This is a summary report of a study that examined the current state of information-sharing among independent criminal justice agencies, identified existing gaps in such information-sharing, and developed a framework for stakeholders to use in improving their information-sharing practices.
The study found that although the criminal justice enterprise in the United States has invested significantly in developing information-sharing standards, it has not developed a comprehensive view of the information-sharing process. Currently, law enforcement agencies are well represented, but other areas of criminal justice, such as forensics and statistical data analytics, are not as well represented. In addition, guidance and data elements for exchanging unstructured data, such as video, images, and voice recordings, are insufficient. A lack of metrics and measured results weakens evidence-based investment decisions on the impact of sharing information. In addressing these gaps, the current project developed a framework for understanding the current state of justice information-sharing. The proposal, called the National Justice Data Architecture (NIDA), can provide stakeholders with a systematic method for identifying and creating cross-agency information-sharing plans. This framework has three perspectives that address the needs of stakeholders based on their roles and primary responsibilities and assists in decision-making. These perspectives are the planning view, the operational view, and the design view. The personnel expertise and functions for each of these perspectives are outlined in this report.