Harris County Jury Management No Longer a Trial with Catapult Solution
Serving the Houston metropolitan area, the Harris County District Clerk's Office has jurisdiction over the selection of prospective jurors for the County’s 98 courts. The District Clerk’s Office has long been committed to using technology to help save taxpayers money and streamline operations. This commitment to practical, results-based technology solutions was one of the main drivers behind a recent decision to upgrade the Office’s jury management system.
The old system was based on paper summonses. When prospective jurors arrived in the morning, the summonses—up to 2,000 a day—had to be collected, checked for completeness, assembled and sorted by hand. Each one had to be painstakingly photocopied in order, three per page. Up to eight copies were sometimes required for each juror. The photocopies were then stapled into booklets and passed out to bailiffs and court clerks.
The whole process was time-consuming, labor-intensive and prone to error. Photocopying thousands of summonses every day was a major expense. Courts had to wait while the summonses were being processed and the jurors assembled into panels. The courts had no way of knowing how many jurors were available each session, so judges sometimes overestimated the number of jurors they might need, just to make sure they had enough. Ironically, this often led to postponed trials in other courts because of a lack of available jurors.
Finally, the office used a mainframe-based jury management system that lacked a number of features that they urgently needed, such as electronic document management and better reporting. The system also incurred significant operational and maintenance costs.
Paul Billingsley, Director, Technical Services Bureau and his staff evaluated a number of proprietary jury management systems, but found that applications could not be easily integrated with Microsoft .NET, the architecture recently adopted by Harris County. Billingsley turned to Catapult Systems to help them develop a customized application to meet their unique needs.
"Catapult gave us exactly what we needed technically. Most importantly, we can now serve the public and support the judicial system more efficiently and effectively." Paul Billingsley, Director, Technical Services Bureau, Harris County District Clerk’s Office.
Catapult Systems had already completed several successful application development projects for Harris County, so they were a natural choice for the jury management project. Working with Billingsley and his team, Catapult consultants were able to develop and implement a customized jury management solution that was fully integrated with the Harris County IT architecture and interface design.
Integration was built into the new application from the ground up. "The District Clerk’s Office already had their .NET architecture in place and the look and feel they wanted," explained Jimmy Sauers, Senior Consultant for Catapult Systems. "So we leveraged their architecture and designed interfaces to their specifications. We weren’t there to reinvent any wheels but to do things their way and improve what they already had."
Completed on time and on budget, the new application has helped streamline the entire jury management procedure. Now when jurors report for duty, their summonses are fully digitized, eliminating the need for photocopies. Sorting is done electronically. Information on current juror availability is now fully accessible by the courts.
"Catapult Systems gave us the customized, integrated solution we needed – on time and on budget," said Billingsley.
The Catapult Systems solution was also designed for easy management and control by the Technical Services staff.
"The new system was designed to make the jury management process easier for everyone involved – the District Clerk’s office, the courts and the jurors. The end result is a user-friendly solution that enables Harris County to efficiently serve its growing population," said Ken Keating, Account Executive, Catapult Systems.
Juror processing streamlined and accelerated
Costs decreased through reduced paperwork and photocopying, improved productivity by office staff, all juror data transferred from mainframe to SQL Server and in-house maintenance and control
More efficient use of available jurors
Reduced errors in jury management and payment
Full integration with Harris County information technology systems
The new jury management system saved Harris County over an hour per person in juror processing, a significant savings when 98 courts are waiting for juries. According to Billingsley, the courts are happy with the savings and so are the jurors since they now spend less time waiting for assignments.
Cost efficiencies have improved significantly. Paperwork has been virtually eliminated, including almost all photocopies of summonses. Staff productivity has improved, with a reduction in processing errors. Mainframe data has been cleaned, normalized and transferred to a more cost-effective Microsoft SQL Server database. Since information on current juror availability is now accessible by the courts, jurors are assigned to panels more efficiently, with less waiting time for assignments. Jury panels are not over-assigned and trials no longer have to be postponed because of a lack of available jurors.
With a fully integrated system and interfaces designed to reflect their own specifications, the Technical Services staff can now control and easily manage the system themselves, helping to further reduce operational costs and accelerate their return on investment (ROI).
"Catapult gave us exactly what we needed technically," said Billingsley. "More importantly, we can now serve the public and support the judicial system more efficiently and effectively."