Vol. 13 No. 4
August/September 2015
Newest Case Management Solutions Pretrial Risk Predictors: Better Than Bail?
CTC 2015 Coverage CHANGE SERVICE REQUESTED
Courts Today 69 Lyme Road, Hanover, NH 03755
Educational Tracks & Technology on the Trade Floor
with alternative & diversion programs
Publisher & Executive Editor Thomas S. Kapinos
A U G U S T / S E P T E M B E R 2 015 VOLU M E 13 N U M B E R 4 F EATU R E S
4 MRT Outcomes in Drug Courts 10 Educational Technology Tracks at CTC 2015
18 Newest Case Management Solutions
Assistant Publisher Jennifer Kapinos Editor Donna Rogers Contributing Editors Michael Grohs, Bill Schiffner G.F. Guercio, Kelly Mason Art Director Jamie Stroud Marketing Representatives Bonnie Dodson (828) 479-7472 Art Sylvie (480) 816-3448 Peggy Virgadamo (718) 456-7329
28 Kiosks: Keeping Traffic Moving 32 Ignition Interlocks Impact on DUIs 36 Pretrial Risk Predictors: Findings 42 Jury Management Efficiencies
with alternative & diversion programs
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BY GRE G ORY L . L I T T LE , E D . D . , N C P A N D K E N N E TH D. R OBI NS ON E D.D.
MRT IN DRUG COURTS A comprehensive review of recidivism outcomes & meta-analysis of adult court results
parative recidivism statistics, including programs that did not utilize MRT as the primary treatment method.
Moral Reconation Therapy—MRT™—has been employed in drug court treatment programs since the mid-1990s. The cognitive-behavioral program was developed by Correctional Counseling Inc. and is used for substance abuse treatment and for criminal justice offenders in 49 states, the District of Columbia and beyond. The present article is a comprehensive review of 56 recidivism outcome studies published in journals, independent program evaluations, and technical reports over the past two decades reporting on the effects of MRT in drug court operations and includes updated material from a previous report of 33 articles in 2006. In addition, this updated report combined and collapsed data from all studies of adult drug courts that cited com-
Adult Drug Courts Many published studies that were reviewed included retention and/or graduation rates. MRT-based drug court implementations have shown to yield a retention rate somewhat higher than non-MRT programs. Seven of the published studies included recidivism data with a comparison between groups that utilized MRT and groups that did not. Six of these seven studies showed that MRT treatment led to lower recidivism. The average recidivism reduction rate of the MRT treatment group in all seven Continues on page 46
AVERAGE REDUCTION IN RECIDIVISM 5%
10%
15%
Drug Courts with MRT Programming
Other Drug Courts
20%
25%
21.6%
10% to 15%
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BY BI L L S C H I FFN ER, CO N T R I B U T I N G E D IT O R
CTC 2015 to Feature a Host of Educational Technology Tracks 6 tracks from social media to court of the future
Innovation is the theme court professionals will hear time and again as they convene in the “City of Lakes” to check out the latest in court technology trends, issues and solutions at CTC 2015, being held at the Minneapolis Convention Center from September 22-24. The biennial conference provides court personnel with three days of networking and educational sessions as well as the latest in courtroom technology on display.
The Need to Innovate
Kicking off CTC 2015 will be keynote speaker, Mark Britton, founder and CEO of Avvo, the world’s largest community for legal
guidance and services. Britton’s keynote will address “The Innovation Imperative.” Britton will discuss how the justice system can more effectively embrace innovation. He will examine how innovation has transformed services in many other industries—medical, transportation, food, and travel. Britton says “it’s time for the justice system step up its pace and develop more systems that foster innovation.”
Educational Tracks CTC 2015 will be presenting six educational tracks through the conference. Each track includes a number of sessions that looks at specific sections of court technology. The six educational tracks feature: Tools for the 21st-Century Judge; Electronic
Court Records Management; How IT Can Design and Deliver Solutions to Create a High Performance Court; The Judiciary in a Virtual, Mobile, Social World; Access to Justice; and Courthouse of the Future. “The future of court technology is here, and the educational tracks at CTC 2015 set a solid foundation for both users and vendors alike to map out and adapt to emerging technology that meets the needs of the courts, constituents and justice partners,” comments Manoj Jain, vice president and global head of Business Development at Thomson Reuters.
1. Tools for the 21stCentury Judge Most judges are likely to have a smart phone, tablet, or both. They
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communicate via Skype, text, and email, and they bank, shop, and plan travel using a number of different technology solutions. It is a natural progression for them to expect advances in the tools and technology in the workplace. Ron Bowmaster, the director of the Information Technology Division for Utah’s Administrative Office of the Courts will be among the speakers that will look at “The Impact of Judicial Tools on IT.” He says of his session, “As more and more courts adopt electronic filing and digital documents, courts must create alternative ways for judges and staff to work directly with these electronic documents. Requiring judges to print documents for use on the bench defeats the purpose of the digital record. This session will focus on methodologies that are in place that allow judges to work with the court’s digital record both in the courtroom and in chambers. “This track also explores both vendor and in-house developed solutions in courts with varying degrees of technical maturity,” Bowmaster furthers. “Attendees will gain behind-the-scenes insights and lessons learned from practitioners and experts who have implemented these solutions for judges and chambers staff.”
2. Managing Electronic Records
As the judicial branch continues to adopt e-filing and increasingly relies on electronic records systems, courts face new challenges in ensuring the continued accessibility, integrity, and preservation of these records in the face of ongoing technical obsolescence. This track will highlight the emerging policy and technical issues facing the courts in this area, as well as introduce successful practices and applicable standards. One of the sessions in this track “Email: When Is It a Record?” will
be presented by Laurie Fischer, managing director of Huron Consulting Group’s informationgovernance-consulting practice. Huron is a leading provider of independent and objective information management and governance services tailored to address the increasingly complex and demanding regu-
latory and technological challenges of today. “Over the past two decades, email has revolutionized business communication. It has become a critical tool replacing many of the more traditional methods of communication, collaboration and transmission,” Fischer says. “Consequently, email messages may be subject to information lifecycle management requirements for preservation, protection, retention, and disposition. This session will examine whether email generated by the courts should be considered “records,” therefore requiring enhanced management controls,” she adds.
3. How IT Can Design and Deliver Solutions to Create a High Performance Court
There is a wave of technological change happening, and it is happening very fast—far too fast for many courts to keep pace with. Most people are using technology in
their private lives that is more sophisticated than what they use at the office. Court “customers” are also increasingly more tech-savvy and expect the court to provide services online. Yet many courts still view their court technologists as simply “order takers” who execute against their vision. One of the most important sessions in this track is “Managing the Ever-Changing Technology Department.” Managing a court technology department has many challenges. Internal and external needs change, platforms frequently shift, hiring and retaining staff can be a challenge, setting and communicating technology expectations can be time
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consuming, and project management and funding have various complexities. Presenters Bryant Baehr, CIO, Oregon Judicial Department and Jim Conlin deputy CIO, Oregon Judicial Branch, have encountered each of these dynamics and will discuss their insight/successes and challenges as they lead the State of Oregon Judicial Branch through a complete technology transformation. “Creating a high performance court is not as simple as installing the latest device or software,” notes Michael Kleiman, director of marketing for Tyler’s Courts & Justice Division. “It requires vision and a long-term plan. As important as it is to deliver great software, it is equally as important to work with experienced, committed vendors on developing that plan and working together with all interested parties to ensure it gets implemented.”
4. The Judiciary in a Virtual, Mobile, Social World
What day-to-day transactions do you conduct virtually on your mobile device? What information do you access in near real-time through your social networks? How is your court using virtual communications, mobile devices, and social media to improve its operations, user experiences, and public trust and confidence? This session is dedicated to exploring courts’ use of these technologies throughout the lifecycle of a case, from pretrial to post-disposition, and throughout the communities they serve. Speaker Norman H. Meyer Clerk of the Court, U.S. Bankruptcy Court, District of New Mexico, comments: “Kicking off the Judiciary in a virtual, social, mobile world CTC track will be an overview of many virtual/social/mobile issues and opportunities for courts, with particular attention to social media and mobile efforts as guides for the future.” Following that, presenters hope to bring about “an entertaining debate about why or why not social media should be in every court’s toolkit,” and will highlight the advantages and dangers in this evolving area. Meyer concludes: “These and other sessions in this track will show how courts can improve accessibility, transparency, efficiency, and public service in costeffective ways.”
5. Access to Justice
How is technology being used to enhance and improve access to justice? Courts are innovating with basic technologies (kiosks and phones) as well as new technologies (interactive Web-based tools for adjudication and online avatars) and evaluating current implementations (how are self-represented litigants using efiling?). For the purposes of this track, the term access is broadly defined to include language access, navigation August/September 2015 14
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Court Case Management in the Cloud
What is the Cloud?
Justice Systems, Inc. now offers a complete, cloud-based, Software as a Service (SaaS) solution for FullCourt Enterprise™, their innovative court case management software.
Courts Facing IT Challenges
Every day Courts must address a diversity of complex processes, overlapping and intersecting tasks, and hundreds of details. Shrinking budgets, aging technology, and compounding processes and procedures cause many Courts to struggle for better solutions. In a typical environment, Courts must purchase and maintain all of the hardware and other infrastructure necessary to support an advanced case management system and additional modules. According to the IJIS Institute Info Brief: Cloud Computing for the Courts, in Courts at county and state levels, a case management system can account for 70-75% of the total IT capital expenditure and 30-40% of total operational costs, presenting a major challenge to Court IT departments. They also must contend with scalability issues (i.e., accommodating growing computing demands without performance degradation), and with reliability (i.e., keeping applications and systems running 24-hours-a-day, 7-days-a-week). State and local courts in the USA are increasingly challenged in acquiring and maintaining modern case management capabilities with their the traditional upfront capital expenditure requirements and increasingly advanced technology.
Cloud computing is a service model that utilizes Internet technologies to deliver scalable and flexible IT-enabled capabilities to external users. Cloud computing, or the Cloud, allows an organization to reduce its burden of IT infrastructure by permitting a third-party hosting company to maintain all of the servers and databases required to support the software system and database. With a cloud-based case management system, Court users only require a browser with an Internet connection to access the system. The Cloud can allow Courts to minimize upfront infrastructure costs, while focusing on increasing case management efficiency. With SaaS, Courts do not pay for software licensing upfront; instead, they pay an annual or monthly subscription fee. This pricing model allows courts to switch their capital expenditures to operational expenditures, according to the IJIS Institute Info Brief.
FullCourt Enterprise in the Cloud
Since FullCourt Enterprise was designed as browser-based, user-friendly case management system, it is ideally suited to be a cloud-based SaaS solution. Combined with Justice Systems’ new hosting services, FullCourt Enterprise eases the burden on the Court’s upfront infrastructure costs, offers Courts simplified and rapid scalability, and provides enhanced reliability. Additionally, the Cloud will allow Courts to transition to FullCourt Enterprise faster, while improving manageability and reducing maintenance. FullCourt Enterprise manages the Court’s intricate details while automating and simplifying repetitive tasks. Justice Systems will host FullCourt Enterprise using the Oracle Cloud Platform. The cloud-based FullCourt Enterprise system will include browser-based imaging and document management, a Public Access Module, the CitePayUSA online payment system, support for PDF-based document generation and printing, enhanced security, and common data exchanges (e.g., Citation Import).
Justice Systems is the Right Solution
Justice Systems’ solutions can save money, boost productivity, save office space, make information sharing easier, and keep information more secure—all within the cloud. Justice Systems’ has more than 30 years of experience in the design, development, and implementation of Court, prosecutor, and public defender automation software. With their proven technology foundation, experienced people, and focus on the needs of their customers, Justice Systems has earned the trust of hundreds of Courts across the United States. For more information, please call 505-883-3987 or visit Justice Systems’ website at www.justicesystems.com.
of the courthouse as well as the legal process, and a wide range of technologies from basic to advanced. Janet G. Cornell will be one of the presenters who will look at Court Performance Measures: From Concepts to Reality (or Making it Happen!). This session will demonstrate how to transfer performance metrics from mere ideas to actual practice and use, and why measures and metrics are critical to operations, demonstrate accountability, support access to justice, and display good leadership. Cornell is a consultant, presenter, and author. She previously served as a court administrator for Scottsdale, Ariz; a staff consultant for the Maricopa County (Phoenix) IT Department (for a countywide $25 million justice integration project as well as interim justice court administrator for Maricopa County.
6. Courthouse of the Future
Many of today’s courthouses are woefully inadequate to support the work that must be done therein. They were designed to support physical adjacencies of people, case files, justice stakeholder agencies, and
other resources. Electronic documents, videoconferencing, e-filing, and other technologies have altered the need for these adjacencies dramatically. The sessions in this track will explore these kinds of important issues such as: What are the essential functions that belong in a courthouse? How can new courthouses be designed to be more adaptable to changes coming in the next 50 years? How can space in existing facilities be repurposed to better support judicial branch needs? How will security, continuity of operations, and disaster-planning concerns affect courthouse design in the future? David Wiklund and Julie Munkelwitz will focus on “Public Defender Kiosks and on Deck Displays: Increasing Courthouse Efficiency Through the Creative Use of Technology.” Wiklund is an IT supervisor for the Fourth Judicial District Court in Minneapolis and manages the Project Management Office and software development. He has led the multiyear project that digitized all of the court records in the Fourth District and was instrumental in the formation of the Project Management Office. He has
also implemented several largescale IT projects, including the recent software update and expansion of the Public Defender Eligibility Kiosk program. Munkelwitz is a court operations manager in the Criminal Division, 2nd Judicial District, Ramsey County, Minn. She is a certified court executive with 28 years of service with Ramsey County, where she manages two court locations and acts as a project manager for several eCourt, technology, and integrations projects. In addition to the six tracks there are a number of presentations from sponsors as well as other sessions running concurrently such as Courtroom 21: State of Courtroom Technology Today being held on Tuesday, September 22, 10:00-11:00 AM. Fred Lederer, William & Mary Chancellor Professor and the director of the Center for Legal and Court Technology (also known as the Courtroom 21 Project), offers a review of the state of courtroom technology today. This session will introduce courtroom and related technology for those new to the field, as well as review recent developments for those who are more experienced.
Innovation + Tradition
“Although there’s no sign that brick and mortar courthouses will be replaced by virtual courthouses, some of the things that happen there, like digital recordings, can now be managed centrally from remote locations. And these recordings can be integrated with the case management system automatically,” adds Tyler’s Kleiman. “All and all, the tracks at this year’s CTC look terrific. All six of them are relevant to the topics we are hearing about from clients, and technology solutions that we are also working on,” he concludes. CT August/September 2015 16
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BY BI L L S C H I FFN ER, CO N T R I B U T I N G E D IT O R
Case Management Solutions to be Highlighted at CTC 2015
One of the major product areas at CTC 2015 will be in the case management software category. Case management continues to help courts stay current in the face of growing workload demands. As one of the sought-after features, most legal software vendors’ products now include the ability to take advantage of electronic filing by pulling data from the case manage-
ment product and pushing it into court filing systems with some added options.
Growing Trends Another big trend is toward evidence-based decisions. “As problem-solving programs continue to prove out that evidence-based practices really do work, courts will find other areas where risk/needs assess-
ments make sense,” says Sue Humphreys, director of Industry Solutions at CourtView Justice Solutions. “We’re seeing interest in that for certain sentencing scenarios and as an element of case triage where the CMS can assess ‘at risk’ cases and suggest alternative paths or resource options to help move those cases to disposition. Even at the human level, like with self-represented liti-
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gants, the very same concepts can be used to determine what kind of assistance someone needs and then interact with that person accordingly.” She says along with rule-driven caseflow and workflow management in general, we’re going to see more uses for these different types of decision-support tools right within the court’s CMS. Humphreys furthers, “Another big trend is ‘judicial tools,’ which is a combination of these great flows and decision-support, along with content management and views that can be personalized for any judicial officer. You can extend that right on out to include just about any role in the court—like supervision tools and such. Unfortunately, the ability to easily view, digest, and act on information in their CMS—in a straightforward and timely way—continues to be a struggle for many courts. It’s critical that case management systems eradicate those constraints,” she emphasizes.
More Efficient Access “We have heard a lot from clients about a need to improve access to justice while working within strict
budgets,” reports Michael Kleiman, marketing director of Tyler’s Courts & Justice Division. “We expect a lot of traffic in the Tyler booth from courts interested in Odyssey Guide and File—our self-service tool that helps guide self-represented litigants through an easy-to-use Web-based process to initiate cases,” he adds. Manoj Jain, vice president and global head of Business Development at Thomson Reuters adds “At CTC 2015, attendees will see that Thomson Reuters CTrack can help save time and money and significantly reduce errors for our customers. With our help, courts have reduced redundancies, automated paper and manual processes, and enabled an efficient, secure process to share data with the justice partners. We work in close partnership with courts and other legal entities to develop systems that support the legal needs of the future by driving efficiencies between justice partners, improving access to the legal process by reducing time to justice, and enabling integration with a variety of Thomson Reuters Legal Solutions available to the legal community today. In the end, we seek to improve access to justice on a global scale.” Riley Miles, director of development at Journal Technologies says for courts of all jurisdictions, their eCourt is a browser-based configurable case management solution. “ECourt’s graphical user interface is natively touch screen enabled. Access cases from anywhere on your browser-enabled device—desktops, laptops, smartphones and tablets. Because it is browserbased, it’s very fast and designed for high-speed performance. Information may be updated from the bench, for example, using configurable judges tools. Calendars and views of each day’s docket—configured by person, by judge, by courtroom, by time—are all available with eCourt,” he adds. Let’s take a look at the current crop of case management software solutions, and some of the other products they integrate with, that are being showcased at CTC 2015.
CMS Offerings Caseflow Management With its dynamic caseflow management (DCM) engine, flexible screen builder, and role-driven dashboards and navigation, JWorks is the most configurable COTS case management system around. What you see—and how you interact with information—is completely configurable in JWorks and can be easily tailored to roles, teams, and individuals. Built-in workflow automatically assigns and routes outstanding to-dos and deadlines and lets you notify, escalate, re-route, and reAugust/September 2015 20
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assign work as needed. This unique capability goes beyond caseflow to include the flow of person information and specific activities like calendaring, warrants, investigation, financials, docketing, motion tracking, and documents to name a few. www.courtview.com/ct, 1.800.406.4333
Management Systems FivePoint Solutions provides accountability court case manage-
ment, document management, contract management, records conversion, data integration services and payment processing. The company helps their customers derive value from previous technology investments through integration and the elimination of information gaps. http://myfivepoint.com, 1.803.951.2094
System Integration Combining technology with justice system expertise, ImageSoft solutions seamlessly integrate with a court’s existing Case Management System, providing judges, clerks,
court staff and constituents a “better-than-paper” experience. Offering both JusticeTech, a comprehensive software solution that enables courts to store, manage, automate and securely share 100% of their information electronically and TrueFiling, an electronic filing solution that supports all case types and dramatically improves court efficiency and constituent access, ImageSoft has helped revolutionize court and justice system operations throughout North America. www.imagesoftinc.com, 248.948.8100
Focusing on Core Court Competencies The best outcomes are achieved when the court is agile and refocuses on what they do the best, their core competencies. Agility is the ability to
move quickly and easily; AgileCourt and AgileJury are the Xerox solutions that deliver exactly that. They also augment these solutions through a broad range of offerings that help optimize court services. www.xerox.com/justice, 1.877.414.2676
to integrate with all CMS systems or to be used as a standalone solution. www.extractsystems.com, 1.608.821-6534
Case Management System Tyler’s Odyssey solution is the leading case management system in the U.S., empowering courts serving
more than 100 million citizens in more than 600 counties across 21 states, reports the firm. Built upon Odyssey case management functionality to support appellate courts, the new appellate case module offers robust features to generate efficiencies and improve workflow processes for case management, panel assignment, opinion management and lower court case functions. www.tylertechnologies.com, 1.800.431.5776
Web-based Case Management ECourt is database agnostic, automates repetitive tasks, brings judges tools to the bench, and fully supports real-time in-court processing. Court professionals need only a
Redaction Tool Extract Systems developed ID Shield to meet the specific demands of government and public organizations to automatically capture and redact information from their recorded documents. ID Shield secures sensitive information for municipal, county and state courts across the country. Extract Systems has developed almost 90 different data capture and manipulation objects that are used to build a stateof-the-art redaction solution. ID Shield is built in the Microsoft Windows environment and designed
web browser to access full eCourt functionality, meaning eCourt is available to judges and clerks via smartphone or mobile device. No apps are necessary. Because eCourt is highly configurable, it will evolve with processes within a Court as they change over time. www.journaltechnologies.com, 1.877.587.8927
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Management Solutions Thomson Reuters provides customers with unrivaled solutions that integrate content, expertise
that, offering courts customizable management solutions configured to how a court functions. C-Track CMS offers new features and functions leading to the next generation of adaptable case management systems. www.thomsonreuters.com, 1.877.923.7800
Online Court Systems
and technologies, according to the firm. C-Track CMS delivers just
Jury Systems Incorporated was founded by jury professionals who have been in the business since the beginning of jury automation in the 1980s. Many of the team members are former jury managers who prioritize helping each client improve efficiency and streamline court procedures. The developer’s newest product, JURY+ Web Generation, is
a browser-based JMS developed and supported by this team. www.jurysystems.com, 1.805.285.5800
e-filing Software More and more courts are realizing the savings of time and money that Tybera’s eFlex brings through reduced manual data entry and automated workflow. With support for both the software license model and the attorney pays model, courts are offered even more value through
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new features like their document generation and CASEaDia PDF binders for judges. The firm will also be showing a Domestic Violence eFiling Wizard that they developed with the North Carolina AOC. www.tybera.com, 801.226.2746
Integrated Case Management Justice Systems, Inc.’s FullCourt Enterprise is a complete, fully integrated court case management software system that runs in an onpremise or Oracle Cloud environment and can easily exchange data with other judicial agencies. The solution provides a powerful backend infrastructure, an innovative browser-based user interface, and a comprehensive collection of modu-
lar tools and applications. FullCourt Enterprise’s customizable, tablebased architecture allows the system
to be widely configured to meet the specific requirements of the Court. www.justicesystems.com, 505.883.3987
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eFiling System CourtFileNow is a comprehensive eFiling system for courts, clerks and attorneys powered by Cenifax Courts. This Internet-based system links Court Documents and Workplace Tools to your Court Management System. CourtFileNow allows flexibility for courts and clerks to customize the system to the way business is done in your county. CourtFileNow simplifies most court processes so that they can be accomplished in eFiling. It also features instant communication of court, clerk or attorney activity to all attorneys on the case via eService and immediate access to the most current information. http://courtfilenow.net, 1.888.318.4751
Georgia, GreenCourt serves more than 80% of the State and Superior Courts in Georgia. GreenCourt¹s combination of justice system expertise and technology innovation creates affordable, tailored software for eFiling and eAccess. Judges, court
administrators, clerks, attorneys and the general public benefit from GreenCourt’s people-first approach to court technology. http://www.greencourt.com, 1.844.423.3453
IN A SUPPORTING ROLE Litigant Solutions TurboCourt features sophisticated guided-interview technology, proven to solve court challenges regarding self-represented litigants. Online interviews precisely tailored to court workflows and rules, with onscreen filer help
Cloud Solutions Adobe’s cloud solutions for government enable public sector organizations to revolutionize citizen experiences through the creation and delivery of dynamic content and websites. Supporting the launch of its cloud solutions for government, Adobe is also offering tools and resources to help customers better understand the benefits of adopting new cloud solutions. http://adobe.com/go/govassembly, 1.800.872.3023
Electronic Filing and Access GreenCourt specializes in electronic filing of and electronic access to court documents and related information. In partnership with the Council of Superior Court Clerks of
at every step, and innovative decision-making checkpoints, produce 100% error-free court forms ready for print, e-delivery or e-file. TurboCourt’s award-winning platform seamlessly integrates with any court management system, including Tyler Odyssey. www.turbocourt.com, 1.877.260.1792
Decision Support System Not a case management system and not a document management system but a decision support system for judges, Mentis reinvents the courtroom. A judge and recent aiSMARTBENCH user, said of his experience using the system, “Anything that helps us do our job quicker, better, faster, while still paying attention to that overarching requirement of justice— and that’s the main thing—it’s good for everybody.” Their mission was to create a solution for judicial users that exceeds the efficiencies of conventional paper files. www.aiSmartBench.com, 303.756.4564
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BY DONNA ROG ERS , E D I T O R
Kiosks Keep Traffic Moving Self-service, speed and staff savings are obvious benefits of the devices.
…they’re popping up everywhere. As virtual receptionists in corporate lobbies…in U.S. government offices to offer information….at universities to automate financial aid applications and registration…at healthcare and hospitality entities for checkin…in airports to print boarding passes and even to download movies. And soon they will beef up service in the “Golden Arches” in NYC. Beginning in August New Yorkers will be among the first in the nation to use giant iPad-like kiosks at MacDonalds to choose from nine new burger toppings and seven sauces in the burger chain’s new
Kiosks
“Create Your Taste” customization effort. It’s an attempt to attract younger patrons and to reverse 11 straight quarters of declining samestore sales, reports the New York Post. Yet, while courts aren’t serving up special sauce, they can offer another type of special: a self serve option that saves on staffing. Beginning in the lobby, kiosks provide for self-service information and wayfinding, allowing visitors to continue on their way more quickly without causing long queues. Courthouse kiosks allow automated check-in for jurors allowing more satisfaction for those serving. Of course kiosks accept fines and fees, and are even providing probationers
Infax’s new SmartScreen technology enables court patrons to be interactive with all of the company’s modules within the CourtSight Suite.
a way to take a self-administered alcohol/drug of abuse screening test. These kiosks are designed to handle high traffic applications and automate many of the tasks that staff members normally have to process. This allows various government agencies to provide better service through reduced congestion and shorter wait times while also lowering the overhead costs of personnel, according to the web page of Olea Kiosks Inc., a maker of standard and custom kiosks. Olea has government installations at the Department of Homeland Security; Customs & Border Protection and Department of Veteran Affairs. Kiosk use is on the rise. In fact, according to a new report by
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Sandler Research entitled "Global Interactive Kiosk Market 20152019," the self-service kiosk market will grow at 11 percent compound annual growth rate. The report noted that retail currently holds the lion's share of the kiosk market, as it generated 46% of all kiosk revenue in 2014. China and India lead the retail kiosk growth. However, the report also mentions some of the challenges in the market, such as the rapid pace of technology. Manufacturers have to update kiosk hardware and software every six months simply to stay updated. In addition, tablet kiosks are beginning to replace traditional kiosk designs in several industries such as hotels and restaurants, due to lower costs and increased customization, the report states. Health
care and financial industries are currently not utilizing tablet kiosks due to their restrictive features. For courts, kiosks come in wallmounted and floor mounted in all sizes and styles—standard to custom—from smaller ADA compliant footprints that are 50 inches high, to those that are 68 inches in height. Screen sizes span from standard that may be 19 inches to large that are 55 inches and more. These can be configured with peripherals including thermal printers, a media player device, magnetic and smart card readers, proximity sensors and QR/barcode scanners—and of late new apps enable them to interact with a user’s smartphone. Infax, Inc., the leading interactive signage and wayfinding vendor, will debut its SmartScreen application at the upcoming Court Technology
Conference. The application, which will be exhibited with Infax’s checkin software, enables patrons to be interactive with all of the company’s modules within the CourtSight Suite. Kristen Zeck, sales & marketing associate, notes that now more than ever, there is a greater push in the judicial market to go paperless and the modules respond to this. DocketCall, CourtSight’s flagship product, is an electronic docket display system that automates the court’s docket each day, eliminating paper print-outs. Courts can upload their public notices to the CourtBoard dashboard and display them on monitors rather than corkboards. And JuryCall electronically allows potential jurors to remain informed about where they are to appear throughout the jury selection
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The BreathcheK kiosk from Streetime, installed in 20 agency locations thus far, contains a Lifeloc FC20 PBT that collects a breath sample from the client.
process. SmartScreens tie everything together by allowing patrons to interact with all the CourtSight modules. On a single screen patrons can see an overview and interact with maps, directories, FAQs and the docket. The module also offers a check-in feature that gives case patrons and potential jurors the ability to check in for their specific appointments. To an unfamiliar patron the large touchscreen monitors are reported to be intuitive and inviting, drawing them to the self-service monitors to obtain their answers, saving staff valuable time. The ADA compliant SmartScreens can be mounted on a wall or in a floor mounted kiosk. The ease of using SmartScreens in judicial settings will make it an “unparalleled solution to courthouse traffic,” says Zeck. At the touch of a finger, potential and selected jurors can easily find their way around the courthouse, look up docket information, view FAQs and check in and out of the court, she furthers. “Processes that often hold up the court are
Jurors can perform a host of tasks on this kiosk from Courthouse Technologies.
streamlined into one efficient, interactive application that keep courthouse patrons and staff moving.”
Speeding up theTheProcess main purpose of kiosks is the self-service aspect, notes John Arntsen, vice president of Client Services, Courthouse Technologies, the juror software developer and kiosk provider. Thus, the main functionality in a jury operation is for self-service check-in and attendance as well as jurors completing their questionnaire. Similar to kiosks’ use in an airport, court-specific kiosks are meant to increase the accessibility of services without requiring additional personnel. For example, he says, if you have four kiosks, this means you can have four jurors check in at the same time and only require one staff member to oversee their use. Kiosks are meant to replace certain tasks and responsibilities that court staff would normally be responsible for. However, due to
budget issues, staffing issues, accessibility issues, etc., it places limits on those staff . “Kiosks are a great idea to solve these issues while costing you less,” he says. Kiosks are meant for any place—banks, retails stores, etc.— where the customer experience can be sped up, or made more convenient without it affecting a business’s bottom line—and courts are no different, he informs. At the CTC conference, Courthouse Technologies plans to exhibit its entire jury platform and how technology can be used to create more efficiency and convenience for jurors and court staff alike, notes Arntsen. “The goal is to show how effective use of technology, combined constant communication can increase a court’s jury yield and save them money. “ CHT will also have on display its latest kiosk that compensates jurors. “We are the first company to produce a cash-dispensing kiosk specifically for paying jurors,” points out Arntsen. Its payment system is integrated with CHT’s core jury management system, which is complete
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with audit trials, and standard accounting principles.
Alcohol Screening For self-administered drug court automated alcohol screening, Streetime Technologies offers a kiosk called BreathcheK that requires the client to enter an ID on a touch screen to complete an automated passive breath test. Their fingerprint is then digitally validated. The client then blows into holes in a box that contains a Lifeloc FC20 PBT that triggers the unit and a breath sample is collected. If the BAC is at .002 or greater they trigger a positive and further testing is recommended. Breathchek has the ability to test clients with minimal staff involvement, explains John Diamond, vice president of Sales, StreeTime Technologies. Courts are looking for automation of compliance to reduce staff involvement and costs associated with it, he says, and this does just that. The Alcohol Addiction Recovery Center a
Infax’s new SmartScreen technology shown in a floor-mounted option.
nonprofit in Forth Wayne, Indiana, uses the system to not only validate the reporting in of clients but also is able to administer breath tests in volume at a far lower cost than with staff administered tests, he details. Kiosks provide the ability to complete large numbers of tests in a shorter period of time thus insuring compliance with court orders. By reducing staff involvement it therefore reduces costs, he concludes. Floor-standing BreathcheK kiosks are providing efficiencies to pretrial, probation and parole clients in 20 locations so far, including Douglas County Drug Court, Omaha, Neb., Dallas County community Supervision and Corrections Dept. Another recent innovation from StreeTime, according to Diamond, is its SleepTime √ in Kiosk. It frees up staff time by allowing clients to complete a self-administered upload of their Sleeptime “watch” in the agency lobby. A passive breathalyzer test is also completed prior to each upload. The SleepTime device is actually a precision accelerometer that measures not only body movement and intensity of movement during sleep (it also serves as a wristwatch during waking hours). An accelerometer is a device for measuring acceleration and gravity-induced reaction forces. It detects magnitude and direction of the acceleration and can be used to sense orientation, vibration and shocks similar to activity trackers like FitBit. The SleepTime upload operates on research going back to the 1930s about alcohol’s effect on sleep. The science behind the technology, reports the company, is that consuming alcohol or other abused drugs will place the user in a deeper sleep initially and as it wears off the body goes into withdrawal, causing more subconscious waking episodes and with the waking episodes comes sleep movement, which the
SmartScreen technology from Infax.
SleepTime watch records in its memory. A sleep movement baseline process is created for each client, and if that baseline is deviated the SleepTime data upload result creates a flag for that client to drop a UA on the next scheduled upload. The results are immediately emailed and/or texted to the agency program administrator. Meanwhile the kiosk instructs the client to “see staff” and a urine sample is collected and a deep lung breathalyzer test is administered.
Coming Soon to a Courthouse Near You Overall, kiosks are helping community supervision officers screening drugs of abuse clients to help save time and money on random testing. They are receiving fees and fines to help increase collections. They are interacting with your smartphone to help direct you to your courtroom. And when court is in recess, you may even be able to use one to order lunch! CT August/September 2015x
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BY MI C H A E L G R O H S , C O N T R IB U T IN G E D I T O R
New laws may allow IIDs to lower DUI recidivism rates without forcing license suspensions. September 1, 2015, Texas will become one of the states that allow someone with a DUI to get his or her license back, and Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD), which is based in Irving, Texas, is pleased about it. They should be. According to MADD data, 10% of all drunk driving fatalities occur in Texas. In 2013, that figure was 1,337 deaths, and data show that IIDs – when installed – work to lower the amount of DUI recidivism. There will be fewer intoxicated drivers on the road, and people convicted of a DUI will not have their lives disrupted by not being allowed to drive. Offenders will be able to get to work and drop their kids off at school. Under HB 2246, which was signed into law by Gov. Greg Abbott, drivers convicted of a DUI with a blood alcohol content of less than 0.15 will be
ON
able to drive as long as they have an IID installed on their car. Rep. Jason Villalba (R-Dallas) helped write the law and noted that people previously had been required to accept a license suspension, and while judges had discretion to allow exemptions such as allowing an offender to drive to and from work, which was common in rural areas but not in urban areas such as Dallas, the problem, says Villalba, was that offenders were still driving even though their license had been suspended. Not only that, said Ed Cohen of Smart Start, a person might be out there driving not only without a license, but also without insurance, and possibly under the influence. “A trifecta of bad ideas.” According to data from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), as many as 80% of motorists continue to drive on a suspended license.
Limited Success
Kentucky also passed a mandatory IID law in 2015, but while Rep. Dennis Keene considers the passage a victory, as he told WLWT, “The final passage of mandatory interlock legislation in Kentucky is not everything we fought for.” The bill will require first-time offenders to install an IID in order to retain driving privileges, but unlike many of the other 24 states with mandatory firsttime offender laws, it is required only if there were aggravating circumstances such as having a child in the car, driving 30 or more miles over the speed limit, or causing injury to another person. Rep. Keene had been working on the bill since the start of his six terms of service. His daughter was nearly killed by a drunk driver in 2002. There are considerations when dis-
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cussing bills regarding all offenders interlock ignition laws. When Texas lawmakers were considering their bill, the concern arose over whether the state had the resources required to deal with all first-time offenders. When New Jersey lawmakers, the first to put a drunk driving law on record way back in 1906, were debating the current state’s proposed law, Dan Phillips, the legislative liaison for the Administrative Office of the Courts, raised potential issues. For one, said Phillips, it might put judges in the position of having to "go through a long analysis" such as they do in criminal trials in regards to whether the IID should be installed or if the offender’s license should just be suspended. Bob Ramsey, who publishes a handbook on the state’s DUI laws, voiced concern for family members of offenders who would likewise have to participate in the program despite having committed no crime. There is also the matter that the Bill would require the devices to be placed on a single car and not do anything to pre-
vent the offender from driving another. That is the very loophole two Wisconsin lawmakers are trying to close in their own state. As it is, if an operator is convicted of a DUI and ordered to install an IID, he or she will have to designate the vehicle and have it fitted with the device. The loophole came in when an operator was caught driving another vehicle that had not been outfitted with the device. “It wasn’t necessarily a criminal offense. It was more like they were operating after revocation which was a lesser violation,” Sen. Wanggaard, one of the two sponsors of the bill told FOX6NOW. The proposed legislation would tie the IID to the driver’s license, thus making it a restricted license and dictating that any car they are driving has to have an IID.
IIDs all around
Two politicians from New York are proposing taking IID use further than mandatory use for first time offenders. Assistant Assembly Speaker Felix Ortiz (D-Brooklyn)
has proposed Bill A.6445, which would require that all vehicles in New York have ignition interlock devices by 2019. He further proposed that IIDs be retrofitted to older vehicles and that the BAC lowered to .06, a reduction of 25%, which was also recommended by the National Transportation Safety Board in 2013, which stated that the reduction would lower the amount of accidents by 40%-50%. The Bill was drafted as a result of an accident in which the Bouaz-Ostane family was killed in a fire resulting from an alcohol-related crash on the Southern State Parkway. Data suggest that mandatory IIDs on all vehicles would significantly reduce the more than 10,000 people killed as a result of DUI related accidents in the U.S. each year. A systematic review of 15 studies conducted by the CDC found that the use of IID use realized a 67% reduction in recidivism. Dr. Patrick Carter of the University of Michigan Injury Center and his team set out to deter-
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mine the number of lives that could be saved if IIDs were mandatory on all cars. Using data from Fatality Analysis Reporting System and the National Automotive Sampling System's General Estimates System, the group assessed data of alcoholrelated accidents that occurred between 2006 and 2010. The results, which were published in the American Journal of Public Health, suggested that 85% of alcohol related auto accident deaths and between 84%-88% of all non-fatal accidents over a 15-year period were prevented: a figure that equates to nearly 60,000 lives saved and 1.25 million non-fatal crashes avoided. The researchers also found that the data suggested installing IIDs on all new vehicles would realize a financial savings of $343 billion in unintentional injury costs over that same period. U.S. Senator Charles Shumer of N.Y. has even taken the matter a step further. He is asking the nation to increase funding for the development of high-tech sensors that would detect if the driver is drunk and prevent the ignition from starting. He states that such sensors are less burdensome than traditional IIDs and could be made as a regular option on automobiles. He furthers that such sensors, which detect alcohol on breath and skin, should be made mandatory for all DUI offenders.
ALCOLOCK USA
The WR2 alcohol interlock features electrochemical fuel cell sensors to ensure that every test is testing only for alcohol, thereby reducing the chance of a false-positive. The WR2 is programmable at the factory level to include service appointment reminders, random retests, and violation resets. The device has the ability to operate in extreme conditions at altitudes of up to 3,500 meters and features an enhanced data logging capability for
more and a more sophisticated reporting format that includes statistical analysis of events over extended periods to enable comprehensive program review. www.alcolockusa.com, 1.888.937.9646
DRAGER
The Interlock 7000 is an in-car breathalyzer that reinvents the traditional ignition interlock device to incorporate enhanced user features and monitoring capabilities, says the company. In addition, the intelligent camera, mouth alcohol detection, and GPS/GPRS options anticipate the compliance regulations (for compliance with an ignition interlock restriction only). With more than 60 years of experience, Dräger is a world leader in advanced breath alcohol measurement devices. Its ignition interlock devices are built on the proven technology of its Alcotest line of breath alcohol instruments, which are trusted in police departments worldwide. www.draeger.com, 1.800.332.6858
time options, compatibility with all vehicle makes/models, wireless data download, integrated heater for cold weather, programmable violation levels, alcohol-specific fuel cell technology, and immediate notification of violation to monitoring authorities. The SSI-20/30, Smart Start’s newest model, features a bright color display screen and a user-friendly keypad. The SSI-20/30 is roughly the size of a cell phone, with multiple testing options and quick installation. Beneficial for users and monitoring authorities alike, it offers GPS tracking, compatibility with all vehicle makes/models, upcoming test alerts, anti-circumvention features, multiple languages, integrated heater for colder weather, programmable violation levels, and immediate notification of violation to monitoring authorities. The mouthpiece is removable, so the device is always clean, and the alcohol-specific fuel
SMART START
The SSI-20/20™ is a discreet, state-of-the-art device that boasts myriad benefits for users and monitoring authorities. On-screen instructions and interface design are simple and intuitive for easy breath alcohol testing. The Photo ID module adds an extra method of tamper detection to the SSI-20/20 wherein recorded photos identify the user with every test. The SSI-20/20 also boasts GPS options, multiple programmable blowing patterns, restricted driving
cell technology ensures maximum test accuracy. Finally, the device is compatible with our Photo ID module, which allows monitoring authorities to confirm the identification of the tester through color photos of each test. www.smartstartinc.com, 1.800.880.3394, info@smartstartinc.com
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BY G. F. G U ERC I O, C O N T R IB U T IN G E D I T O R
PRETRIAL RISK PREDICTORS: ASSESSING THEIR EFFECTIVENESS AND IMPACT.
WHO
can predict the future? Who among us has a crystal ball? Still judges and agencies are asked to make decisions about offenders pretrial that will affect the person greatly. How can we better analyze these decisions? This has been the focus of many studies to date with outcomes and assessments that are changing the way those in position make these decisions. And it all starts with science—the science of predictive analyses. “There are hundreds of studies of criminal behavior over many years involving thousands of offenders that have found a great deal of consistency with regard to the basic domains of risk: criminal history, anti-social attitudes, values and beliefs; temperament and anti-social personality
patterns; peer associations; familial factors; employment, educational and financial achievement; substance abuse; and lack of pro-social leisure activities,” says Edward Latessa, director, School of Criminal Justice, University of Cincinnati. “It is important to remember that with Pretrial assessment there are several important issues that need to be taken into consideration,” he contends. “Some methodological and practical issues in developing pretrial assessment are all the problems normally associated with developing assessment tools plus skewed samples: many high-risk, serious defendants are not granted pretrial release. The legal status limits the type of information that can be gathered, and there are time constraints for the assessment.” He says for traditional pretrial
programs—looking at FTA (failure to appear) or risk of reoffending— most tools are similar and sort fairly well. For pretrial programs that want to provide services—for example place in drug court—most of the existing general assessment tools will do just fine—for example the LSI or ORAS (Level of Service Inventory or Ohio Risk Assessment System) series of tools. Latessa was involved in developing the ORAS-PAT (Pretrial Assessment). In describing the development and validation of the pretrial screening tool, he says that the data collection tool covers theoretical risk and need domains. The ability to identify higher-risk defendants both for safety and the use of resources is an important aspect, but just as important is identifying lowrisk defendants not needing super-
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vision or detention. In fact, he notes, assigning intense supervision or preventive detention to low-risk defendants either removes the individual from positive social aspects or exposes them to risk factors that were previously nonexistent resulting in greater risk of recidivism or negative supervision outcomes. “We need to start developing alternatives to arrest so that low level offenders don’t get taken to jail—such as citations and other tools for law enforcement,” he says. “I would like to see an app developed that police could use to assess someone prior to bringing them to jail. If they are low risk, non-serious offenses they could simply give a citation to appear or some other alternative.” Along with increases in public awareness, correctional agencies are
becoming more aware about issues involving pretrial prison overcrowding, says Kevin M. Williams, Ph.D., manager, Product Development, Clinical/Education/Public Safety Division, Multi-Health Systems, Inc. “There is also increasing recognition that pretrial remand decisions are often influenced by the offender’s financial status as opposed to their actual risk to reoffend or fail to reappear. These issues have sparked renewed interest in evaluating objective risk/need assessments in pretrial settings.” More and more agencies are recognizing the importance of applying evidence-based practice to their risk assessment methods, he says, meaning ongoing research specific to these issues is imperative. “Effective assessment will not only relieve burdens involving prison
overcrowding and overwhelming officer caseloads, but also improve public safety.” He is “hopeful” that the current trends will continue in identifying current or new objective instruments that best predict pretrial reoffenders or those that may fail to appear. He points out the current literature suggests that the core factors that are most predictive of reoffending are consistent across demographic variables, types of offending, geographic locations, and settings (e.g., pretrial vs. post-conviction). “This suggests that there will not be a need to create new risk assessments for pretrial settings, but instead existing measures can be used for these decisions. The biggest challenge will be to identify assessments that are time- and resource-effective but also possess
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clear evidence of predictive validity.” “The number of tools available is quite large, possibly too large to list in one article,” he suggests. “The most prominent tool we provide at MHS is the Level of Service/Case Management Inventory (LS/CMI).
settings.” He points to Bonta & Motiuk (1991), which reported that LSI-R scores correlated with decisions to remand offenders into custody. “The State of Hawaii’s Department of Public Safety has also reported research demonstrat-
COLORADO TOOL EXAMPLE Risk Category
Public Safety Rate
Court Appearance Rate
% of Defendants
1 2 3 4
91% 80% 69% 58%
95% 85% 77% 51%
20% 49% 23% 8%
The table provided by Pretrial Justice Institute shows results from an empirically-derived pretrial risk assessment tool, in this case, the statewide tool that was constructed through research for Colorado. The first column shows the risk level of defendants as determined by the pretrial risk assessment tool, with “1” being the lowest risk and “4” being the highest risk. As the table shows, defendants that scored as low-risk by this tool went through the pretrial period without an arrest for new criminal activity (Public Safety Rate) at a rate of 91 percent, and made all their court appearances at a rate of 95 percent. These percentages go down with each risk level. Colorado jurisdictions that have implemented and tracked this tool have found that defendants’ predicted success on pretrial release and actual success are nearly identical.
It is the latest revision to the Level of Service Inventory – Revised (LSIR) and also includes a screening version (LSI-R:SV). These instruments are the most well-researched risk/need measures of general reoffending risk and use objective, empirically-based criteria for assigning risk. In a pretrial setting, this type of instrument is informative in determining whether an offender is at risk to reoffend if they are released into the community while awaiting trial.” Dr. Williams says, “Generally speaking, any instrument that demonstrates strong empirical support in the prediction of reoffending or failure to appear—particularly in a pre-trial sample—will be most effective. Ideally, the measure should be able to be completed objectively in a time- and resourceeffective manner. As implied previously, the LS/CMI, LSI-R, and LSIR:SV should be effective in pretrial
ing the effectiveness of the LSI-R for pretrial applications in their state.” (See http://icis.hawaii.gov/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/PSD_riskclass_2003-06.pdf)
October 2009, deferring the construction of a new jail and closing another, saving taxpayers millions of dollars. The conclusion of these authors was as follows: “Findings confirmed the accuracy of the instrument. The validation study indicated that COMPAS had high levels of accuracy in predicting general recidivism, violence, and failure to appear for court.” Dr. Brennan notes there are several ways to combine risk factors into an overall predictive algorithm or instrument. Clinical judgment/ human intuition: The classifying officer, judge or psychologist simply reviews all the risk factors in their head and intuitively makes a predictive decision. Simple linear additive (unweighted) point scales: This simply adds up the risk factor scores into a single risk score. Cut points are applied to separate high and low scoring offenders usually into three risk levels. Cut points can be developed by policy arguments, statistical procedures or even guesswork. “Surprisingly several studies have shown that this simple method performs as well as more complex actu-
Broward County Success Tim Brennan, Ph.D, chief scientist, at Northpointe Inc., relates use of their applications at the Broward County Sheriff’s office: “This agency installed the COMPAS (Correctional Offender Management Profiling for Alternative Sanctions) risk assessment models to inform pre-trial release decision-making as a tool to improve population management, control crowding and reduce costs, while simultaneously showing no increase in crime.” The report by Mann (Mann et al. 2012) and colleagues on the impact of the changes in policies and practices indicated the closure of one jail in
Cherise Fanno Burdeen, executive director, Pretrial Justice Institute
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arial methods in predicting future crime,” he says. Weighted additive linear point scale: In this alternative to simple linear additive approach each risk factor is given a different weight, generally based on its importance. “For several decades it has been the preferred method of most criminal justice researchers for developing predictive equations for a large variety of predictive risk decisions,” Brennan notes. The emergence of machine learning (ML): These include a variety of predictive and classification methods from the field of artificial intelligence. They are just beginning to be used in corrections and criminal justice. Examples include neural networks, support vector machines and various kinds of decision trees.
These methods differ dramatically from the above linear additive methods, by their ability to deal with non-linear and non-additive relations within the data. “Since much criminal justice data is characterized by some of these data features the exploration of ML methods may lead to some important advances in criminal justice,” he says. Ensemble or aggregation methods: A recent ML approach uses massive computing power to rapidly compute many separate predictive risk assessment models giving labels of low, medium or high label for each offender. These separate risk models are then automatically aggregated into a final overall score. This integration often uses a simple “majority voting procedure” that tallies the high/medium/ low votes
for each offender and assigns the offender to the group that has the maximum number of votes across all the models, Brenna details.
‘Largest-ever Dataset’ The Laura and John Arnold Foundation provided a recent study published in April 2015 in the Federal Sentencing Reporter (Vol. 27, No. 4, 2015 Vera Institute of Justice) “Pretrial Risk Assessment: Improving Public Safety and Fairness in Pretrial Decision Making” by Anne Milgram, et al. (see “Resources” for more on the report and the institute.) It states: “We recently assembled the largest-ever dataset of pretrial records, encompassing more than 1.5 million cases drawn from hundreds of jurisdictions across the
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lent crime than average defendants. “Defendants flagged by the tool as being at an elevated risk of violence who were released pretrial were, in fact, re-arrested at a rate of 17 times higher than that of other defendants.” Some have wondered whether these types of improvements to public safety might come at the expense of fairness. The study’s authors note that the PSA-Court was designed to be—and has proven to be—race- and genderneutral. The assessment’s factors Tim Brennan, Ph.D, chief scientist at Northpointe Inc., home of COMPAS (Correctional Offender Management Profiling for Alternative Sanctions).
United States, and analyzed them to determine what factors about a defendant or his case are most predictive of the likelihood that an individual will commit new crimes, new violent crimes, or fail to appear for court if released before trial. “Indeed, with only nine such factors, we were able to create an assessment—the Public Safety Assessment-Court (PSA-Court)— that accurately predicts the risk of new crime, new violence, and court appearance in a manner that not only improves public safety, but also enhances fairness and helps jurisdictions use resources more efficiently. The PSA-Court has been successfully validated in four additional sites, including the entire state of Kentucky and three diverse counties across the United States.” In Kentucky, the tool has helped judges reduce crime by up to 15 percent among defendants on pretrial release, while at the same time increasing the percentage of defendants released before trial, thereby reducing both crime and jail populations. The tool also helped judges identify the number of defendants— approximately 8 percent— who were far more likely to commit vio-
pertain to criminal history, current charge, and current age; and no factors are included that could be implicitly or explicitly discriminatory, such as education level, socioeconomic status, race, gender, or neighborhood of residence. The benefits of this design have been borne out in the results from Kentucky: the tool has accurately classified defendants’ risk levels without regard to whether they were white or Black, male or female, the authors explain. All fairness equations go back to
Resources • Pretrial Justice Institute—Organization takes the stance that it is time to end use of cash in the bail system, and replace it with a system in which lower- and moderate-risk defendants are released to the community without having to post any money, and those who pose unmanageable risks are detained without bond. www.pretrial.org/solutions/ • Vera Institute of Justice—The Federal Sentencing Reporter is published by the University of California Press on behalf of the Vera Institute of Justice, an independent nonprofit organization that combines expertise in research, demonstration projects, and technical assistance to help leaders in government and civil society improve the systems people rely on for justice and safety. Also, it is the only academic journal in the United States that focuses on sentencing law, policy, and reform. www.vera.org/project/federal-sentencing-reporter. • National Pretrial Justice Coalition— Policy statements and resolutions from the Conference of Chief Justices, the Conference of State Court Administrators, the International Association of Chiefs of Police, the National Sheriffsʼ Association, the Association of Prosecuting Attorneys, the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, and the American Council of Chief Defenders, among others, call for jurisdictions to use empirically-derived pretrial risk assessment tools. www.pretrial.org/get-involved/pretrial-national-coalition/. • Luminosity, Inc.— Conducts pretrial-related research studies including “The Public Safety Assessment-Court Pretrial Risk Assessment,” The Hidden Costs of Pretrial Detention,” The effect of Pretrial Detention on Sentencing,” “Pretrial Risk Assessment in the Federal Court.” www.luminositysolutions.com.
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the legal charge, according to Cherise Fanno Burdeen, executive director, Pretrial Justice Institute. Referring to the Stack v. Boyle case in Supreme Court (342 U.S. 1), where multiple defendants were given the same bail based on the charge but the judge noted the chances all posed the same risk level were slim, she comments, “When we rely on the charge alone, we are wildly mis-assessing risks.” She adds, “We also know from the risk assessment research that risk assessments that are based on intuition or on the consensus of key stakeholders, perform poorly. Yet such tools continue to be used in many jurisdictions today. As a result, defendants who are actually low-risk sit in jail pending trial, and many who are high-risk are being released to the community.”
Colorado Study Over 60 percent of inmates in our jails are there pending adjudication of their cases, Burdeen furthers. “A study done in Colorado found that, when controlling for risk levels, defendants who are released without having to post any money prior to release do just as well, in terms of both appearance in court and completing the pretrial period with no arrests for new criminal activity, as those who are required to post money. (Michael R. Jones, Unsecured Bonds: The As Effective and Most Efficient Pretrial Release Option, Washington, DC: Pretrial Justice Institute, 2013.) As the table with the Colorado risk assessment results illustrates, (see Colorado Tool Example) only 8 percent of defendants show up in the highest risk category in that state, she discerns. Almost 70 percent of the defendants fall into the two lowest-risk categories, with very high rates of success while on pretrial release. “The risk assessment
“When we rely on the charge alone, we are wildly mis-assessing risks.” Cherise Fanno Burdeen, executive director, Pretrial Justice Institute studies that have been done in other jurisdictions show similar results; that most defendants do very well on pretrial release,” she says. Earlier this year, a federal judge in Missouri looked at the question of financial bonds from a different angle, Burdeen notes. In a case involving a class action suit challenging the use of financial bonds for poor persons, the judge ruled that the Constitution prohibits the setting of a bond that a defendant cannot afford to meet. The Court wrote: “No person may, consistent with the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, be held in custody after arrest because the person is too poor to post a monetary bond.” (Pierce v. The City of Velda City, No. 4-15-cv-570-HEA, U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri, 2015.) Based on these findings, she shares her view of the future: “If we grasp this opportunity and listen to the science, in the near future all judicial officers throughout the country, when making pretrial release decisions, will be guided by the results of empirically-derived pretrial risk assessment tools. When that occurs, and if we match risk assessment findings to appropriate, evidence-based risk management strategies, the pretrial detainee populations of our jails will include only
those individuals who pose such high risks that no release condition or combination of conditions could provide reasonable assurance of public safety and court appearance. All other defendants will be released to the community either on their own recognizance or with conditions of release designed to mitigate any risks identified through the risk assessment.” For More Information: Multi-Health Systems, Inc., www.mhs.com, US: 1.800.456.3003 Ext. 264, Canada: 1.800.268.6011 Ext. 264, International: 416.492.2627 Ext. 264, kevin.williams@mhs.com, LSI (Level of Service) Pretrial Justice Institute, www.pretrial.org, 1.240.477.7152, SOLUTIONS (www.pretrial.org/solutions) School of Criminal Justice, University of Cincinnati, Edward.Latessa@uc.edu, ORAS-PAT (Ohio Risk Assessment System –Pretrial Assessment) Northpointe Inc., www.northpointeinc.com, 1.888.221.4615, tim.brennan@northpointeinc.com, COMPAS (Correctional Offender Management Profiling for Alternative Sanctions) The Laura and John Arnold Foundation, www.arnoldfoundation.org, 1.713.554.1349, PSA-COURT (Public Safety Assessment-Court) August/September 2015x
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BY DONNA ROG ERS , E D I T O R
GETTING AHEAD OF THE JURY TECHNOLOGY CURVE
Texting is one way to keep jurors happy says jury solution developer Judicial Systems Inc.
SOLUTIONS THAT CUT A CLEAR PATH TO JURY EFFICIENCIES.
eeping voters happy by using convenient technology is a great way to ensure your county stays ahead of the “jury technology curve,” notes one jury technology developer. And what will keep them happier but using the fastest growing form of communication: texting. Texting allows a person to communicate without completely stopping what they are doing to send a quick communiqué, and allows them to check important notifications while multi-tasking (hopefully not while driving a car). This developer, Judicial Systems Inc., allows courts to keep in touch with jurors on the go, 24/7. For example, jurors can query the court en route by texting or emailing inquires, in common non-formatted syntax, such as where do I park?, when do I need to report? and how do I get there? Jurors are also able to receive last minute changes or reminders of reporting instructions, allowing them to always be “in the know.” New technology is about providing the public with as much convenience as possible, agrees John
K
Arntsen, vice president of Client Services, Courthouse Technologies (CHT). This can be achieved through kiosks, emails, text messaging, etc., he says. “In fact, the more the public is informed and the more access they have, they more costeffective and efficient a court’s jury operation can be.”
Overview of Functions Overall jury management— which refers to all of the functions involved in the identification, qualification, summoning, and support for prospective jurors—has become increasingly sophisticated and efficient, saving time for both the prospective juror and the court. In addition to more specific reporting times, jurors can be better qualified by the court, receive automatic notifications once they report and they can receive compensation for service before they depart the courthouse. Many steps go into creating the most effective jury management solution. The automation process begins with creating/maintaining
the master jury list, summoning/ qualifying prospective jurors, managing prospective jurors as they serve, post service documentation and compensation and should ideally conclude with conducting postservice performance evaluations, according to the Joint Technology Committee (JTC), a working group established by the Conference of State Court Administrators (COSCA), the National Association for Court Management (NACM) and the National Center for State Courts (NCSC). To assist Courts in developing their own jury automation systems, the JTC published a new standard In December 2014, called the “Jury Management System Requirements,” through a project designed for the Minnesota Office of State Court Administration and overseen by the Administrative Manager of the 4th Judicial District of Minnesota, Hennepin County. It is designed to provide a tool to provide context for existing, and identification of possible new, technology standards initiatives for the courts community (see www.ncsc-jury-
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studies.org). The document contains a plethora of information describing the numerous jury automation business capabilities available and detailing needs, such as business rules, report and display and infrastructure needs, for each. Here we asked some of the vendors showcasing new technologies on the floor at CTC what they are offering to help streamline the jury process.
Xerox’s AgileJury solution shows active pools at a glance.
JURY+ Web Generation screenshot shows juror's history/activity in the JMS.
Integration is Key
“The most important feature of a jury system is its ability to integrate all peripheral products, technology and services with the core jury system,” says Arntsen. He explains that this will allow you to have more active communication with jurors and will be able to provide them with more timely information. At the September show, he notes, “we will be focusing on the newer technology and services CHT can provide that no one else can. Hosting services, text messaging, integrated summons mailing, and cash-dispensing jury payment kiosks are just some of the things we have in store. “
Easy Admin Controls
To support instant communications, the Judicial Systems Inc. texting solution mentioned above has new “breakthrough” admin capabilities, according to Judicial Systems’ president Gary Dower. The jury management component of its Jury2015Plus Jury Administration System, mJuror, now not only communicates pertinent information to jurors by means of texting and email, but also provides authorized court personnel the ability to com-
municate with and manage the jury administration system itself. Court administration can adjust, cancel or reschedule the reporting instructions for jurors from their smart phones by means of texting and email. Along with the ability to immediately manage juror reporting instructions, mJuror allows designated court staff such as judges, bailiffs, etc., to be notified instantly of such changes. And, in addition these written announcements, court personnel now have the ability to record announcements to be broadcast to jurors as audio messages in the form of MMS text and email. Tyler Technologies views the public as “digital citizens” who increasingly interact with businesses via the web. These citizens want to interact with the court in the same way, and expect similar experiences for all their online activities, the company says.
Courthouse JMS Messaging Center from CHT sends an automatic email if a juror fails to appear.
Tyler Tech will be demonstrating its new Odyssey Jury solution at CTC. It provides an online portal where jurors may complete their initial response card, request to be rescheduled to a different day, or be excused from service based on jurisdictional local rules, details Michael Kleinman, director of Marketing of Tyler’s Courts & Justice Division. The new jury system completely integrates with its Odyssey case management system. He furthers that citizen’s requests are then automatically approved or August/September 2015x
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sent to a jury clerk’s queue for processing using Odyssey’s workflow and task management features. Once the request is updated, the juror can receive notification via email with their updated status. In keeping with the mobility of accessing information, the Odyssey Portal is architected using the latest HTML5 technology so jurors can use any device—PC, iPhone, Android, iPad, Blackberry, etc.—to access this data. For those jurors that do not respond online, the flow is also automated. Odyssey Jury provides flexible document management features that allow users to batch scan stacks of response cards and automatically attach them to the juror, the pool, or panel via a barcode, Kleinman notes. Since the document is associated with the juror, it will follow them throughout their service lifecycle, thus allowing these documents to be included as part of a panel packet that is sent to the courtroom. The jury system assembles the scanned responses and online response data into an integrated document. Once created, the packet can then be shared electronically to allow for a paperless transfer of information. Improving the juror experience is a trend in jury management solutions, agrees Tessa Prophet, marketing specialist with Jury Systems Incorporated. Fortunately this is something this company—which was founded by jury professionals back in the 1980s—has always emphasized, she says. “JURY+ Web Solution (our online juror response), JURY+ SMS Notifications (a text reminder regarding service), and JURY+ Express Check-In (our seamless juror checkin) are just a few examples of how we continue to concentrate on improving the jury process, communicating more effectively with jurors, and delivering a positive experience to both court employees and jurors alike,” she says.
With infax’s JuryCall, patrons can find their name and where they are to report in 60 seconds or less.
At CTC, Jury Systems will be highlighting three products. JURY+ Web Generation is a new browserbased JMS (introduced in 2014) that she says is quickly gaining popularity. “Existing clients using JURY+ Next Generation, our Windowsbased version, are thrilled with how simple of a transition working with JURY+ Web Generation is.” Next JURY+ Express Check-In is an attendance module that can be configured in various ways. It can be used as a device in which jurors walk up to it and give themselves attendance in either the jury room or a courtroom. Alternatively, for courts that require personnel to check jurors in, it can be run in “user mode” for quick scanning. The module can perform a myriad of functions, such as calculating juror mileage, printing our work certificates, or giving jurors the option to donate their pay, she says. And finally, Prophet furthers, with the JURY+ Web Solution
prospective jurors can go online and update their information, qualify/disqualify themselves for service, request a postponement, and more. Typically when a client implements JURY+ Web Solution, online response rates vary between 50%75%. She notes that if your court’s current response rate is lower, it may be time to take a look at it.
Evolving Technology
Jury Management systems continue to evolve as technology and processes allow innovations, says Lane Turner, AgileJury product manager with Xerox. “Solutions such as [telephone] IVR, kiosks, mobile device access and online portals that allow jurors to manage their profiles, request postponements, and track their attendance, although not new, are providing even more options for potential jurors every day.”
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Xerox will be showcasing two new jury-specific features at the CTC show. The first is a way of using a postcard for jury service notification and the second is a multi-use kiosk that provides courts more functionality than the typical jury check in/out kiosk, notes Turner. Xerox believes that flexibility and configurability are the most important features of a jury management system, and build that into their products, says Turner. By flexibility he means that the software must allow both jury staff to be able to change their processes to realize cost savings and efficiencies, and also provide jurors options for interacting with the jury services staff in many different ways including online, via IVR or in person. These For more information: Courthouse Technologies (CHT) John Arntsen Vice President of Client Services jarntsen@courthousetechnologies.com 1.877.685.2199 x.222 Judicial Systems, Inc. www.judicialsystems.com Gary Dower President gary@judicialsystems.com 1.800.205.4068 Jury Systems Incorporated www.jurysystems.com sales@jurysystems.com 805.285.5800 Tyler Technologies www.tylertech.com info@tylertech.com 1.800.431.5776 Xerox Justice Solutions www.xerox.com/justice Michael Hartman Michael.hartman@xerox.com 1.800.772.0597
systems also need to provide configurability allowing jury staff to make changes to the system as needs arise (e.g. legislative changes). Xerox AgileJury was designed by jury administrators for jury administrators. The solution covers “the entire jury process from printing and mailing the jury summons to providing jurors payment cards once their service is complete and everything in between, providing our client with a complete, yet flexible solution to meet their needs,” Turner emphasizes. From creating summons, to recording qualification to attending, empanelling and paying jurors, this solution was designed to make these functions easier for Courts to perform. Finally, by combining AgileJury with other solutions such as print/mail services, eJuror interactive web response, interactive voice response, jury displays, document management, payment cards, and its mobile apps, he concludes, “it gives jury services managers the options they need to make their jury process work more efficiently.”
Summoning Costs
Another perennial issue for Courts in mailing juror summonses is how frequently people are on the move. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, 14% of people move annually, Kleinman of Tyler points out. Thus, another key challenge with an increasingly mobile jury pool is to lower the cost of summoning jurors. He says that Odyssey Jury contains these costs—including that of postage spent on undeliverable summons—by integrating with the National Change of Address registry to validate current addresses of jurors in a summons list and reach potential jurors even when they’re on the move.
Information at a Glance
Unless the information from a solution can be communicated and
viewed it is not worth its salt. JuryCall, a module from the Infax’s CourtSight Suite digital signage solution, solves this problem by integrating with any jury management system to automate the juror selection process for individuals summoned for jury duty. It displays a potential juror name, badge number or panel number and can visual page a potential juror. By using JuryCall, patrons can find their name and where they are to report in 60 seconds or less. In addition, while prospective jurors wait in the jury assembly area, large displays in the waiting room can show a judge’s message, live news feeds or important court information. No matter the progression of the jury selection process, displays can show the appropriate subset of jurors at each step. JuryCall can also be supplemented with a self-help kiosk. It can be used to automate the juror check-in process and provide service certification at the end of the day. Kiosks can also be configured to print juror badges.
Creating Efficiencies & Lowering Costs
In the end, many of the important features of jury systems are the same, notes Kleinman. “The key differentiators are the juror experience and how well jury management solutions share information with other court systems to create efficiencies and lower costs,” he states. Overall, he concludes, the integration automates processes, eliminates duplicate data entry, and “empowers jury clerks to achieve an efficient and reliable jury process for the jurors, attorneys, court staff and the judge.” Getting ahead of the technology curve is what all Courts are striving for. Jury management software should help in that effort. CT August/September 2015x
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Continued from page 4 AVERAGE REDUCTION IN RECIDIVISM
studies was 21.6%, which compares favorably to the 10%-15% recidivism reduction rate of other drug courts.
Juvenile Drug Courts MRT has been implemented in dozens of juvenile drug courts across the country for more than 15 years. However, fewer outcome studies have been published on juvenile drug courts as compared to adult drug courts.
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Alkermes......................................6 Carter Goble Lee ......................11 Computing System Innovations............................19 CourtView..................................13 Draeger Medical Systems .......33 Extract Systems.........................23 FTR Limited ................................5 Garrett Metal Detectors...........14 Infax .............................................2 Journal Technologies ...............25 Justice Systems .........................15 Mentis Technology Solutions, LLC..................Insert National Center State Courts..27 OraSure Technologies, Inc. .....39 Rapid Financial Solutions........37 Streetime...................................29 StunCuff Enterprises, Inc.........20 Telmate ......................................24 Thermo Fisher Scientific..........35 Thomson Reuters.....................48 Tybera ........................................17 Tyler Technologies....................47 Xerox ..........................................21 This advertisers index is provided as a service to our readers only. The publisher does not assume liability for errors or omissions.
0%
5%
10%
15%
Juvenile Drug Courts with MRT Programming
Other Juvenile Drug Courts
20%
17%
6.5%
A total of 19 studies were reviewed that reported on MRTbased juvenile drug courts. The average retention rate in these studies is 70.1%. Three of these studies included recidivism data with a comparison between groups that utilized MRT and groups that did not. The combined recidivism of the MRT-treated juvenile offenders in these three studies was 35.7%, compared to 52.7% in the comparison groups. This shows a reduction in recidivism of 17% among MRTbased programs, as compared to the 6.5% average recidivism reduction recently reported in a large study of juvenile drug court results.
participants for the most recent year of the study was 20%, while a matched comparison group showed a re-arrest rate of 63%, more than three times higher. A further study on the Spokane Tribe wellness court showed a re-arrest rate of 19%. Veterans Courts are a relatively new phenomenon in drug courts and attempt to focus specialized programming to address the unique characteristics of military veterans. A 2014 study of efforts at reducing recidivism in veterans, who become enmeshed in criminal justice, discovered that MRT is one of the most frequently employed methods being utilized.
Family Courts, Wellness Courts, & Veterans Courts
Conclusion
Data has also been published detailing the effectiveness of MRT in Family Courts, Wellness Courts, and Veterans Courts across the country. For example, a Family Court in Marin County, Oregon established to treat substance-abusing parents of young children requires MRT for all participants. Within four years these clients showed a 13% rate of losing parenting rights, as compared to a control group with a rate of 38%. Wellness Courts are typically targeted to Native American groups and operate under tribal governance. According to a study conducted on the Anchorage, Alaska Wellness Court, the re-arrest rate for MRT
While considerable attention has been given to the variety of factors involved with engaging and retaining clients in drug court programs, drug court treatment providers have given remarkably little attention to the specific treatment methodologies employed. The assumption by many drug courts often appears to be that all treatments are essentially the same. Specifically, cognitive programs are often lumped together as being equal in research support and effectiveness. An extensive review of published recidivism outcome studies reveals that MRT is a viable and effective approach. Gregory Little, Ed.D., and Kenneth Robinson, Ed.D. developed Moral Reconation Therapy in 1985.
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