Brandon Anderson (entrepreneur)

Anderson was born in Oklahoma. His mother is a rental car clerk and his father a forklift truck driver. He has described his childhood as being "characterised by violence". He was kicked out of his grandparents house as a teenager and made homeless. Anderson ran away with his best friend, with whom he later fell in love. In 2007, while Anderson was serving as an engineer in the army overseas, he alleged that his partner was shot and killed by a police officer during a routine traffic stop. An August 2024 article in The New York Times by David Fahrenthold suggested Anderson fabricated this origin story. Anderson was discharged from the Army once he disclosed his sexuality. == Education and career ==

Anderson became a community activist and organiser, earning a degree at Georgetown University in 2015. In 2014 Anderson was awarded money from Fast ForWord and the My Brother's Keeper Challenge to build Raheem.ai, a Facebook messenger chatbot that eliminates barriers to reporting police misconduct. The chatbot allowed the public to evaluate police interactions and offers follow-on support for users. Raheem.ai was inspired by Waze, who, alongside offering navigation information, used user-generated information to inform local government about fill potholes. Raheem.ai published reports about where police are working well and where they are failing communities. It aimed to reach all fifty states by 2020. With Raheem.ai, Anderson looked to build the first crowdsourced database of police interactions. In 2016 Anderson delivered a TED talk at Georgetown, where he discussed what it means to be vulnerable. He was named as one of the National Black Justice Coalition 100 Black LGBTQ/SGL Emerging Leaders. Anderson was made an Echoing Green Fellow in 2018. However, Raheem.ai was never able to overcome a fundamental problem: that the US' thousands of separate police agencies have their own individual ways of preferred contact. David Fahrenthold of The New York Times wrote in August 2024: In November 2024, Attorney General Attorney General Brian L. Schwalb sued Raheem AI, a nonprofit created to improve transparency and accountability in policing, and its founder and Executive Director Brandon Anderson for violating the District’s nonprofit and workers’ rights laws. Anderson used Raheem AI’s charitable funds for his own personal benefit - specifically to support his luxurious lifestyle - while the organization failed to monitor spending or implement basic nonprofit governance requirements. Anderson and Raheem AI also failed to pay the organization’s sole District-based employee the wages she had earned and required her to sign an illegal non-compete clause. == References ==