The Future is Not Paper - Part 4

Syndicated Court Calendars

Court calendaring is simply a nightmare.  But as we all know, calendars are the grease in the court's wheels.  And without the structure and schedules, the judicial process would be chaos.  But while Case Management Systems have done a good job of being able to store preferences and automatically search for the next available time based upon a jurisdiction's complex rules, these capabilities and information sharing have not extended beyond the courthouse walls.

One brief example: In 2005, the Governor of the State of New Mexico, Bill Richardson asked the legislature for additional judges partly because of scheduling issues.  The Police Sergeant in charge of DWI crime in Albuquerque, NM reported that:

"scheduling nightmares abound for officers. In a single afternoon, he's been scheduled to attend three trials and three pretrial interviews. That's problematic because arresting officers are often the only witnesses in DWI cases so many are dismissed when officers fail to appear in court. 

"I have eight officers on this unit, and they make 2,200 to 2,500 DWI arrests a year," Brown said. "When I get a (failure to appear) notice on one of them, I research it, and a lot of times I find that one officer was scheduled in 12 different courtrooms in the morning alone."(see Endnote 1)

Courts use primarily manual processes to calendar and schedule (I've even seen white boards).  The current "technologies" are:

• The automated CMS for setup and recording the core calendar structure and scheduling events.
• Telephone and E-mail with voice and manual negotiation by staff (calendar clerks and judicial assistants) and requesting attorneys, paralegals, and litigants.
• Face-to-face meetings (in courtrooms, chambers, etc.) with everyone consulting their individual calendars is one of the most common ways that schedules are set.
• And even a few courts employing instant messaging
• All methods employ a lot of personal time and effort to communicate even the most basic information.  

But there are some interesting ideas that have been developing in recent years that could be part of a future solution.  John Udell is a "Technology Evangelist" with Microsoft Corporation and formerly a columnist with  InfoWorld and the "classic" Byte magazines as well as a person who's writings I follow closely via his blog.

In recent years he became interested in problems surrounding calendars and their inefficiency and ineffectiveness.  And this past December (2010) he gave a talk at Harvard University Law School's Berkman Center.(see Endnote 2).  The video webcast for online or download viewing can be found at: http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/interactive/events/luncheon/2010/12/udell   In the talk he explains his "elmcity project" that created a web enabled community calendar supporting "information syndication".

There are a lot of ideas in that last sentence and so let's break it down:

1. Web Enabled - meaning that it can easily send and receive information using internet standards.
2. Community - meaning shared and open.
3. Information syndication - meaning you can subscribe to personally receive the information being shared in the calendar.

Now doesn't something like that sound like there are some ideas in there that might make the tortured world of court calendaring and scheduling easier?  I think so; and therefore let's continue.

Specifically as he writes in his blog post about elmcity and his Harvard talk:

• Realize that event data published in a structured format, unlike data published as HTML or PDF, can be routed through a publication/subscription syndication networks.
• Make public calendars available in the appropriate structured format: iCalendar (RFC 5545), the venerable Internet standard supported by all major calendar applications and services.
• Recognize that iCalendar is the RSS of calendars. It can enable a calendar-sphere in which, as in the blogosphere, everyone can publish their own feeds and also subscribe to feeds from other people  or from network services.
• Help build the data web by owning the parts of it for which we ourselves are the authoritative  sources.

Let's talk about this iCalendar standard.  Nearly everyone uses the iCalendar standard if you have a smart phone (like a Blackberry) that automatically connects with your Microsoft Exchange Calendar; even if you don't realize it.  This is the best kind of standard for users because you don't need to do anything, it just simply works.

But John Udell realized that it could and should do more.  As originally developed iCalendar was limited in the usual scope of implementation. An analogy might be "texting" between cell phones before Twitter.  Texting basically is one to one communications while Twitter allows the message to be sent to anyone who subscribes to the feed.  And one other fact, many of the commercial Court Case Management Systems vendors already have provided connections/extensions from the court calendar to Microsoft Exchange and/or to the iPhone/Blackberry using the iCalendar standard.

So with the "elmcity project" Mr. Udell has created an ability for the shared calendar to be fed the information from many sources and in turn, send that calendar schedule to those who subscribe.  The elmcity service is an example of what Rohit Khare memorably called syndication-oriented  architecture.  And while "elmcity" doesn't replace the court's CMS calendar, it provides a concept for a web service that extends and facilitates calendaring information sharing via the web.  And in another article Mr. Udell explains how one can manage their private and public calendars together. Again, doesn't this sounds a lot like what courts do every day?

http://blog.jonudell.net/2010/05/19/how-to-manage-private-and-public-calendars-together/

He has published an extensive FAQ about the elmcity project at:

http://blog.jonudell.net/elmcity-project-faq/

And as mentioned above, to see some elmcity calendars that have already been created go to:

http://elmcity.cloudapp.net/

Therefore in summary, there is a standard, iCalendar that allows for scheduling information to be created and shared.  The elmcity project provides for subscription and syndication of that information to those who choose to receive it.

Much more discussion to come?
----
Endnotes:

1) Retrieved from: http://www.freenewmexican.com/news/9346.html in 2009 from an Associated Press article published on January 17, 2005 titled: Richardson pledges more judgeships, more funding for prosecutors at DWI summit.


2) We here at the NCSC are long time admirers of the Berkman Center staff having hosted two keynote speakers at Court Technology Conferences, Prof. Jonathan Zittrain in 1999 and Prof. Charles Ogletree in 2001.

Maine: One sentence bill directs judicial branch to upgrade its computer system

Typically legislation related to a state judiciary's computer system(s) are parts of budget bills or sections of other non-appropriations bills related to the judiciary. Maine's HB 644 of 2011, however, may go on record as the single shortest and most direct piece of legislation on the matter ever.

Below is the sum total of the bill (formatting in original):

Resolve, To Streamline the Judicial Process in Maine's Courts

Sec. 1. Judicial Department to upgrade its computer system. Resolved: That the Judicial Department shall design and implement a plan to upgrade its computer system to ensure access by Maine citizens and attorneys to electronic filing and scheduling online.

The bill's summary is almost as long as the bill itself:

This resolve directs the Judicial Department to design and implement a plan to upgrade its computer system to ensure access by Maine citizens and attorneys to electronic filing and scheduling online.

The bill has yet to be assigned to a committee, but presumably it would be sent to the Joint Committee on the Judiciary. Interesting note: Maine is one of three states (Connecticut and Massachusetts are the others) that rely primarily on joint judiciary committees.

Cross-posted to Gavel to Gavel.

Colorado: Bill would require *private* companies that maintain criminal court records purge their data when court orders records sealed

It is somewhat of a truism that nothing is ever truly lost or forgotten on the internet. Colorado's HB 1203 of 2011, as passed by the state's House on February 23, looks to put the genie somewhat back in the bottle.

Under CRS 24-72-308, if a Colorado State court orders a criminal record sealed, "each custodian of the records" must seal the record. But "custodian" is limited to "the official custodian or any authorized person having personal custody and control of the criminal justice records in question." Private companies are therefore not included.

HB 1203 keeps the existing definition of "custodian" but defines a "private custodian" as "a private entity that has custody of the information and provides that information to others as a part of its business." These "private custodians" would also be subject to court orders requiring the sealing of criminal records. After being served with a copy of the order, the private custodian "shall remove the records that are subject to [the] order from its database."

Indiana: Floor amendment to unrelated bill would require courts provide bulk data

Courts have been contending with how to handle bulk data requests for years. Recently, however, efforts in Arizona and other states have sought to bypass the courts and mandate the disbursement by legislative act. The most recent example is in Indiana.

SB 561, as introduced, dealt with corrections and sentencing. A floor amendment, added on February 21 however, requires the division of state court administration to implement a standard program for disseminating bulk court case information for a reasonable fee. Moreover, the bill requires an executive branch agency (the Indiana Office of Technology) annually certify that case management systems operated or funded by the division of state court administration comply with this program.

Finally, while the amendment allows for the charging of "a reasonable fee" it defines "reasonable" as "not [to] exceed the direct cost of operating the export program and delivering data to the recipient plus a prorated fee to recoup the direct costs of developing the export program. In any one (1) year, the aggregate prorated fees charged under this subdivision may not exceed five percent (5%) of the direct costs of developing the export program."

The bill, as amended, was approved by the full Senate 2/22/11 and is currently in the House awaiting committee assignment.

Cross-posted to Gavel to Gavel.

Florida: Frustration over inability to come up with privacy rules for online court records

In 2003, the Florida Supreme Court created a Committee on Privacy and Court Records with the laudable goal of set policies of the information available on court records in general, and electronically accessible records in particular (read the order creating the committee here).

Eight years later the debate continues, much to the chagrin of Justice Barbara Pariente who has asked committee members to "get on the stick and get the rest done." According to The Lakeland Ledger, the committee has only now "proposed rules for excluding personal information such as Social Security and credit card numbers from court files if not required to resolve or manage cases. Criminal and traffic cases, though, would be exempt as committees for those two segments of the judicial system have yet to submit recommendations for removing personal information from case filings." Questions about the use or entire (or partial) Social Security Numbers, names of minors, and the sheer volume of data involved continue to plague the committee.

Legal XML E-Filing Standard Revision Review for Comment Announced

Via e-mail from OASIS-Open.org on February 26, 2011:  The OASIS LegalXML Electronic Court Filing TC members have recently approved a Committee Specification Draft (CSD) and submitted this specification for 30-day public review.

This OASIS Technical Committee was chartered to will develop specifications for the use of XML to create legal documents and to transmit legal documents from an attorney, party or self-represented litigant to a court, from a court to an attorney, party or self-represented litigant or to another court, and from an attorney or other user to another attorney or other user of legal documents.

Overview: This document defines the LegalXML Electronic Court Filing 4.01 (ECF 4.0) specification, which consists of a set of non-proprietary XML and Web services specifications, along with clarifying explanations and amendments to those specifications, that have been added for the purpose of promoting interoperability among electronic court filing vendors and systems. ECF Version 4.01 is a maintenance release to address several minor schema and definition issues identified by implementers of the ECF 4.0 specification.

Public Review Period: The public review starts today, 26 February 2011 and ends 28 March 2011.

This is an open invitation to comment. OASIS solicits feedback from potential users, developers and others, whether OASIS members or not, for the sake of improving the interoperability and quality of its technical work.

URIs: The prose specification document and related files are available here:

Editable Source (Authoritative):

http://docs.oasis-open.org/legalxml-courtfiling/specs/ecf/v4.01/ecf-v4.01-spec/csprd01/ecf-v4.01-spec-csprd01.doc
HTML:
http://docs.oasis-open.org/legalxml-courtfiling/specs/ecf/v4.01/ecf-v4.01-spec/csprd01/ecf-v4.01-spec-csprd01.html
PDF:
http://docs.oasis-open.org/legalxml-courtfiling/specs/ecf/v4.01/ecf-v4.01-spec/csprd01/ecf-v4.01-spec-csprd01.pdf

XML Schemas:
http://docs.oasis-open.org/legalxml-courtfiling/specs/ecf/v4.01/ecf-v4.01-spec/csprd01/xsd/

Other specification artifacts:
http://docs.oasis-open.org/legalxml-courtfiling/specs/ecf/v4.01/ecf-v4.01-spec/csprd01/

Additional information about the specification and the OASIS LegalXML Electronic Court Filing TC may be found at the TC's public home page:
http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/legalxml-courtfiling/

Comments may be submitted to the TC by any person through the use of the OASIS TC Comment Facility which can be located via the button labeled "Send A Comment" at the top of the TC public home page, or directly at:
http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/comments/form.php?wg_abbrev=legalxml-courtfiling

Comments submitted by TC non-members for this work and for other work of this TC are publicly archived and can be viewed at:
http://lists.oasis-open.org/archives/legalxml-courtfiling-comment/

Predicting Technology

Earlier this week I was looking for an article in the old printed versions of the Court Technology Bulletin and ran across an article on the 1996 COMDEX computer exposition in the January/February 1997 edition.  At that conference I had the privilege of seeing a presentation by Intel CEO, Andy Grove who would later be named 1997 Time Magazine's "Person of the Year".

During the address Mr. Grove made the following prediction about computer power in the year 2011 that we documented in the CTB.

"What Will 2011 Bring?" (1997 CTB article)

"Today's top PC microprocessors contain 5.5 million transistors (using .35 micron fabrication technology), run at 200 MHz, and process 400 million instructions per second.

In his COMDEX keynote address, Andy Grove, president and CEO of Intel Corporation, predicts that the computer of the year 2011 will have one billion transistors (based on .07 micron technology), run at 10 GHz, and process 100 billion instructions per second.  Such a PC would be 250 times more powerful than today's top-of-the-line Pentium Pro machines, in a little over a decade."

So let's see how Andy did?  Recently Intel announced yet another generation of processor chips, code named "Poulson" for 2011.  The specifications say:

• 3.1 Billion Transistors (Andy predicted 1 billion)
• 32 nano-micron technology (Andy predicted 70 nano-microns)
• The new chip has 8-12 core processors. This parallel processing allows the overall chip to exceed Andy's prediction of 10 GHz by splitting work between the core processors.

I couldn't find a direct comparison regarding computer instructions per second because the new chips are rated in Gigaflops.

So Andy was a little conservative on his predictions (although the currently released i7 chips are very close).

What does this mean?  Computers are still getting faster.  It is our challenge to figure out how to use all that power effectively to help with the work of the courts.  For some possible examples of how this might be headed, Microsoft issued this video on their user interface work (3.5 minutes) that takes advantage of the increasing computing power.

City of Dallas, Texas Seeks CCMS

The City of Dallas, Texas has posted an RFP for a new Court Case Management System (Solicitation Number BUZ1107).  The notice states:  "The purpose of this solicitation is to seek interested and qualified parties to implement a turnkey replacement Court Case Management System that will serve the needs of the City of Dallas with best in class maintainable products, with world class performance and lowest total cost of ownership over the life of the System. The City reserves the right to award by method deemed most advantageous to the City. Specifications and all associated documents may be viewed and downloaded at www.bids.dallascityhall.org."

The Future is Not Paper - Third in a Series

How to Verify a Court Document?

Before the technical troubles with the Court Technology Bulletin occurred in the summer of 2010, I had started a series of articles on that the future of court information is not based upon paper documents.  Part 1 and Part 2 can be viewed by clicking on the respective links.

The present “myth" and reality is that a paper court document with a rubber stamp or embossed seal is magically accepted as authentic by all legal authorities.  This is true despite the fact that any elementary school child with a computer and printer (or even white-out and a copier) can forge a paper document.  And unfortunately in recent years there are multiple instances where a fraudulent court document was faxed to a jail and an inmate mistakenly released.

Certainly the banking and financial industry understand that their authentic records are electronic.  And even when a paper financial documents such as "bearer bonds" are created, great effort is made (as with paper currency) using various printing techniques such as embedded fibers and micro-printing to authenticate the physical document (some are wonderful works of art such as this fraudulent one). However, the courts cannot afford to undertake such time consuming and expensive activities.  Instead, it is the court’s online electronic document systems that must provide access to the authentic copy of the document that is not otherwise sealed or protected.

But there is a significant problem that must be addressed to make documents easier to retrieve and verify via the Internet.  This is where the work of the URN:Lex or Universal Resource Name, Legal begins.  The basic concept is that every legal document submitted to or produced by the court (and ideally the entire legal system) would be assigned a unique reference number.

Specifically, “(t)he purpose of the "lex" namespace is to assign an unequivocal identifier, in standard format, to documents that are sources of law. The identifier is conceived so that its construction depends only on the characteristics of the document itself and is, therefore, independent from the document's on-line availability, its physical location, and access mode.”

For the full technical details of the currently circulated draft standard see: http://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-spinosa-urn-lex-02

A unique reference number greatly facilitates retrieval of the document from any system and any type of database or file system that would reside in the court or on an open or commercial system; and it would be consistent for all future retrieval systems that are developed.  In addition to easy retrieval and reference, there is a great possibility for URN:Lex to address a vexing problem of electronic information -  document recall.  Courts continually wish to identify and update documents that are incorrect or expired.  The URN:Lex approach allows notifications to be posted and/or distributed; and further allows for systems to be developed with persistent hyper-links such as the online legal publishers have created for statutory and case references.

And finally, this is not to say that visible verification (document file stamps) is not of benefit.  Several courts are adding visible indications of electronic filing as a watermark using the widely available PDF capability.  But a visible verification that includes the URN:Lex would serve multiple legal system needs.  To see a crude example click here.

Parking Technology?

One of the court manager's more off-beat but stressful jobs is to manage the courthouse parking lot.  Some recent technology introduced in France might be of interest... parking spot sensors.  The sensors are buried in the pavement can report via cell phone where empty spaces are located.  For more see the IT World article "Take us to your leader('s parking spot).