Integrated Justice Information Systems

Technology is an essential tool to criminal justice and law enforcement agencies. The faster and more effectively it works, the safer our streets and communities. The more cost effectively it can work, the more officers, investigators, and agents can be used to fight crime - not paperwork.

SAIC creates integrated justice information systems that help authorized users get the information they need through an easy-to-use system for accessing, processing, and analyzing vast amounts of data from different sources. Our systems collect, analyze, and summarize the available data as comprehensively and completely as possible. Our systems aid decision support by providing meaningful, accurate information based on the summarized data. We use electronic case management systems that support agencies from law enforcement through the corrections process by tailoring commercial off-the-shelf software with legacy systems to provide a fully integrated system with access to necessary data, while incorporating security safeguards.

Some of our systems include:

Interstate Identification Index (III)

SAIC designed and completed the development of the Interstate Identification Index segment of the FBI's Integrated Automated Fingerprint Identification System (IAFIS). This system became operational nationwide in July 1999. One of the key challenges with this program was the migration of the criminal history database to a client/server environment. SAIC's expertise created a system that provides the same level of control and reliability as the legacy system, yet with improved speed, flexibility and expandability. This system is a high performance, on-line criminal history and mug shot database (45 million people), which is accessed by federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies via the National Crime Information Center network.

National Instant Check System (NICS)

The Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act mandated that a national instant criminal background check system be established by November 30, 1998. The FBI chose SAIC to design, implement and operate the back-end database system and the call center for the National Instant Check System (NICS). NICS ties in with FBI's analysis center, which conducts additional research when the background check indicates that the prospective gun purchaser may not qualify to own a firearm. NICS provides any licensed firearms importer, manufacturer, or dealer a determination - completed by authorized law-enforcement officials - as to whether the transfer of a firearm to an individual is legal or in violation of federal law. NICS supports a community of about 60,000 users and routinely handles 10,000 to 30,000 transactions per day.

Automated Law Enforcement Information Access System (ALIAS®) for State/Local Governments

State and local law enforcement organizations need high-power information systems that can be tailored to each organization's unique needs. SAIC's Automated Law Enforcement Information Access System (ALIAS®) is such a solution.

ALIAS is a full-service integrated criminal justice information system solution. At its heart is a criminal history database; master name index; and "hot files" for officer safety, vehicle, property, orders of protection, and registered sex offenders. ALIAS is based on state-of-the-art technology and built from mature, off-the-shelf products. The result is customizable toolkit that can be used as a turnkey integrated criminal justice information system. ALIAS is fully integrated with national, state, and regional systems. It is scalable, flexible, and user-friendly. ALIAS users can maintain and enhance their system or they can choose to outsource selected components of system maintenance and enhancements to maximize their efficiency and focus.

Key characteristics of the ALIAS solution are:

• Uses Open Architecture and is Platform-Independent
• Based on a Service-Oriented Architecture (SOA)
• Uses Standards-Based Web Services
• Robust, system-wide backbone provided through an Enterprise Service Bus (ESB)
• Existing services provide business functionality and operational system capabilities that can be readily leveraged for new implementations
• Extensible architecture that supports an Incremental Deployment Approach

SAIC invested more than 10,000 person-hours in corporate funding to begin ALIAS. More than 50,000 public/private person-hours were committed to its first release. The cumulative contribution to ALIAS now represents more than 100,000 person-hours spanning more than 11 years.

Success Stories

Oregon State Police
The Oregon State Police (OSP) chose ALIAS as a replacement to their Integrated State Justice Information and Criminal History Repository. OSP used ALIAS to support mission-critical information needs such as criminal history records, warrants, stolen vehicles and property, restraining orders, sex-offender registration, parole/probation records, concealed handgun licenses, and other applications. SAIC migrated Oregon's existing database system from a legacy mainframe environment to state-of-the-art server technology without disrupting 24-hour-a-day access to criminal justice applications.

Washington State Patrol
ALIAS was the Washington State Patrol's (WSP) replacement for its Integrated State Justice Information and Criminal History Repository. SAIC tailored ALIAS for the Washington State Patrol by adding graphical user interfaces for arrest and court disposition forms processing, an online sex offender registration process, and electronic integration with their Automated Fingerprint Identification System (AFIS). SAIC continues to work with the WSP as an extension of its staff. Special reports and some system support and modifications are performed by WSP staff, and under the direction of the WSP, SAIC maintains and enhances the software.

States of Kentucky, Michigan, and Alaska
For the Kentucky State Police Criminal Identification and Records Branch, SAIC has expanded the capabilities of ALIAS to include support for the national standard XML Report of Arrests and Prosecutions (RAP) sheet. For the Michigan State Police Criminal Justice Information Center, SAIC expanded the features of ALIAS to include a web browser user interface. At the Alaska Department of Public Safety, SAIC is expanding ALIAS to support the timely service of legal process with the creation of the civil writ database that is used by the Judicial Services component of the Alaska State Troopers .