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November/December 1996 Volume 8 Number 6
Integration: Building a Central Structure for Information
In just two years, most of Washington’s 200+ trial and appellate courts will be able to share each other’s information via “JIS”—the state’s automated Judicial Information System. Users at every jurisdictional level will use the same database. Screens and reports will have a common look and feel. More importantly, subsystems will be integrated, i.e., information generated at one court level will be available to users at the other levels.
Background
Database integration has been a JIS goal since 1987. A system plan update in 1993 validated system integration as a strategy. It also recommended standardizing functions for all JIS applications, distributing and supporting standard local databases and applications, and interfacing JIS with local systems. In 1995, a new domestic violence law mandated that defendant information be made available across all jurisdictions in the state, a requirement achievable only through integration.
JIS currently consists of four separate subsystems, each designed to serve a distinct jurisdiction: appellate (supreme court and court of appeals), superior (general jurisdiction), juvenile, and district and municipal (limited jurisdiction). Appellate, superior, and juvenile systems (ACORDS, SCOMIS, and JUVIS) serve basic needs, but lack data sharing and defendant data compilation capabilities.
However, JIS’s district and municipal court system (DISCIS) and a superior court component, the Judicial Accounting Sub-System (JASS), both use modern database technology—IBM’s DB2—a powerful, relational database management system that runs on JIS’s mainframe computer. All systems will be shifted to this database, thus making data accessible to all users.
The Plan
JIS will tackle integration through a series of projects that will result in a single system for all courts. The integration goal will be achieved in several manageable, incremental steps.
The first step was completed last year. JASS was added to the DB2 platform to provide a full accounting system for superior courts, plus enhanced accounting and defendant information capabilities for general and limited jurisdiction courts. With JASS, a multijurisdictional, person database was created. The Judicial Receipting System for Windows (JRS/WIN), which replaced the DOS-based JRS, distributes a standard application to local courts.
Conversion to DB2
This year, a second step will be taken to lay the foundation for integration by converting the superior court system into the relational database now used by DISCIS/JASS. Follow-on projects will redevelop programs to integrate SCOMIS applications and will add and enhance functionality for the superior courts. Additional benefits will include the ability to seal, reopen, and transfer electronic case files between all court levels.
In January, staff of the state’s office of the administrator for the courts completed a database design that forms the core requirement for converting SCOMIS programs. A contractor made changes to the programs and delivered them to JIS in September and October 1996. Actual implementation will be phased in court by court over the first half of 1997.
Juvis on DB2
The JIS has begun two related integration projects: (1) the family and juvenile justice project, which will move JUVIS to the relational database and integrated system, and (2) development of enhancements to meet the 1995 domestic violence legislation mandates.
The JUVIS migration is necessary, as new statutes require courts to have a single method of entering and viewing information on domestic violence cases. More specifically, courts must be able to match information on parties with cases in juvenile as well as general and limited jurisdiction courts.
Similarly, courts dealing with juvenile and family violence cases must have the ability to relate defendants and parties with cohorts and family members who also have cases in the system. These identifiers will be built into the integrated system. Name-search software with the flexibility to adjust to JIS requirements will enhance the ability to identify defendants correctly. The software will recognize foreign surnames, names with special characters, and names with minor spelling variations.
Automated Proceedings
Development of a new Court Automated Proceedings System (CAPS), the first project to add functionality for superior courts, will be undertaken during 1997. CAPS will give these courts the capability to schedule hearings and manage court calendars automatically. It will also give JIS the capability to distribute more processing to local court levels.
CAPS will build on the Law Enforcement Court Scheduling (LECS) system’s judicial resource scheduling module, now being implemented in several of the state’s limited jurisdiction trial court districts. Full implementation of CAPS business requirements mandates the conversion of SCOMIS data to the DB2 database. This system will allow the upload of local data.
Hardware Upgrade
As systemwide integrated applications are being developed, converted, and implemented, JIS will improve the technical infrastructure to provide needed processor data storage and user workstation and telecommunications capacity to support integration and the changing user environment. As design work is completed, processor and storage needs will be evaluated. Acquisition of additional disk storage to handle the SCOMIS conversion has been completed. The JIS mainframe will be upgraded by mid-1997.
JIS also asked for legislative approval of a five-year replacement plan to begin in the upcoming fiscal year, with a first-year appropriation of $2 million. Most of these funds will be used to replace aging terminals with personal computers.
Communications Upgrade
In the next 18 months, JIS will move from the current network, based on IBM’s proprietary Systems Network Architecture (SNA), to an open network based on TCP/IP. Objectives include reducing network operating costs, maintaining or improving response times, and providing better connections with the growing number of courts that use personal computers on local and wide-area networks. The new network is necessary to support the CAPS, LECS, and client server data exchange projects.
Data Sharing
Client server projects that will facilitate easier exchange of standardized information between the OAC and local courts are underway. Future client server initiatives will require a relational database (DB2), a TCP/IP network, and the standardization of data elements that must be shared between courts, OAC, and law enforcement agencies. Client server technology, combined with a standardized central database, is the only practical method of providing statewide Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) of justice information.
Each of these major projects will become an essential piece of a fully functional, integrated Judicial Information System, the central structure of a future environment in which courts and other criminal justice organizations can get, give, and maintain a full range of information.
Legend
- JIS - Judicial Information System
- ACORDS - Appellate (supreme court and court of appeals) Court Online Record System
- SCOMIS - Superior Court Online Management Information System
- JASS - Judicial Accounting Sub-System
- JUVIS - Juvenile Information System
- DISCIS - District and Municipal Court Information System
- JRS/WIN - Judicial Receipting System for Windows
- CAPS - Court Automated Proceeding System
- LECS - Law Enforcement Court Scheduling
Brian Backus is deputy director of the Information Services Division of Washington’s Office of the Administrator for the Courts. He formerly worked as the information and revenue director for the Seattle Municipal Court, the state’s largest court of limited jurisdiction. He can be contacted at (360) 753-3365.
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