FY 2017 West Virginia NCHIP

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.

Under the 2017 NCHIP, the West Virginia Division of Justice and Community Services (DJCS) will use funds to support administrative efforts and pass through funding to the Administrative Office of the West Virginia Supreme Courts of Appeals (WV AOC) and the West Virginia State Police (WVSP) to continue the missing disposition records and scanning projects.

Under both projects, DJCS will support the AOC and WVSP by providing the staff used to address several projects - the disposition backlog project and the WV Offender Case Management System (WVOCMS) continuation project. Both of these projects play a vital role in the ability of the court and the state police to maintain and improve the quality, completeness and availability of records at the state and national levels. While the AOC has made significant progress in addressing the backlog of dispositions in the Criminal Record Repository, there still remains several years backlog on disposition reporting due in part to challenges locating the records and replacing the outdated CCH system. This incomplete record information is of concern due to the increased use of criminal history records for criminal justice, non-criminal justice, and homeland security needs. There are several gaps in reporting that the AOC and WVSP have identified but, one of the main issues was reporting of indictments to complete the criminal history file. To build upon the efforts, the AOC will continue to collaborate with the West Virginia State Police to hire contracts and staff to support the efforts of the implementation of the WVSP new CCH system. The WVOCMS is the system that collects all demographic information, family and criminal history, assessment information, fees information, incarceration information, drug testing and other identifying information. The system has the capability to house scanned copies of the pre-sentence report, court orders and indictments and record missing dispositions for the pre-sentence and LS/CMI reports. The WVOCMS is the most accurate electronic system to pull indictment and submit case file data with a disposition and a required prohibitor to the WVSP Criminal Record Repository for inclusion in the criminal history file. DJCS, WVSP and the WV AOC will be responsible for contributing a 10% match collectively under the 2017 NCHIP grant.

(CA/NCF)