Article
Criminal Justice at a Crossroad: AI’s Impact on Law Enforcement and Legal Systems

By : Vikas Katheria

Page No: 245-262

Abstract
The rapid rise of Artificial Intelligence (AI), particularly agentic AI capable of autonomous decision-making, planning and adaptive action, is transforming crime, law enforcement and legal systems. Moving beyond passive tools, these systems can independently interact across digital environments, creating both opportunities and risks. Criminal enterprises increasingly weaponise AI for cyber intrusions, fraud, identity manipulation and automated attacks, while law enforcement adopts AI for predictive analytics, surveillance, evidence processing and intelligence-led policing.
However, traditional legal frameworks grounded in human intent struggle to address harms caused by autonomous systems, producing accountability gaps and challenges in assigning liability. Algorithmic opacity, emergent behaviour, bias in datasets and the growing judicial competency gap further complicate the use of AI-generated evidence. At the same time, cybercrime’s borderless nature exposes the limitations of traditional policing structures. The article argues that incremental reforms are insufficient and calls for new liability models, stronger transparency standards and networked, technology-driven enforcement to ensure
justice systems remain effective and legitimate in the AI era.

Author
Vikas Katheria is a distinguished senior officer of the Indian Police Service. He is presently working as Deputy Inspector General (Intelligence), in the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF). He has worked in the triad of intelligence-Operations- Investigations during his significant stints in National Investigation Agency, Nagaland Police and CRPF where he worked in the most sensitive assignments. His scholarly works include books such as ‘The Art of Scientific Criminal Investigations’ and ‘The Terror Matrix: Decoding Terrorism’. He regularly contributes articles on major national security and police journals.
 

DOI: http://doi.org/10.32381/NS.2026.09.02.6