The Mixture of AI to Close the Justice Gap

The Justice Gap at a Glance

AI is useful in legal services and there is no doubt that AI and technology will play a huge role in helping to close the justice gap in the United States. In more than 75 percent of all civil trial cases in the United States, at least one litigant does not have a lawyer. Cases that have an even higher contrast are those cases involving family law, domestic violence, house and small-claim matters where at least one party lacks representation in 70 to 98 percent of cases.These numbers solely take into account American citizens who go to court, whereas 80 percent of the civil legal needs of those living in poverty go unmet entirely.There have been advancements in AI that address the concern of the justice gap and in particular, implementation of solutions that address civil claims.

Implementations of AI to Address the Justice Gap

AI is implemented in situations to address the justice gap in areas such as online robots, chat bots, and mobile applications. These programs provide unrepresented litigants with an easier way to present their cases and to win their cases without a lawyer. Although only one of these solutions is currently offered in the U.S., the technology exists and the U.S. can implement similar technology.

Melbourne Online Robot

Doogue O’Brien George is a law firm in Melbourne, which recently launched an online robot designed to help people represent themselves in court. The robot produces a template, which acts as a starting point for unrepresented litigants.The robot puts together a baseline story for the unrepresented litigant to present to the magistrate. This implementation is important to both speed up the litigation process in already over-crowded courts and to prepare unrepresented litigants to arrive at court and feel more comfortable stating their case.

Do Not Pay

Do Not Pay is a chat bot downloadable as a mobile application for no cost to the user. This application addresses the process of appealing parking tickets and appealing for compensation for delayed flights. In just five months, Do Not Pay helped users to save three million dollars in 2016. The user enters specific information regarding a parking ticket into the chat bot and the program is able to generate a legally sound appeal for the user. Depending on what type of appeal, the document that Do Not Pay provides is ready to be sent directly to local councils, airlines or banks. As of June 2016, Do Not Pay had successfully challenged 160,000 out of 250,000 tickets. This mobile application allows users to contest legal challenges from the comfort of their home without any costs, other than to ship the legal statements to the appropriate source.

Rechtwijzer

Rechtwijzer 2.0 is an online-based online dispute resolution platform that supports people throughout their divorce journey.This platform provides legal options while simultaneously providing rich support for an interest-based dialogue between the parties involved. Two parties can put their communications into online program to see if they can come to an outcome that suits everyone. However, if this is not a possibility, the program provides mediation, adjudication, or a neutral review to settle the case online. At the end of the process, a neutral party reviews the separation plan and decides on the issue. The tool does not end there. Users can log onto the tool and check up on changes and the status of their separation. Primarily, Rechtwijzer is used for divorce disputes, however, it addresses various common disputes that citizens face. This solution is primarily in use in the Netherlands and has not reached the United States, but it demonstrates one of the ways that AI provides low-cost legal services globally.

The development of AI spans the globe and is a promising solution to the lack of access to justice in the U.S. It is unclear where these innovations will end up, but there is a promising future using AI to solve the access to justice gap.

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