Category: News

As cannabis legalization and regulation evolve, the United States is at a tipping point. Congress is now exploring the decriminalization and rescheduling of cannabis. These continued changes in laws are impacting our courts and society and are creating a dynamic and sometimes confusing landscape for a variety of disciplines including judges, law enforcement, drug court professionals, the drug and alcohol testing industry, and employers’ human resource offices.

As a result of this, the American Judges Association, partnered with The National Judicial College, Society for Human Resource Management, Drug and Alcohol Testing Industry Association, California Western School of Law, Colorado Highway Safety Office, and New England Association of Recovery Court Professionals are bringing forward a first-of-its kind interdisciplinary approach to cannabis issues facing all of these disciplines, the 2022 National Interdisciplinary Cannabis Symposium. This Symposium, funded by State Justice Institute, will bring together these impacted disciplinary groups and allow for substantial interaction, discussion, and knowledge-sharing on the topic of cannabis.

The goals of the symposium are: 1) identify current issues related to the legalization of cannabis and its impact on judges, law enforcement, academia, drug court professionals, the drug and alcohol testing
industry, and human resources; 2) identify and analyze how cannabis-related issues are addressed by each discipline; 3) develop an educated approach and plan to address the issues facing each discipline with a multidisciplinary perspective. The event will be held May 20-22, 2022 in San Diego, CA and also online. Registration information coming soon.

The SJI Board of Directors met virtually on December 6, 2021 to make decisions on quarterly grant applications, and approved a total of 11 new grants.

Five (5) Strategic Initiatives Grants were awarded: 1) the National Center for State Courts (NCSC) to support Phase III of the Conference of Chief Justices and Conference of State Court Administrators (CCJ/COSCA) Pandemic Rapid Response Team (RRT).  The RRT will work with NCSC in Phase III on the transition to implementation of the innovative strategies courts have used to operate during COVID-19.  This is in addition to support that SJI provided to 12 projects that are assisting state and local courts in their response to, and recovery from, COVID-19, with a look towards the future of court operations; 2) the NCSC to support the CCJ/COSCA Leveling of the Scales of Justice initiative.  The initiative will create a set of practical, evidence-based tools and recommended processes as an Action Blueprint for Racial Justice.  With SJI support in FY 2021, work on the Blueprint commenced with the development, testing, and future dissemination of a comprehensive, research-informed, data-driven organizational assessment tool that will enable judicial leaders to determine how best to ensure racial and ethnic fairness in their courts; 3) The NCSC and Rulo Strategies to support Phase II of the Rural Justice Collaborative (RJC).  The Collaborative provides direct technical assistance to rural communities and stakeholders, and is supported by a cross-sector advisory council composed of rural judges from across the United States, along with additional stakeholders in the justice, child welfare, and behavioral health systems. .  In Phase II, the RJC will provide technical assistance to up to thirty communities with a focus on justice stakeholders; 4) Policy Research Associates (PRA) to examine the scope, mechanisms, and effectiveness of strategies and approaches that civil and criminal courts are using to provide non-legal aid to help people with unmet needs better navigate the court system, and have their needs identified and addressed; and 5) support to the Cady Family Initiative, along with experts in trauma-informed technology approaches in family law, experts from Indiana and Stanford Universities, representatives of court case management systems, developers of protection order portals, and online dispute resolution providers to prototype a triage process that identifies risk and the services needed to resolve family cases.

Two (2) Project Grants were awarded: 1) The National Association for Court Management (NACM) to: develop and deliver nationally significant educational programs, related material, and curriculum with continued focus on SJI Priority Investment Areas and the NACM Core®; and continue distant learning opportunities to broaden the scope and delivery of educational opportunities available in a convenient and flexible method accessed by judges, court managers, administrators, and other judicial branch employees to include many of NACM’s justice partners; 2) the New York Unified Court System to develop and implement a mandatory, comprehensive, and sustainable racial bias, cultural awareness, and procedural justice education and training program for all judges and court staff.  The project will include an evaluation of the impact this training has on judges, staff, and court culture.

Four (4) Technical Assistance Grants were awarded:. 1) the Wyoming Judicial Branch for a compensation/salary assessment, review human resources policies, practices, and rules related to employee compensation; and development of a new pay schedule/pay grades; 2) the Eleventh Judicial Circuit Court of Florida to plan the development of a solution for Self-Represented Litigants that provides interactive engagements with the Court’s website and physical locations; 3) the Yavapai County, Arizona, Superior Court to enable the Court’s leadership, in collaboration with community and justice system partners, to reimagine and transform how court services are delivered, and develop a roadmap and strategies for making continued improvements; and 4) the Florida Office of the State Courts Administrator to improve civil court processes and procedures by identifying patterns and themes of data entry errors related to case status.

The next deadline for grant applications is February 1, 2022. 

The National Institute of Justice (NIJ) supported the Criminal Justice Testing and Evaluation Consortium has released a technology brief to help us better understand the use of chatbots in criminal justice. (Chatbots are computer programs designed to simulate conversation with human users.) Five major takeaways include…

1. Chatbots have the potential to improve efficiency, reduce costs and workloads, expand capabilities, and aid users across many criminal justice use cases; however, capturing these gains requires forethought and may require significant investment and time. 

2. Stakeholders should consider the economic, operational, legal, safety, and privacy implications of implementing chatbots. 

3. Despite advances in AI, deploying AI-driven chatbots is not a “plug-and-play” opportunity for criminal justice applications; access to high-quality data for training the chatbot is critical for success. 

4. Chatbots have the potential to reduce administrative burden by freeing up staff to work on higher value tasks; however, the organization needs to consider how it will ensure human oversight of the chatbot to mitigate any potential risks. 

5. The continuous advancement of AI, machine learning, and natural language processing (NLP) will expand chatbot use cases and applications in the criminal justice system. 

For more information and to download the full report, please visit: Chatbots in the Criminal Justice System (cjtec.org)

The National Center for State Courts (NCSC), in partnership with the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges (NCJFCJ), funded by State Justice Institute, synthesized best practices in juvenile and family court and case management principles to develop an adaptable and responsive online training curriculum. The curriculum helps courts assess their adherence to principles of case management and scheduling and investigate research-supported strategies for increasing effective case management in dependency cases.

For more information and to access the case management curriculum, please visit: https://www.ncsc.org/services-and-experts/areas-of-expertise/children-and-families/caseflow-management-curriculum.

Should remote hearings stay, or go? Results from the National Center for State Courts (NCSC)’s recent annual survey of public opinion finds that a majority of respondents believe that courts should continue to conduct remote hearings. Results show that majority of respondents believe courts should continue to hold hearings by video because it allows them to hear more cases and resolve cases more quickly, and it makes it easier for people to participate without having to travel to a courthouse, take time off work and find childcare.

This year’s survey also finds that large numbers of respondents indicate that barriers to getting to a physical courthouse exist, including a remarkable 49 percent who indicated that the distance they would need to travel to reach their courthouse would be a problem for them.

To read the full article, please visit State of the State Courts | NCSC.

The National Immigrant Women’s Advocacy Project (NIWAP), working in partnership with the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges (NCJFCJ) on a State Justice Institute (SJI) funded project is pleased to invite you to participate in the National Judicial Network: Forum on Human Trafficking and Immigration in State Courts (“The Network”). The Network is seeking judges, commissioners, magistrates, Tribal judges, and other judicial officers to join the National Judicial Network, a peer to peer forum. The Network will provide a forum for judges to engage in peer-to-peer learning sessions with judges from across the country, participate in webinars, communicate with other judges in a member-only confidential Slack/Listserv, access topic-specific publications, and attend future in-person trainings on issues that arise in state courts involving human trafficking and immigrant victims.

For more information please visit: https://niwaplibrary.wcl.american.edu/wp-content/uploads/NJN-Outreach-Letter-06.15.21.pdf and https://niwaplibrary.wcl.american.edu/pubs/njn-outreach-flyer

Nine of the country’s most innovative rural justice programs have been selected to serve as models for other communities as part of the Rural Justice Collaborative (RJC) Initiative. This initiative – a project of NCSC, Rulo Strategies and funded by State Justice Institute – will work with these sites to create educational materials for an online resource center and provide training opportunities.

The Nine (9) Innovation Sites selected include:
* South Carolina Victim Assistance Network Reaching Rural Initiative
* Lazarus Recovery Services in North Carolina
* The Center for Empowering Victims of Gender-Based Violence in Kansas
* The Rural Attorney Recruitment Program in South Dakota
* The Rural Incubator Project for Lawyers in Montana
* Texas Dispute Resolution System: Rural Mediation
* Public Defender Corporation Recovery Coach Project in West Virginia
* Scott County Coordinated Community Response (CCR) Team in Tennessee
* Family Accountability and Recovery Court in North Carolina

For more information please visit: https://www.ruraljusticecollaborative.org/innovation-sites