Comparative Statistical Model Standards

 

One “unicorn” (a mythical goal) in Court Technology has been that Case Management Systems will have the ability to create comparative case statistics between court systems. Policymakers love that idea so they can compare and punish/reward, but also perhaps better understand policy differences. The announcement that got me thinking about this is the recent NIEM 5.0 announcement that included as part of their update preparation for the future addition of GISM (Generic Statistical Information Model).

Also, understand that the ideal statistical comparison system doesn’t stop between courts, it extends to the full criminal and civil court systems. That brings us to discuss the new announcements and what they might mean for our future unicorn hunting.

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Our friend from LegalXML work, Jim Cabral, pointed out that the NIEM 5.0 release candidate 1 announced includes the “addition of content from the Generic Statistical Information Model (GSIM) as a precursor to the upcoming Statistics domain”. 

The GSIM program brochure (PDF) explains that:

“GSIM provides a set of standardized, consistently described information objects, which are the inputs and outputs in the design and production of statistics. By defining objects common to all statistical production, regardless of subject matter, GSIM enables statistical organizations to rethink how their business could be more efficiently organized. GSIM can be used to:

1. Improve communication between different disciplines involved in statistical production, within and between statistical organizations; and between users and producers of official statistics.
2. Generate economies of scale by enabling greater collaboration within and between organizations, especially through the reuse of information, methods, or technology.
3. Enable greater automation of the statistical production process, thus increasing efficiency and reducing costs.
4. Provide a basis for flexibility and innovation, including support for the easy deployment of new statistical products and the adoption of new types of statistical data sources
5. Build staff capability by using GSIM as a teaching aid that provides a simple, easy to understand views of complex information, with clear definitions
6. Validate existing information systems and compare with best practice in other organizations.

"A more detailed paper provides further information, still for a general statistical audience, and a detailed "specification" layer provides the information needed by specialists to implement GSIM."

Electronic versions of all layers of documentation can be found at: https://statswiki.unece.org/display/gsim/

NCSC National Open Data Standards (NODS)

The Conference of State Court Administrators and the National Center for State Courts (NCSC) through the National Open Court Data Standards (NODS) will develop business and technical court data standards to support the creation, sharing, and integration of court data by ensuring a clear understanding of what court data represent and how court data can be shared in a user-friendly format.

Data standards are “the rules by which data are described and recorded.”[1] Data standards facilitate the sharing of data, increase transparency, provide for consistency in data interpretation, allow for meaningful comparisons across data sets, and reduce the cost of producing or extracting individual data sets. The NODS project will include two types of standards: (1) logical business standards that define the variables to be included; and (2) technical standards that will define the data structure, variable formats, and values.

The purposes of the National Open Data Standards (NODS) project are:

• To make case-level state court data available to researchers, policymakers, the media, and the public to provide for transparency in court operations and to improve public policy;
• To make data available for public and court system used in a consistent manner that reduces the possibility of error and misinterpretation; and
• To reduce the burden on court system staff in responding to data requests.

The project website is available here.

UN ICCS standards

In addition to GISM, one should also be aware of the United Nations International Classification of Crime for Statistical (ICCS) purposes standard.  For a couple of years, we have been working to adapt and integrate the UN ISSD for criminal cases used in a Case Management System by mapping the country’s statutory code to the charges brought by law enforcement and prosecution.  

From the UN website, the purpose is “To enhance the consistency and international comparability of crime statistics, and improve analytical capabilities at both the national and international levels”

“The ICCS provides a framework for the systematic production and comparison of statistical data across different criminal justice institutions and jurisdictions. This means that the ICCS is applicable to all forms of crime data, whatever the stage of the criminal justice process (police, prosecution, conviction, imprisonment) at which they are collected, as well as to data collected in crime victimization surveys.”

We have found that it is a challenge to first define the mapping but also that we really needed to review how it was used by the courts after a couple of years.  It is critical that this review process takes place because the first round can involve a lot of “guesswork”.

The full standard can be found here: https://unstats.un.org/unsd/classifications/Family/Detail/1000

Happy unicorn hunting!