The Augsburger Allgemeine reports the case of the Augsburger charged with smuggling 180 Greek tortoises into Germany.
The public prosecutor’s office produced the following text in the indictment:
Dem angeschuldigten Arschloch ist ein Pflichtverteidiger zu bestellen.
(Defence counsel shall be assigned to the accused arsehole.)
This was apparently the result of speech recognition software and office incompetence. The error was corrected but the correction not properly saved to disc (I think it should simply have read ‘Dem Angeschuldigten’ (the accused).
Leitender Oberstaatsanwalt Reinhard Nemetz ist betroffen. Er spricht von einem “nicht akzeptablen” Fehlverhalten seiner Behörde. “Ich muss mich bei dem Bürger ausdrücklich und in aller Form entschuldigen”, sagte Nemetz am Montag unserer Zeitung. Der Behördenchef hat eine penible Überprüfung des Vorgangs angekündigt und betont: “Ich will wissen, wer dafür verantwortlich ist.”
The case has been stayed for witnesses to be summoned from abroad. The defendant has a previous tortoise-smuggling conviction, but denies the present charge.
I suppose it makes a change from blaming it on the interpreter.
(From Digital Diktieren – the speech recognition blog – which reports that Dragon Naturally Speaking contains such words in the new version, but some programs delete them).
A wonderful story. Augsburgers like Bertold Brecht will be turning in their graves.
Reminds me of per anum – mis-typed at my previous City of London law firm by a human audio-typist – for per annum. No prizes for guessing what her nickname then became.
I have edited a book, written by well-known industry expert Bettye Keyes, on speech recognition for reporters in the court.
In this book she explains a good approach to the use of profane words, which includes a recommendation that Dragon users remove all profane words from Dragon’s vocabulary.