1. Croatia Statistical Training
Courts
Session 7, January 18th, – 12.00
An Electronic Case Management System – Use of a CMS for statistics and other information
With funding from the European Union
DEVELOPMENT OF MONITORING INSTRUMENTS FOR JUDICIAL AND LAW ENFORCEMENT INSTITUTIONS IN THE WESTERN BALKANS
Phase three – Training 1

2. Four areas of using CMS We can identify four areas of use of a CMS:
Operational level
Local management information (LMI)
Central management information (CMI)
National use for research and policy making (NAT)
Typically, a CMS is built with primarily 1) in mind and possibly 2). 3) And especially 4) could easily be ‘forgotten’.
One of the issues here is: in which area is detailed information on the record (case? offence?) level needed and where is aggregate information sufficient? 2

3. Four areas of using CMS Operational level
Supports handling cases, the primary use of a CMS
Obviously detailed (record level) data needed 3

4. Four areas of using CMS Local management information
Information needed by the management of the court to regulate work processes.
Information typically needed: workload of individual judges, development in types of cases, cases pending etc.
Aggregate data are sufficient 4

5. Four areas of using CMS Central management information
Information needed by a Ministry or Judicial Council to establish and/or distribute resources needed. But also information given by the courts to give account of their activities
Information typically needed: workload of courts, development in types of cases, cases pending etc.
Aggregate data are sufficient 5

6. Four areas of using CMS National use for research and policy making
Information needed by a Ministry, Statistical Office and Research institutes to establish the working of the Criminal Justice System and to define future policies. Also to give account to the general public of the activities of the CJS.
Information typically needed: detailed information on cases: offender, victim, crime type, conviction, punishment etc.
Aggregate data are NOT sufficient, detailed data are usually needed 6

7. Extracting information from CMS
The question is how, for the LMI, CMI and NAT areas, the data are extracted from the CMS.
Six design decisions are important here:
Direct access to the CMS or through an interface?
Extracting of detailed data or aggregate data?
Continuous or periodic extraction?
Different extractions for each area?
What data are exactly needed in every area?
How to deal with privacy issues? 7

8. Extracting information from CMS
First how this is organized in the Netherlands: 8

9. Flow of data, the Netherlands
COMPAS:
Administrative system used in 19 PS offices
Information from appeal courts
Special interface for CBS
Mgmt Info System
for 19 PS offices
Interface for
Criminal Record Register
CBS Statistics
Mgmt Info System for
Central Prosecutor Office
Central
OMDATA
(WODC)
OBJD
Crimes only
Crimes and misdemeanors

10. Extracting information from CMS
The first three decisions are implemented as follows in the Netherlands:
Direct access (d) or Interface (i)
Detailed data (d) or Aggregate (a)
Continuous (c) or periodic (p)
LMI i a* p
CMI
NAT d
c and p 10

11. Extracting information from CMS
The design decisions:
Direct access to the CMS or through an interface?
Generally speaking, direct access is too heavy a burden on the CMS. Also, the IT architecture is more complicated. This could only be an option for the LMI. 11

12. Extracting information from CMS
The design decisions:
2) Extracting of detailed data or aggregate data?
Detailed, record level, data is only needed in the NAT area. However, also in the other areas detailed data give more flexibility. 12

13. Extracting information from CMS
The design decisions:
3) Continuous or periodic extraction?
Continuous: Every time something important happens with a case (input, prosecution decision, court verdict, …) a record is written to an intermediate buffer.
Periodic: Once every month / week / … an extract is made from the primary system.
Continuous is theoretically better, but more difficult to implement 13

14. Extracting information from CMS
The design decisions:
4) Different extractions for each area?
In practice, given the different needs, there could well be one extract/interface for LMI and CMI and another for NAT. 14

15. Extracting information from CMS
The design decisions:
Design decisions 4 and 5 will be discussed in the next session. 15

16. Relation with CBS / Dissemination and analysis
The following discussion applies to the National use for research and policy making (NAT) area only. 16

17. Croatia Statistical Training
Courts
Session 7, January 18th, – 12.00
An Electronic Case Management System – Use of a CMS for statistics and other information
With funding from the European Union
DEVELOPMENT OF MONITORING INSTRUMENTS FOR JUDICIAL AND LAW ENFORCEMENT INSTITUTIONS IN THE WESTERN BALKANS
Phase three – Training 17