Criminal Courts Technical Assistance Project

The Edward Byrne Memorial Competitive Program: National Initiatives, administered by the Office of Justice Programs' (OJP) Bureau of Justice Assistance (BJA), furthers the Department's mission by assisting state and local jurisdictions in improving the criminal justice system and assisting communities in preventing drug abuse and crime. In FY 2008, the program will focus on funding local, regional, and national efforts within five major categories: 1) preventing crime and drug abuse; 2) enhancing local law enforcement; 3) enhancing local courts; 4) enhancing local corrections and offender reentry; and 5) facilitating justice information sharing.

The American University will implement a project under Category 3: Enhancing Local Courts. Through the Criminal Courts Technical Assistance Project (CCTAP), American University will continue to provide on-site and office-based technical assistance, delivered by senior practitioner consultants and project staff, to state and local criminal courts and related agencies in order to: improve the capacity of state and local judicial systems to operate efficiently and fairly; provide BJA with a flexible and responsive mechanism through which to deliver a wide range of judicial system technical assistance and training services nationwide, in a variety of contexts and using a variety of modalities; facilitate peer networking among judicial system leaders and administrative staff; and improve tribal-state judicial system coordination and cooperation.

The project will use a mix of technical assistance modalities (e.g., office based assistance, hosted peer visits, on-site studies) and cost-sharing arrangements with requesting agencies where possible. Three special initiatives, each documented in an implementation guideline, will also be undertaken which include: 1) planning assistance to seven state court administrative offices interested in developing caseflow management improvement initiatives statewide or with specific courts; 2) focused technical assistance to three courts interested in improving case scheduling practices, using differentiated case management (DCM) principles and including problem-solving dockets; and 3) continued efforts to promote increased tribal-state judicial system coordination.

CA/NCF