Legal Justice Information Systems Integration Term Paper

For instance, in the eyes of the courts, an offense's level could be equated to the guideline for the seriousness of a crime. The next aspect of the scorecard was the offender's personal or associative criminal history. Prior offenses dictated a level of conviction frequencies and social offenses. Therefore the personal criminal history of an individual ends up playing a major role in the sentencing guidelines. A person's propensity to repeat offences entails longer sentences. The person that had a history of repeat offenses offered a greater threat and therefore was often thought to be more dangerous to society. but, how does the justice system maintain a culprit's history without an ability to utilize integrated processes?

This is a prime example of where justice information systems integration could have far reaching implications. In regard to sentencing, first time offenders in one community may not have been labeled as serial offenders because of the lack of integration and communication between disparate communities. Far too often individuals were not severely punished when they committed crimes in one local that did not communicate with a local where the same offender had committed the same or a similar crime. Other examples can be seen when one agency searches for a potential criminal culprit even though that individual was already in custody in another jurisdiction unbeknownst to the first. Through an integrated jurisprudence system, these types of offenders are less likely to get away from multiple jurisdiction crimes. Thus, inter-community communication and systems integration will lead to more accurate sentencing and arrest patterns and therefore may reduce crime.

Security

One area where the justice system integration will need to be epically careful is the area of security. Network security in networked environments has three main objectives. "Three basic security concepts important to information on the Internet are confidentiality, integrity, and availability. Concepts relating to the people who use that information are authentication, authorization, and nonrepudiation." (Dekker, 2004) an illegal entry into the justice system entails much more than a network for a different user. When illegal network accesses stalled the computer systems at Yahoo one summer could have far less reaching implications than a terrorist wiping out the all fingerprint files in as single swoop. Whatever the case, network security for an integrated justice system will have many entry points for criminal as well as legal elements. Consider that any high school kid with an F. average could have the basic knowledge to make an unauthorized access into a secure network environment. A integrated communication link in the justice system could therefore allow for access to the many people who know exactly what they are doing because they have grown up with this technology. Couple that with the fact that terrorists can represent whole nations and they have many tools at their disposal to bring our judicial system down. "Incidents can be broadly classified into several kinds: the probe, scan, account compromise, root compromise, packet sniffer, denial of service, exploitation of trust, malicious code, and Internet infrastructure attacks." (Dekker, 2004)

The key is that if the integrated judicial systems are open-ended for ease of use, they may be insecure at best. No one who uses an 'open ended network' or that has access to an outside domain can be considered immune to security breeches. "Security and usability are often inversely proportional. There is no such thing as "complete security" in a usable system. Consequently, it's important to concentrate on reducing risk, but not waste resources trying to eliminate it completely." (Avolio, 2000) This integrated system will have a daunting task of protecting itself and the entire population. "Those affected include banks and financial companies, insurance companies, brokerage houses, consultants, government contractors, government agencies, hospitals and medical laboratories, network service providers, utility companies, the textile business, universities, and wholesale and retail trades." (Dekker, 2004)

Conclusion

This report was about Information Systems Integration in regard to the legal and justice systems of the nation. We are currently a part of the twenty first century digital era where information has become a major part of the criminal justice process. In order to make the justice process more accurate, efficient and effective, integration will be required though the many diverse departments, localities, states and national systems. This system will need to combine the advances in technology with an overall reevaluation of the existing day-to-day manual processes. Integration of the justice information system will imply future seamless sharing of information at all points of the justice decision making process and advances will raise the level of expertise and efficiency from the highest court in the land to the local sheriff's departments of the nation. "In recognition of this need to share information, many state and local jurisdictions, including the State of Iowa, are actively developing and implementing plans for comprehensive integrated justice information systems. Integrated systems improve the quality of information and thereby: improves public safety, eliminates data entry errors and redundant data entry, provides complete, current and timely data, improves the ability to evaluate policy decisions and changes, maximizes available resources, improves data retrieval response time, provides for better, more informed decision making, and improves the operational effectiveness of existing systems." (Meyers, 2004)

References

Avolio, Frederick M. (2000, March 20). Best Practices in Network Security -- as the Networking Landscape Changes, So Must the Policies That Govern Its Use. Don't Be Afraid of Imperfection When it Comes to Developing Those for Your Group. Network Computing.

Capital Punishment in U.S. Hit 30-Year Low in 2003. Ed. All American Patriots. (March 1, 2005). Retrieved on April 21, 2005, from All American Patriots at http://www.allamericanpatriots.com/m-news+article+storyid-6869-PHPSESSID-c7528df1df14be6397da4e89e25a7374.html.

Dekker, Marcel. (n.d.). Security of the Internet. Retrieved on April 21, 2005, at http://www.cert.org/encyc_article/tocencyc.html#Overview

Holmes, Amir., Webster, Lawrence P., & Sullivan, Teri (2004). JIEM Reference Model. SEARCH, the National Consortium for Justice Information and Statistics. Retrieved on April 21, 2005, at http://www.search.org/integration/JRM1.0.1.pdf

Meyers, D. (2004). Justice Information Systems Integration Summary. State of Iowa Implementation.

Morton, Heather. (n.d.). Integrated Criminal Justice Information Systems. Retrieved on April 21, 2005, from National Conference of State Legislatures Web Site: http://www.ncsl.org/programs/lis/intjust/report01.htm

The Justice Information Exchange Model. (2004). SEARCH Model. Retrieved on April 21, 2005, at http://www.search.org/integration/info_exchange.asp

Schacter, Bernice. Issues and Dilemmas of Biotechnology: A Reference Guide. Westwood: Greenwood P, 1999.

Appendix a Information Technology