Address: 730 Simms, Suite #109, Golden, CO Digital Government: Government to Citizen (G to C)*

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1 NASCIO Nomination Form Title of Nomination: Colorado Integrated Criminal Justice Information System (CICJIS) Project/System Manager: Theresa Brandorff Job Title: Agency: Chief Information Officer Colorado Integrated Criminal Justice Information System (CICJIS); Colorado Bureau of Investigation (CBI) - Department of Public Safety; Colorado Judicial Branch; Colorado District Attorney s Council (CDAC); Colorado Department of Corrections (DOC); and Division of Youth Corrections (DYC) Human Services Department: CICJIS Address: 730 Simms, Suite #109, Golden, CO Phone: Fax: theresa.brandorff@cdps.state.co.us Category for judging: Digital Government: Government to Citizen (G to C)* * could also be considered for G to G and Enterprise Information Architecture Person Nominating: Robert S. Feingold Job Title: State of Colorado Chief Information Officer Address: 225 E. 16 th Avenue, Suite 900 City: Denver State: Colorado Zip: Phone: Fax: bob.feingold@state.co.us 1 2/24/02 Issue Brief from the NGA Center for Best Practices

2 Executive Summary The decisions and actions of law enforcement and other public safety officials need to be informed by complete, accurate, and timely information. Unfortunately for most states, this information is often unavailable, or is incomplete, inaccurate, or dated. As a result, critical information is not always shared at key decision points in the justice process, sometimes with tragic consequences for public safety. 1 Since 1998, Colorado has not been one of the unfortunate states. The Colorado Integrated Criminal Justice Information System (CICJIS) is a single program that facilitates the sharing of critical criminal justice data among five state-level agencies at key decision points in the criminal justice process. CICJIS is a program that relies on the equal participation of the five CICJIS agencies. Each agency has its own business, business models, and strategies, yet each has a vested interest in and gains benefits from the CICJIS program. The agencies (primary stakeholders) are the Colorado Department of Public Safety, Colorado Bureau of Investigation; Colorado Judicial Branch; Colorado Department of Corrections; Colorado Department of Human Services, Division of Youth Corrections; and Colorado District Attorneys Council. The vision of the Colorado Integrated Criminal Justice Information System is to provide the right information to the right people at the right time and place in the criminal justice process. CICJIS continually strives to provide timely, accurate information reliably. CICJIS is made up of electronic services or functions the entire program consists of electronic services that maximize standardization of data and communications technology among the five agencies. CICJIS has been recognized as one of the most advanced and successful integrated criminal justice information systems in the country. The primary customers of the CICJIS program are the five criminal justice agencies, their employees and customers, and the public. The benefits of the CICJIS program to citizens and peace officers include: Enhanced public safety Enhanced peace officer safety Reduced false arrests Enhanced protection and information for victims of crimes The benefits of these electronic functions to each agency s business processes include: Improved information accuracy Improved information timeliness Reduced data entry redundancy Reduced paper based processing and inter-agency contacts (phone, fax, ) As a result, each agency is able to improve efficiencies allowing employees who are trying to do more with less the opportunity to focus on non-redundant tasks. The public today has higher expectations of government with respect to information sharing, especially within the state. CICJIS continually strives to meet these expectations by fulfilling its role to share information. CICJIS delivers these benefits by making more timely accurate and complete information concerning offenders available statewide to all criminal justice agencies and to individual decision-makers in the system including police officers, judges, prosecutors, and corrections officers. (Text from Article 20.5 of C.R.S ). The need to ensure that the decisions and actions of law enforcement and other public safety officials is as profound and evident as at any other point in our nation s history. In the wake of the September 11 attacks, policymakers at all levels of government are pursuing strategies to enhance emergency response and preparedness. They are pressing for immediate solutions to problems that inhibit communications and information sharing among the individuals on whom the public relies for its safety. 2 CICJIS is one of the most critical and successful solutions in the country. 1, 2 2/24/02 Issue Brief from the NGA Center for Best Practices

3 Written Justification a. Description of the Project The Colorado Integrated Criminal Justice Information System (CICJIS is a single program that facilitates the sharing of critical criminal justice data among five state-level agencies at key decision points in the criminal justice process. CICJIS is a program that relies on the equal participation of the five CICJIS agencies. Each agency has its own business, business models, and strategies, yet each has a vested interest in and gains benefits from the CICJIS program. The agencies (primary stakeholders) are the Colorado Department of Public Safety, Colorado Bureau of Investigation; Colorado Judicial Branch; Colorado Department of Corrections; Colorado Department of Human Services, Division of Youth Corrections; and Colorado District Attorneys Council. Colorado Judicial Branch Department of Corrections CICJIS Central Colorado Bureau of Investigation (Public Safety) Division of Youth Corrections (Human Services) Colorado District Attorneys Council CICJIS is a system made up of electronic services the entire program consists of electronic services that maximize standardization of data and communications technology among the five agencies. CICJIS acts as a hub that links these systems together into one virtual database allowing the systems to share common data and to provide a single view or source of criminal justice information to all criminal justice agencies in a manner that supports and complements the missions of its five constituent agencies. CICJIS has been recognized as one of the most advanced and successful integrated criminal justice information systems in the country. CICJIS utilizes a three-tier middleware solution comprised of CICJIS Central hardware - HP9000/580 4X Unix System with 2 Gb of memory and an HP Model 12H Autoraid Disk Array with 100 GB of disk storage on a HPUX operating system. The core of CICJIS is written primarily in Sybase Transact SQL however there are several Open Servers written in the C programming language. The CICJIS Central Index database is driven by a Sybase Adaptive Server Enterprise version This Central database is connected through Sybase Direct Connect products and various C open servers to the agencies systems. 3

4 The reason for integrating or sharing data is to provide information to key decision makers in the criminal justice process. As a result, the vision of CICJIS is to provide the right information to the right people at the right time and place. CICJIS makes the information available with three primary electronic services. The primary services or functions of the system are to electronically: Share common data among the five criminal justice agencies Provide access to unique information stored on remote systems Enable inquiries on current offender status within the criminal justice system The functions are referred to as data transfers, queries, and the central index, respectively. Data Transfers: The criminal justice system relies upon common data to track offenders through the process. Historically, each agency developed its own information systems to meet its unique business needs. Much of the data was required by all and was re-keyed into each system. CICJIS eliminates the need for redundant data entry of this common data through the use of event driven, real-time data transfers. Legacy systems have been modified to trigger data transfers at key stages in the process. A few examples include: arrest information is transferred to the prosecutors, charges are electronically filed by the prosecutors to the courts, and sentence data is transferred to adult and juvenile corrections. Sharing data is the foundation of CICJIS because it has compelled data and format standardization across all of the systems. Queries: Each agency s information system evolved over many years to meet its own unique needs; however, none provided a complete view of the entire system. Queries provided by CICJIS fulfill this function and enable users on any of the five systems to view information contained on another system as if it were stored locally. Each system presents the query results to their users as if they were an extension of their own system, thereby providing end-users with an interface that reflects the look and feel of their own system. Central Index: Current status information about an offender is provided by the CICJIS Central Index, which stores summary information about each offender in the system, providing a point-in-time view. The central index also serves as a pointer to information contained on the five systems. Since each agency has its own unique identifiers, the central index provides the keys necessary to find data throughout the system. The most profound and visible of the functions include: Real time electronic protective order information Real time electronic warrants Real time electronic transfers of initial and subsequent filing information b. Significance to the improvement of the operation of government In early 2002, prosecutors filed over 700 charges against an accused offender. Pre-CICJIS, multiple agencies would have had to enter those charges multiple times, increasing the chance for data entry errors, and reducing productivity on redundant tasks. CICJIS enabled the data to be entered once, and electronically transferred the charges multiple agencies, allowing the courts to start their case(s). The benefits of these electronic functions to each agency s business processes include: Improved information accuracy Improved information timeliness Reduced data entry redundancy 4

5 Reduced paper based processing and inter-agency contacts (phone, fax, ) As a result, each agency is able to improve efficiencies allowing employees who are trying to do more with less the opportunity to focus on non-redundant tasks. An important note is that the public today has higher expectations of government with respect to information sharing within the state. The CICJIS role is to provide accurate information. Additionally, CICJIS dramatically improved the disposition match rate. A disposition is a decision of the court (i.e. guilty, not guilty, no file, etc.) in a specific case. Disposition matching is the process of connecting the disposed court case with an arrest on the defendants RAP sheet. Colorado defines Disposition Matching as a ratio of disposed felony court cases matching a fingerprint-based arrest divided by the total disposed court cases for a given time frame: Disposition Match Rate = Disposed Court Cases with Matching Arrest Record Total Disposed Court Cases In the beginning, Colorado had a very low Disposition Match Rate however it was in line with the national average. CICJIS has been formally measuring felony Disposition Match rates since January The current Disposition Match Rate is averaging about 77.2% (over the last 12 months). CICJIS tracks the missed opportunities by county and requires the counties to fix those that should have matched but did not, usually due to a human element in the process (i.e. bad fingerprint, incorrect docket number, incorrect originating or arresting agency). Disposition Matching reflects the accuracy of CICJIS information. Without CICJIS, Colorado would see the disposition match rate decline to something closer to the pre- CICJIS rate of around 8-10% (April 1998). A lower disposition match rate increases the chance of citizen litigation against the state. When the match rates are low, we create additional work for state agencies and potential liability issues when an accused offender was found not guilty and denied employment or gun purchase as a result of the error. c. Benefits realized by service recipients, taxpayers, agency or state A tragic example has already occurred that illustrates the value of the accurate and timely transfer of protective order information: the multiple deaths including three children in Castle Rock in June The state reverted processing of gun checks back to the FBI s Insta-check system earlier that spring, but protective order information transferred by CICJIS from the state courts to CCIC was not passed on the FBI. If the state performed background checks at that time, the protective order against the aforementioned murderer would have prevented him from purchasing a handgun. Unfortunately, he was able to do so because the information did not reach the FBI. The state is again processing gun checks. The values or benefits of the CICJIS program to citizens and peace officers are summarized below: Enhanced public safety Enhanced peace officer safety Reduced false arrests Enhanced protection and information for victims of crimes Public and officer safety become an issue without the electronic warrants. In the past (pre-cicjis process) warrants could take days to be entered into the CBI s wanted persons system upon receipt from the courts. During that time, a police officer could have routinely stopped a wanted person on a traffic violation, but not arrested him/her since they were unaware of the warrant. Worse, if the person they 5

6 stopped was an escapee or was wanted due to charges of assault on a police officer, the officers lives could be in danger. Similarly, immediate access to protective order information enhances the protection and information for victims of crimes. Victim protection works identically to the warrant process, with the addition of electronic restraining orders. Within minutes of receiving the restraining order from the courts, the information is shared statewide. The information received may save the lives of domestic violence victims with active restraining orders against their attacker. Next, we ve all heard the horror stories of releasing an offender who had served time, but the facility was unaware of other crimes due to the lack of matching new cases to the same offender. In several cases in other states, those released offenders committed more horrible crimes immediately upon release something that should not have happened. Without sharing the data in a timely manner, we could be putting Colorado citizens at risk for similar scenarios. CICJIS drastically reduces the chance of these types of paperwork errors to take place. The recent accidental release of a inmate convicted of murder illustrates this problem: the inmate was sentenced in 1994 (prior to CICJIS), and the paperwork was never received by the DOC. Similarly, on the public interest side, CICJIS also provides deleted warrants, thereby reducing the potential for false arrests. If you are wanted due to failure to pay your fines on a speeding ticket, but you voluntarily go in to resolve the matter (pay your fines), you are no longer a wanted person. If it takes days to update the systems, if you are pulled over on a traffic stop, you could be cuffed and taken to jail if the warrant clerks had not yet entered your delete. CICJIS delivers these benefits by making more timely accurate and complete information concerning offenders available statewide to all criminal justice agencies and to individual decision-makers in the system including police officers, judges, and corrections officers. (Text from Article 20.5 of C.R.S ). d. Return on investment, short-term/long-term payback The Colorado Integrated Criminal Justice Information System (CICJIS) was immediately successful and continues to make life easier on the employees at the five agencies. It remains difficult to quantify the value of the program measured in saved lives and public image. However, there have been initial returns, and the continued safety of the public in the state of Colorado. The CICJIS staff was originally funded by FTE contributions from each of the five agencies from immediate workflow improvement. The agencies initial contribution was equivalent to $383,350 (roughly equivalent to the current ongoing cost of the five CICJIS FTE). However, much of the savings have been in the field, not currently baselined or measured at the state level. Many counties have saved warrant clerks, IT staff, and redundant work by their staffs. The agencies continue to contribute annually with in-kind funds through the active involvement of their Executive Directors, CIO s and technical staff. Here is a summary of their contributions: 6

7 CICJIS Agency Contributions Executive CIO Other Tech Staff Judicial $2,000 $8,300 $70,000 $80,300 CBI $2,000 $8,300 $20,000 $30,300 CDAC $2,000 $8,300 $20,000 $30,300 DOC $2,000 $8,300 $20,000 $30,300 DYC $2,000 $8,300 $20,000 $30,300 $201,500 TOTAL Annual Matching Contributions CICJIS has positively impacted the national image of Colorado. CICJIS is proud to have been awarded the following national honors: AWARD WINNER: Government Technology Magazine rated CICJIS #1 for Technical Integration in the Criminal Justice Arena AWARD WINNER: Center for Digital Government selected CICJIS to receive their "Best of Breed" award based on the 2002 Digital State Survey Part I (Law/Courts and Social Svcs) submission. AWARD WINNER: Center for Digital Government selected CICJIS to receive their "Best of Breed" award based on the 2001 Digital State Survey Part I (Law/Courts and Social Svcs) submission. 7