FY2016 National Criminal History Improvement Program

The goal of the National Criminal History Improvement Program (NCHIP) is to improve the Nation's safety and security by enhancing the quality, completeness, and accessibility of criminal history record information and by insuring the nationwide implementation of criminal justice and noncriminal justice background check systems. BJS provides direct financial and technical assistance to the states to improve criminal history and other related records and to build their infrastructure to connect to national record check systems both to supply information and to conduct the requisite checks.

The Missouri State Highway Patrol (MSHP) will administer and monitor three projects conducted by partner agencies. The award activities focus on two objectives: 1) to continue improving criminal justice agency processes through local criminal records audits and disposition cleanup efforts and, 2) to continue automated methods for addressing the criminal reporting problems from partner agencies to the Criminal Records Repository. The 3 following projects address the priority areas (1 & 2) listed in the 2016 NCHIP solicitation:

1) Implementation of Tools for the new Show-Me Courts case management system: The Office of the State Courts Administrator (OSCA) will develop case management tools for the associate and circuit level criminal case processing. The development will include: dashboards which provide judge and court employees the ability to see real-time data to better manage criminal cases; enhance “track this case” functionality to include future notifications; updates to the prosecuting attorney interface; and enhance the accounting portion for processing felony and misdemeanor cases. In order to continue the criminal history interface between the courts, prosecutors and law enforcement, which many state and federal agencies rely on, the interface must be redesigned and programmed for the Show-Me Courts system. These modifications will allow for more efficient and sustainable interfaces with other systems using modern technologies.

2) Research missing prosecutor and court case dispositions: The Missouri State Highway Patrol (MSHP) used 2014 NCHIP and NARIP funding to research and complete 104,091 felony dispositions through employee overtime. The MSHP will use 2016 NCHIP funding to continue their successes in researching and completing dispositions to increase the stateÂ’s overall 69% disposition completion percentage. Missouri has run several reports to identify two types of incomplete records. The first type are those records that have charges filed, but are lacking a court case disposition. The second type are those records that only have an arrest, but there is no further information indicating if charges were filed or declined. The MSHP will devote overtime hours to research these older records in a timely manner. This will increase MissouriÂ’s disposition completion percentage in addition to assist NICS personnel when making firearms purchase decisions.

3) Livescan Lease: The MSHP and Missouri Police ChiefÂ’s Association (MPCA) will use 2016 NCHIP funds to lease Livescan devices and equipment for their local agencies. The purchase and on-going maintenance costs of Livescan devices was and is a huge cost burden in addition to the Livescan equipment seeming to be obsolete after a five year period. With the lease option, the agency will be responsible for an installation fee and then an annual maintenance fee every year thereafter. The largest benefit of the lease plan is that as long as the agency continues to pay the annual maintenance fee, all equipment will be replaced on a five-year schedule with the latest technology. NCHIP funds will be used to pay the initial fee of $6,592 for the agencies. The agency will then sign an agreement indicating that their agency will be responsible for all future annual maintenance fees to keep the device hardware updated. (CA/NCF)