Highland County Court connects to OCN

GREENFIELD – Highland County Court, which recently connected to a statewide justice information exchange system, now has the capability to cast a wider net in searching backgrounds of those appearing in court.

  Developed by the Supreme Court of Ohio, the Ohio Courts Network (OCN) serves as a centralized warehouse of case-related data, enabling courts and justice system partners to share information and to support functions such as criminal history reviews, warrant and protection order searches, pre-sentencing investigations, background checks, handgun pre-purchase reviews and pre-custody reviews.

  These local courts’ case management systems send data each night to the Supreme Court, which then integrates and securely stores this information and makes it available to other courts and justice system partners. As a closed, private, secure application, the OCN is not a public Web site, according to Robert Stuart, Supreme Court IT Director.

  “Through the OCN, the flow of information between local courts and justice system partners is improved because of the availability of current, accurate and centralized data,” said Stuart. “Judges know more about the person charged with a crime who’s standing before them, and state agencies can access case disposition data as soon as the court has entered it into the local system. Because of this, judges make better decisions based on the additional information.”

  Stuart said connecting to the OCN involves only a few steps: signing an agreement to share local court data, training the authorized local court

users, connecting to the OCN and loading cases. Strict protocol governs the appropriate use of OCN data by court staff.

  “Our participation in the OCN gives our court and other agencies a useful tool in determining the criminal history of defendants,” said Ron Coffey, Highland County court administrator and clerk of court. “The fact that the Supreme Court of Ohio has developed the system gives us confidence in the accuracy and security of the data.”

  Judge Robert J. Judkins also touted the benefits of the OCN. “A small court such as ours has limited resources, and we are grateful to the Supreme Court for making it possible for us to be part of the project.”

  The justice system partners’ records available through the OCN include those from the Bureau of Motor Vehicles, the Department of Rehabilitation and Correction, the Bureau of Criminal Identification and Investigation criminal history database and any case-related record from local courts connected to the OCN.

With more than 65 local courts already connected to the OCN statewide, many other courts are in various stages of connectivity. Some courts have begun loading case data, some courts are testing their connectivity before loading cases and some courts have scheduled implementation. It is hoped that 80 percent of the case-related data from local courts will be available system wide by the end of the year.