This situation could have ended up far worse than it did.
An artificial intelligence system at a high school in Baltimore mistook a bag of Doritos as a gun.
On Monday, Taki Allen was waiting for his ride outside of Kenwood when all the sudden police officers wth their weapons drawn demanded Allen to get on the ground.
Allen completely confused by the situation heeded the officers commands and was searched by the officers only to find no weapon on him rather only a bag of Doritos.
The teen told WBRC, “They said that an AI detector or something detected that I had a gun. He showed me a picture. I was just holding a Doritos bag like this.”
In a letter to parents the principal of Kenwood Highschool wrote, “At approximately 7 p.m., school administration received an alert that an individual on school grounds may have been in possession of a weapon. The Department of School Safety and Security quickly reviewed and canceled the initial alert after confirming there was no weapon.”
Armed officers held a student at gunpoint after an AI gun detection system mistakenly flagged a Doritos bag as a firearm
“They made me get on my knees, put my hands behind my back, and cuff me” pic.twitter.com/eSU0y5r1Yy
— Dexerto (@Dexerto) October 23, 2025
Per The Guardian:
An artificial intelligence system (AI) apparently mistook a high school student’s bag of Doritos for a firearm and called local police to tell them the pupil was armed.
Taki Allen was sitting with friends on Monday night outside Kenwood high school in Baltimore and eating a snack when police officers with guns approached him.
“At first, I didn’t know where they were going until they started walking toward me with guns, talking about, ‘Get on the ground,’ and I was like, ‘What?’” Allen told the WBAL-TV 11 News television station.
Allen said they made him get on his knees, handcuffed and searched him – finding nothing. They then showed him a copy of the picture that had triggered the alert.
“I was just holding a Doritos bag – it was two hands and one finger out, and they said it looked like a gun,” Allen said.
The company behind the AI gun detections security system is called Omnilert.
In the last year, Baltimore County Public Schools has invested nearly $2.6 million on AI gun detection security systems in its schools.