Texas Judicial Commission Adopts Functional Model

In a press release: On June 27, 2008, The Supreme Court of Texas Judicial Commission for Children, Youth and Families formally adopted a functional requirements reference model to address the special case management needs of courts handling child protection dependency cases. The reference model consists of a number of web pages presented in an interactive format, providing overviews of the court process, timelines, a feature to allow deep drilldown into the particulars of each subprocess, and detailed descriptions of the data requirements.

Culminating nearly two years of work, the functional requirements reference model was developed to provide developers of court case management software an authoritative set of requirements for the creation of specialized modules of court software systems. The Office of Court Administration, headed by Carl Reynolds, undertook the project in 2005 after receiving Court Improvement Program grant funding, which was given to the Supreme Court of Texas by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Administration for Children and Families.

In Texas and most other states, child protection cases must follow tightly controlled timelines. The cases may have multiple participants, with the judge acting in a problemsolving role. The reference model may be the most comprehensive description ever created to address the special needs of courts handling child abuse and neglect cases. Judges, clerks, attorneys, and other stakeholders from around Texas worked closely with technologists to identify almost all aspects of child protection case management. This is not a system, but a set of blueprints that will enable any software developer to understand the unique court process utilized in this type of case to write the software, said Reynolds.

The Supreme Court Permanent Judicial Commission for Children, Youth and Families is chaired by Justice Harriet OrsquoNeill of the Supreme Court of Texas. Judge Darlene Byrne of Travis County chaired the Technology Committee, which oversaw the development of the functional requirements reference model. It is available on the Commission website, at:  http://www.courts.state.tx.us/oca/texdeck/frd/TexDECK%20Functional%20Requirements.htm .

Court Tech Bulletin Hit with SQL Injection Attack and Other Items

On approximately June 21, 2008, the Court Technology Bulletin website was taken down with an SQL virus code injection attack. We apologize for all for any inconvenience that this caused. This site has been repaired and further security measures instituted. As a result, we also lost all of the articles that we posted for the month of June 1. A summary of some of these articles are posted below.

Illinois Courts Announce E-Business Initiative 6/10/08
In a press release, Chief Justice Robert R. Thomas of the Illinois Supreme Court announced on May 23, 2008 a wide ranging plan to build a technological infrastructure that would link electronically all the courts in the state's 23 judicial circuits and 102 counties.quot For more information, an E-Business in the Illinois Judiciary website has been posted at: http://www.state.il.us/court/ebusiness/default.asp

Vermont Courts Announce Case Management System RFP 6/13/08
The State of Vermont Judiciary announced the posting of a Request for Proposal RFP for a new, consolidated, statewide courts case management, document management, and Efiling solution VCase. The RFP and Attachment files are posted on the Vermont BusinessToBusiness website at: http://www.vermontbusinessregistry.com/BidPreview.aspx?BidID=5627

Nebraska Starts Civil E-Filing 6/20/08
In a press release, quotthe Nebraska Administrative Office of the Courts AOC, in collaboration with http://www.Nebraska.gov, has launched a new online system for attorneys to file new civil cases and to make subsequent filings on open cases. Attorneys who subscribe to http://www.Nebraska.gov are eligible to use the Efiling system. There are no addditional fees to file a case online. The normal court fees for filing cases are transferred electronically from the attorney's account, to the court of filing. The Nebraska Lawyer Magazine's Bar Bytes column for May, 2008 by William E. Olson contains additional information on the new system.

Guam Issues RFP

The Judiciary of Guam has issued a Request for Proposal "To Furnish, Deliver and Install a National Crime Information Center (NCIC) Communications Message Processor System/Computerized Criminal History Records Application.  Responses are due June 9, 2008.  For questions or a copy of the RFP please contact:

Mr. Reymond L.G. Taimanglo
Procurement and Fac. Mgt. Administrator
Procurement and Fac. Mgt. Division
Guam Judicial Center
120 West O'Brien Drive
Hagatna, Guam 96910
Telephone (671)475-3175/3393
Fax: (671)477-8009
Email: rtaimanglo@mail.justice.gov.gu

Oregon Courts Receive Automation Funding

Judge Michael Marcus in Oregon passed along this information from the court's Chief Information Officer, Bud Borja:

"The Oregon Judicial Department’s efforts to obtaining funding for the Oregon eCourt program earlier this year was successful. Two bills passed in the February 2008, Supplement Session provided 24 million in debt financing for Oregon eCourt.  In addition, Oregon Judicial Department (OJD) has authority to spend $2 million from the Collections Account funds that have been set aside for a financial system eplacement.  Receiving this funding allows OJD to move forward with the replacement of our existing case and financial management systems and to bring modern business tools and practices into the Oregon courts."

Video of testimony before the legislature supporting the eCourts initivative has been posted on YouTube.  Here are links to the video clips:

Judges explain eCourt Urgency: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZoPjMQXQ3Lk

TCA explains eCourt Urgency: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Clbv5bq7R_Q

How eCourt improves sentencing: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7-a7Wnzmb7A

Juvenile Information Sharing Webinar On Tap

The Center for Network Development in conjunction with the Juvenile Information Sharing Project has announced that will present a webinar supported by the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP) on June 19, 2008 from 1:00-2:00 PM on the framework for analyzing state laws as recommended in the Guidelines for Juvenile Information Sharing.

The announcement listed the following learning objectives for the session:

• What state law permits and requires as to juvenile record sharing
• Statutory models that authorize multiple agency cooperation
• Interagency agreements and working memoranda of understanding
• About an important online resource

The announcement also noted that "there is no fee to participate and registration is limited to 100 persons.  One can register online at http://www.juvenileis.org/webinar.asp.  The deadline for registering is June 13, 2008."

Federal Court Creates Mobile Website

The April, 2008 edition of The Third Branch newsletter from the US Federal Courts contains an article titled "District Court Offers Mobile Version of Its Website". The article begins:
"Like most federal courts, the Northern District of Illinois created its website long before the advent of e-filing and the proliferation of hand-held computers."

Jonathan Zittrain Interview

CTC6 keynote speaker, Oxford/Harvard Professor Jonathan Zittrain was interviewed on the Charlie Rose show on May13, 2008. To view the video from the show click here.

E-Courts 2008 Online Registration Available

Online registration for this year's E-Courts Conference is now available.  The conference will take place December 8-10 in Las Vegas, Nevada. Our theme is Getting the Job Done and our main focus will be on the real-life benefits that electronic documents, communications, and data systems offer your court. In addition to important sessions providing information on how to manage budgetary constraints while trying to maintain optimal productivity and quality of justice, the conference will again feature a manageable vendor exhibit with vendor showcase sessions. This is the one court technology event where you can actually take time to sit down and talk one-on-one with the technology vendors about your ideas and plans for improving your court. 

New Services Task Team Created

The Global Infrastructure/Standards Working Group (GISWG) has initiated a Services Task Team (STT) for the Justice Reference Architecture (JRA)with the help of the Department of Justice Bureau of Justice Assistance (DOJ BJA).  The task team is being managed as a joint project by IJIS, NCSC and SEARCH.  Jim Douglas from SEARCH chairs the STT.  Their first JRA service definitions will be for fusion center suspicious activity reports and fingerprint/biometric services.  State and local justice projects using the JRA are underway in Maine, New York, Utah and Illinois.  Nevada is also considering its use for a court data integration project. For more on GISWG go to their website at: http://www.iir.com/global/GISWG.htm

NIEM Technical Advisory Committee Update

NCSC VP for Research and Technology, Tom Clarke reports that the NIEM Technical Advisory Committee (NTAC) met recently and finished work on several important documents, while continuing work on other key policies.  The committee has defined a comprehensive list of quality assurance measures for NIEM, defined a comprehensive set of tool requirements in support of NIEM, and agreed on a conceptual approach that enables NIEM domains to issue their own version updates between major NIEM releases. 

The committee also completed work on the Naming and Design Rules (NDR) Version 1.3, which provides conformance guidance for the NIEM data model and IEPD's built using it.  In the coming months, NTAC will work with the other NIEM governance committees to prioritize the implementation of quality assurance measures and tool interface definitions.  Finally, NTAC recommends that no major NIEM release occur before at least early 2010.