Scotland Courtroom Technology Website

The Scottish Court Service has posted a terrific web page that lists court locations and the technology that is available in the courtrooms.  The website states:

"The Scottish Court Service has provided a range of technology to many of its courtrooms to allow evidence to be presented electronically.  The facilities vary from court to court. To assist in understanding what is available and where it is available the table below provides a breakdown of facilities by location."

Click [here] to see this resource.

Jefferson County Kentucky Provides WiFi Access

Press Release:

LOUISVILLE, Ky., Nov. 14, 2007 –- Smoothstone IP Communications and Jefferson County Circuit Court Clerk David Nicholson today announced the availability of free, high-speed, wireless Internet access in key areas within the Jefferson County Judicial Center. 

Smoothstone is providing this service free of charge as a public service to jurors, attorneys and other members of the public who visit the judicial center. The service can accommodate hundreds of simultaneous Internet users and is available in the jury pool area, the Louisville Bar Association room and common areas on the second floor. For the full press release see:
http://courts.ky.gov/pressreleases/PRB11162007.htm

BJA Announces Regional Conferences

Press Release from the US Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Assistance:

Getting it Right: Solutions for Safer Communities - 2008 BJA Regional Conferences

BJA Director Domingo S. Herraiz invites you to join colleagues from your region to learn the latest on key issues in law enforcement and criminal justice at BJA's 2008 Regional Conference Series. The meetings promise to provide participants with new information, stimulate discussion, and offer best practices and solutions to emerging and chronic crime concerns.

Registration information is at www.bjaregionalmeetings.com

Registration for this event is free of charge, but hotel space is limited.

Meeting Locations

West Region - Salt Lake City, UT
January 8-10, 2008
Salt Lake City Marriott Downtown
(Alaska; American Samoa; Arizona; California; Colorado; Guam; Hawaii; Idaho; Montana; Nevada; New Mexico; Northern Mariana Islands; Oregon; Utah; Washington; Wyoming)

Northeast Region - Hartford, CT
January 29-31, 2008
Hilton Hartford
(Connecticut; Delaware; District of Columbia; Maine; Maryland; Massachusetts; New Hampshire; New Jersey; New York; Pennsylvania; Rhode Island; Vermont)

Midwest Region - Indianapolis, IN
February 12-14, 2008
Hilton Indianapolis
(Illinois; Indiana; Iowa; Kansas; Michigan; Minnesota; Missouri; Nebraska; North Dakota; Ohio; South Dakota; Wisconsin)

South Region - Atlanta, GA
March 11-13, 2008
Hyatt Regency Atlanta
(Alabama; Arkansas; Florida; Georgia; Kentucky; Louisiana; Mississippi; North Carolina; Oklahoma; Puerto Rico; South Carolina; Tennessee; Texas; Virgin Islands; Virginia; West Virginia)

Questions? Contact Amy Kirson or Cynthia Stubits at 202-973-8725 or bja@courtesyassoc.com

The Exciting (and Confusing) Court Performance Dashboard Market

CTC-10 presenter, Ingo Keilitz recently wrote about court performance dashboards and the Super Session Presentation made at the conference on his blog at Made2Measure.

Global Justice Endorses Architecture

The Global Justice Information Sharing Initiative Advisory Committee (Global) endorsed the Global Justice Reference Architecture (version 1.4) at its Fall meeting on October 31, 2007.  The Justice Reference Architecture (JRA) provides a technical framework for implementing service oriented architecture in the justice community and improving information sharing and interoperability among justice partners.


Information regarding the JRA can be found at http://it.ojp.gov/topic.jsp?topic_id=242.


More information about Global Justice Information Sharing and related projects can be found at: http://it.ojp.gov/topic.jsp?topic_id=8.

Some Articles on Digital Signature and Validation

As you may know, we keep an eye out for digital signature and digital validation articles.  Here are a couple that may be of interest.

• Federal Computer Week :  E-authentication Grows Up
• Government Computer News: Illinois Crosses the Bridge

Finally, there is also an the American Bar Association's work on Digital Signature Guidelines.  The link is:
http://www.abanet.org/scitech/ec/isc/dsgfree.html

Oakland County Video System Recognized

Government Computer News recognized Oakland County, Michigan for their OakVideo videoconferencing and document sharing system with their Agency Award in the October 8, 2007 edition.  The article titled "Law & Video" explains: the OakVideo judicial-arraignment system, lets law enforcement agencies, prosecutors, community corrections and the courts save and secure case records on a centralized server.

NIEM Executive Briefing Webinar

We received the following press release:

On Wednesday, November 14, 2007, a NIEM Executive Briefing will be offered as a Webinar. This briefing will provide an overview of the NIEM program and will describe the data model and its components. It will also provide an overview of the current NIEM domain, NIEM program accomplishments, the current status of the NIEM model, and the state of NIEM adoption and use, and we will delve into future plans for NIEM. A major focus of the session will be the value of NIEM and how it leverages and expands the successes of standards-based information sharing. Participants will learn about the NIEM governance structure and how to successfully get involved with NIEM. The changes and improvements made to NIEM via Release 2.0, also known as the Harmony release of NIEM, will be discussed. The session will end with an update on the availability of NIEM tools and resources and a brief look to the future of NIEM.

To register, send your name and e-mail address to Ms. Shelby Glover at sglover@iir.com. Prior to the call, you will receive an e-mail notification of the conference call, dial-in instructions, and Web site address for the Webinar. Program content questions should be directed to Ms. Eileen Rixmann of the IJIS Institute at (703) 726-3681 or Eileen.Rixmann@ijis.org.

"Who Killed the Virtual Case File?"

An article posted on IEEE Spectrum Online discusses the long and difficult process, and project management challenges that the US Department of Justice, Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) has had in creating their "Virtual Case File" and other systems.  The full article is at: http://spectrum.ieee.org/sep05/1455

RFID used in State's Attorney Office

Dan Zinn, CIO for the Office of State Attorney for the 15th Judicial Circuit in West Palm Beach, Florida sent us the following article:

State Attorney Barry Krischer had a problem within his office.  How do you handle 18,000 active felony case files that traverse three different floors, are processed by multiple divisions, and go in and out of the building?  His answer was RFID (Radio Frequency Identification).  The federal government and Walmart have been using RFID to track shipments and goods and a few law firms have used it to manage their file libraries.  Hospitals use active RFID to track “Crash Carts” and other critical mobile equipment.  This was the first time that passive RFID has been implemented to track case files as they move through and in and out of a building.

The Technology was simple.  It was like “LoJack” for a file and using GPS coordinates on Google Earth to let staff see the location of the file on a floor plan.  Making it work was a complex system integration project.  The office used the services of the Innerwireless Corporation located in Richardson, Texas and Computer Information and Planning located in Jacksonville, Florida.  CIO Dan Zinn headed the project which involved integrating the PanGo RFID technology from innerwireless into the office case tracking system known as STAC and designing and installing antennas throughout the floors that the files commonly traversed.

Staff only sees the results.  To locate a file a staff members selects the case in STAC, they then press the ‘control I’ keys on their computer and a new screen appears showing the location of the file or the last door that it passed through when exiting the building.  It gives the date and time along with a number of other case details.  The case locator can also be accessed using the office intranet.

This project has just begun.  Plans call for increasing the granularity of the locations to improve location time; integrating RFID staff ID tags to track who was transporting the file and tracking other office fixed assets.

About the technology:  Active RFID tags are tags powered by a battery.  An example is the transponder that is used to pay tolls or to go in and out of parking lots.  This type of technology costs several dollars per unit.  Passive RFID uses tags that harness the power from a radio frequency to activate the tag and then send the information back to the receiving antenna.  The cost for this type of technology starts at less than a quarter.

The RFID project started in 2004 with an initial collaboration with Wal-mart.  The technology was not mature enough at that time to go forward.  The tags started at $5.00 and there were no standards.  Since 2004 RFID Standards were agreed upon, the cost per tag dropped significantly and the technology and software applications improved.  Today RFID is a viable business solution.  For more information on this project, go to the Office of State Attorney for the 15th Judicial Circuit.