesn't spontaneously open up and say "Hey, Maccabi Tel Aviv fans are hooligans". The intent is usually from the user. It's quite possible that the officer prompted the AI while in Word with something like "Help me write a reason we should ban these fans".

jolmg3• 6 months ago

stop their team using Copilot
If the officer had used tools after

They didn't use tools. They did a Google search and assumed the results didn't originate from an AI tool.

The lesson from the article is that even if you don't use AI tools, AI content may still creep into your investigation.

oldjim7982• 6 months ago

The police should be banned from using AI in any form

lloydatkinson• 6 months ago

Just wait till the UK police decide to outsource social media Wrong Think detection to LLM's.

hexbin0103• 6 months ago

They are likely already doing it

Kapura• 6 months ago

this is true of many fields.

secondcoming• 6 months ago

True.

The judiciary are using it too: https://www.scottishlegal.com/articles/overwhelming-support-...

add-sub-mul-div• 6 months ago

The Judiciary's New Clothes

blibble• 6 months ago

everyone else too

simianwords• 6 months ago

the police should also be banned from using google, reddit and youtube.

oldjim7982• 6 months ago

Yes

LeifCarrotson• 6 months ago

I'm not sure I'd go that far, but they should at least be aware of the credibility of information sources they're using to making professional decisions upon. Your world gets very small if you can only gather information that you see with your own eyes, but they do need to validate things they "learn" from Google/FB/Reddit/Youtube/non-official sources. I was unimpressed by the chief's letter:

In preparation for the force response to the HMICFRS inquiry into this matter, on Friday afternoon I became aware that the erroneous result concerning the West Ham v Maccabi Tel Aviv match arose as result of a use of Microsoft Co Pilot[sic]. Both ACC O’Hara and I had, up until Friday afternoon, understood that the West Ham match had only been identified through the use of Google.

My 3rd grader knows better than to do research based solely on a Google summary snippet, and even understands that just because a linked article under the search agrees with the search that this doesn't mean it's true.

I would have expected that if the chief's staff were investigating rumors of a riot in a stadium 3 hours away, they'd call their counterparts at the police station in that location to get police reports from the incident.

They have trivial access to those official reports. They shouldn't be reliant on journalists sensationalizing, and opining the events for their news articles. They shouldn't be reliant on a search engine that exists to sell ads for those news organizations. They certainly shouldn't trust "Co Pilot" to figure out what may or may not have happened! It seems obvious to me that the tool could happily generate a police report from whole cloth.

flooow2• 6 months ago

This story has been horribly misreported in the mainstream media. Suffice to say that the AI gaff was the very thinnest pretence for a politically motivated firing. The true reason being that West Midlands Police made the UK govt furious for suggesting that maybe Maccabi were violent thugs rather than persecuted victims, which goes against prevailing official narratives WRT Israel.

I have only found one news source that actual tells the story properly (warning, long read): https://whispering.media/the-maccabi-gospel/

qweiopqweiop• 6 months ago

I'll share my opposing view point. Whilst Maccabi fans may contain hooligans, that's not really surprising for football fans. Fans travelling within Europe cause trouble all the time.

What is different, is that Maccabi fans were blocked from attending by the police/council when no other sets of fans are given the same treatment. Secondly, the police were aware of plans within the Birmingham Muslim community to attack said fans. Instead of coming down on these people planning violence, they decided to avoid the situation entirely.

Furthermore, they ignored evidence from the Amsterdam authorities who haven't said the Maccabi fans were as riotous as you claim. Using AI hallucinations was just the cherry on the cake.

dundarious7• 6 months ago

when no other sets of fans are given the same treatment

This treatment is often doled out to clubs' fans. Even in Tel Aviv.

pydry3• 6 months ago

They were banned because during a match in Amsterdam they shouted racist abuse, sang racist songs, did plenty of vandalism, threw an innocent member of the public into a river and assaulted Muslim taxi drivers.

Moreover, most of them have military training which makes the racist abuse, vandalism and assault that much more terrifying.

If an antisemitic football team was half that bad they'd be hauled off to prison never mind banned from football matches.

g8oz• 6 months ago

Maccabee fans in Amsterdam - indulged in racist chants like "Death to Arabs" and "There are no more babies in Gaza" (because they're dead)

- Beat an Arab taxi driver

- Tore a Palestinian flag from a woman's balcony and attempted to break in to the apartment.

After they FAFOd and got their asses handed to them the media treated them like the second coming of Anne Frank.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/November_2024_Amsterdam_riots.

The "media reporting" section of the article is particularly illuminating - a Zionist influence operation was in full swing afterwards to minimize the bad behavior of the Israeli fans.

Furthermore Maccabee fans have a reputation for hooliganism in Israel itself. So the West Midlands assessment was eminently reasonable.

The manufactured storm over the decision again showcases a broader pattern of insidious Zionist influence over Western institutions. The decision was lawyered to death in a manner only Israelis get the benefit of.

Matl3• 6 months ago

OP is sharing facts, not 'view points'.

beejiu• 6 months ago

It later transpired the real reason the Police wanted to ban the group:

"West Midlands Police did have "high confidence intelligence" that members of the local community in Birmingham were planning to arm themselves to attack Maccabi supporters."

https://news.sky.com/story/ai-evidence-a-fake-match-and-misl...

physicsguy3• 6 months ago

And yet the SAB downgraded the risk to fans from High to Medium in their report...

gadders6• 6 months ago

Well, that's not accurate either.

Because the police didn't want to upset the "local community" (which is predominantly Muslim), they hunted around for reasons to ban them as that was easier than EG enforcing the law and stopping people getting attacked by mobs.

It's just more two tier policing in the UK.

YeGoblynQueenne4• 6 months ago

Do you mean the West Midlands is predominantly muslim?

tome7• 6 months ago

Maccabi Tel Aviv have been travelling to Europa League away matches every few weeks:

https://www.uefa.com/uefaeuropaleague/clubs/57477--m-tel-avi...

Why is it only Birmingham that saw fit to ban them?

hexbin0103• 6 months ago

Why is it only Birmingham that saw fit to ban them?

It's a complete mystery...

bhouston3• 6 months ago

Why is it only Birmingham that saw fit to ban them?

Huh? Amsterdam is also looking to ban them:

https://www.trtworld.com/article/86ebbfd8eada

The main European football association also found them guilty recently of anti-Arab racist chants and fined, gave them a "suspended one-match away fan ban":

https://news.sky.com/story/maccabi-tel-aviv-fc-given-fan-ban...

bhouston3• 6 months ago

Maccabi fans were also found guilty by the UEFA governing body just in December of racist chants (referring to an Arab-Israeli as a "terrorist") in a separate episode:

https://www.espn.com/soccer/story/_/id/47336888/maccabi-tel-...

And their fans did a racist rampage again Palestinian Arabs just the other day:

https://www.newarab.com/news/maccabi-fans-attack-palestinian...

PaulRobinson• 6 months ago

Talk about a misleading headline.

After months of widespread protests across the UK, the police in West Midlands looked at multiple intelligence reports and concluded that protests and violence would be inevitable if the match went ahead and fans from Maccabi Tel Aviv were allowed to travel to Aston Villa's ground. Their advice was that away fans should not be granted tickets to the event.

The issues at the core of this decision are about alleged antisemitism rising in the UK, presumed violence of a group of fans with an uncertain intelligence picture, and how decisions were made with these analyses trading off against each other.

He resigned because of that process leading to the Home Secretary no longer having confidence in him.

I don't think the misleading of the select committee would have helped him, but he gave an answer based on all that he knew at that point in time, with the best of intentions. The fact he hadn't been briefed isn't his fault. The fact he leaned into a decision that had wide-ranging political ramifications without first opening up the discussion to more stakeholders is his fault, and it's why he's no longer in the job.

gtirloni• 6 months ago

Talk about a misleading headline.

Something I always expect from TheRegister.

gadders6• 6 months ago

>that protests and violence would be inevitable

God forbid they enforce the law.

physicsguy3• 6 months ago

Come on, that's not the full story at all.

The body that made the recommendation, the "Safety and Advisory Board" met several times and changed their report multiple times. When it was finally released they redacted large parts of the decision making process including saying that:

* The police didn't want the match to go ahead (prior to any evidence for that)

* Two local Muslim councillors (Labour and Lib Dem) had been lobbying against it going ahead with one saying (quote) 'we are the voice of the people'

Additionally:

* They edited the report saying risk to local muslim residents went from Medium -> High

* They edited the report saying risk to fans travelling went from High -> Medium.

* They adjusted the number of police needed from 1200 -> 5000 in order to try and justify the decision.

When the full unredacted report was leaked, then they were put on the back foot and falsely threw out that they'd got the evidence (including of local muslim residents in Amsterdam being thrown in a river, which didn't happen) from a Dutch Police report, which wasn't true.

Anyone with a brain in the police should know that recommending cancellation or banning away fans from a Champion's League game is a major international news story. The chief of police needs to be on top of the details and 100% sure that the evidence is there.

pydry3• 6 months ago

The evidence was there. They committed plenty of violence and were loudly and openly racist during their match in Amsterdam.

It was pretty telling that this news story hyperfocused on the one AI image and didnt even address all of the actual evidence. Classic PR move.

chrisjj6• 6 months ago

He resigned because of that process leading to the Home Secretary no longer having confidence in him.

Not according to the news reports. They say e.g. he "blamed what he described as the "political and media frenzy" for his decision to step down."

epgui• 6 months ago

Is it just me (English as a second language but very fluent) or is this extremely hard to read? Does this even grammar?

majorchord• 6 months ago

If you're referring to the headline in the article, it's slang. To "cop out" means you are giving up without a fight.

thaumasiotes• 6 months ago

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/cop_it

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/cop_out

I don't see a gloss for "cop out" that matches the one you give, and the only one I'm personally familiar with is most similar to sense 1, "perform in an insufficient, negligent, or superficial manner".†

And even there, I would think of the derived noun as being the basic vocabulary item, even if the etymology is the other way around.

That said, the sense I get from "Cop cops it after Copilot cops out" is 'this is using vocabulary I don't know, because it's British', not 'how is it possible to put the words together this way?'. It looks like a fairly normal sentence using exotic vocabulary.

† As a separate issue, I don't think the gloss you give can be correct here, because the thing that's supposed to have copped out is Copilot, and what it did was to produce false statements, not surrender before a fight.

If we want to rephrase this headline to avoid any use of the token "cop(s)", it looks something like "Policeman gets in trouble after Copilot screws up" to me.

hexbin0103• 6 months ago

The Register tends to use a lot of puns/colloquialisms etc

YeGoblynQueenne4• 6 months ago

It's a British tradition. I was certain there would be a wikipedia page on that, but I can't find anything.

amiga38610• 6 months ago

FYI: there is a growth of sectarian and antisemitic behaviour in the UK.

Last year, a man named Jihad Al-Shamie attacked a Manchester synagogue on Yom Kippur and killed two congregants before he could be stopped.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cd63p1djgd7o

Antisemitic attacks have increased. Jews do not feel safe in Birmingham.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cpvdxrr0mxpo

Right next door to Aston Villa is Birmingham's Perry Bar ward, where they elected the independent MP Ayoub Khan, for what seems to be his support for the Palestinian side of the Israel-Palestine war.

The West Midlands police were keen to give the impression that they were even-handed and fair in banning Maccabi fans, claiming they consulted multiple faith communities in Birmingham, and besides Maccabi fans are rotters, look at what they did at this other match.

The other match did not exist. The Jewish community did not ask for the Maccabi fans to be banned. Those were lies.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c98ng15qmy9o

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cev82g41vpdo

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cdxw2nv6vzzo

As the match was played last month, pro-Palestinian protesters, including Independent MP Ayoub Khan, gathered outside the stadium, waving flags and banners calling for an end to violence in Gaza.

In my view, the West Midlands police probably had partisan community leaders like Mr Khan tell them to keep Jewish/Israeli fans out of Birmingham or they'd cause a riot, and the police meekly went along with this, then concealed this true reason, and made up bullshit reasons for banning the fans... which they have been caught out on, because they used a chatbot that hallucinated falsehoods and they didn't even verify it before using it as justification to a Parliamentary select committee.

That is what is known as misleading Parliament. That's why the chief's position is untenable.

paganel• 6 months ago

there is a growth of sectarian and antisemitic behaviour in the UK.

Gaza.

pydry3• 6 months ago

Im glad al shamie is dead, but do you condemn the Maccabi fans recorded on camera in Amsterdam repeatedly chanting "death to arabs" and "there are no more schools in gaza because we destroyed them?"

Do you condemn the army of an extremely racist state that committed what the UN describes as genocide?

amiga38610• 6 months ago

Do you condemn the Maccabi fans recorded on camera in Amsterdam repeatedly chanting "death to arabs" and "there are no more schools in gaza because we destroyed them?"

Yes, without question. Those are racist provocations. I also condemn all other violent acts those hooligans committed.

I further condemn their local opponents who made random attacks on unrelated Jewish and Israeli people. I hope you would do the same.

Or the army of an ultra racist state that committed what the UN has described as genocide?

I take no side on the Israel-Palestine conflict. Israelis and Palestinians both have a right to exist, and to live in peace.

EDIT: Also, I want to add: A Jewish person in the UK != an Israeli citizen != the State of Israel and the IDF. If you're angry about Israel and Palestine, don't take it out on Jews in the UK. Don't assume Jews support Israel or the IDF, don't assume Muslims support Palestine or Hamas. Thanks.

midlander2• 6 months ago

That police “intelligence” relies on a google search rather than internal records or in exchange with other precincts and databases is ridiculous.

jolmg3• 6 months ago

All comments seem to assume the officers lied about not using AI, but the article doesn't actually say that:

officers had found this material through a Google search
the erroneous result concerning the West Ham v Maccabi Tel Aviv match arose as result of a use of Microsoft Co Pilot
his force used fictional output from Microsoft Copilot

What this says is that the material originates from Copilot.

I suppose you can read that and interpret that they lied about the Google search, but if you assume incompetence over malice, the more likely interpretation is that they didn't properly verify their source found through Google. It could have been the source of the source of their source that used Copilot, not the officers themselves.

The takeaway here is that even if you don't use AI tools and do things as you did before AI, you may still be basing your work on AI content.

A parallel may someone saying they don't use AI in their code because they don't use AI tools, but then it turns out that a dependency of a dependency is built by AI.

chrisjj6• 6 months ago

True. The biggest problem with "AI" going forward may only be that it doesn't sign its work.

DoctorOetker• 6 months ago

How about an origin agnostic rule for soccer fans: they must wear portable cameras, and pay a bail (which they get back upon good behavior), they pay the escrow at the point of arrival (border train station or at the airport) and return the camera gear at point of departure, upon which they get their escrow back.

Aggressive hooligans don't come at all, or pay ever greater escrows (doubling whenever they misbehave, or halvig when they behave (but never halving below the minimum escrow value).

I think local population would appreciate such measures, regardless of the origin or religious affiliation of aggressive soccer fans.

Sure the soccer industry may suffer from a decrease in ticket sales, but at some point its not soccer industry, but a vacation of violence for the highest bidder... and the local population pays in material damages...

MoKetchups• 6 months ago

I've been running tests on exactly this - AI systems making things up when they hit structural limits.

Tested 5 architectures (GPT-4, Claude, Gemini, Llama, DeepSeek) with a 13-question battery targeting edge cases where self-reference collides with operational constraints.

The interesting finding: hallucination patterns aren't random - they follow architectural signatures. Each system fails in predictable ways when forced to reconcile contradictory instructions with their training.

Full methodology and raw outputs: https://github.com/moketchups/Demerzel

West Midlands police chief quits over AI hallucination

Related Stories