April 29, 2008

New regional inmate booking system goes live in King County

Tool will free up thousands of officer hours in 50 local jurisdictions

A new regional integrated system going live this week will improve public safety by helping law enforcement officers make more informed detention decisions and by speeding up and reducing officer paperwork and handoff processes to get them back on the street faster.

Known as the Booking and Referral System, or BARS, the system is designed to improve arrest, booking, and case initiation processes and eventually reduce some operational costs for the King County Jail.

“With BARS, the normally time-consuming parts of the arrest, booking, and case referral process are automated,” said Todd Clark, captain for Intake and Release Operations for the King County Department of Adult and Juvenile Detention (DAJD). “That gives officers more up-to-date information, reduces the time officers are off the street, and increases accuracy – all of which increases safety for officers, inmates and the community.”

Officers are particularly enthusiastic about a BARS feature known as “hazard flags.” This feature improves field officer safety by quickly communicating special known conditions about individuals with records in the King County Jail system, such as a violent history or medical conditions that may affect an individual’s behavior during an arrest.

BARS has five major components, the "eSuperform" application, Jail Intake Queue, Jail Booking Queue, Prosecutor Case Queues, and Felony Investigation Filing in District Court. For each component, BARS shares information from multiple criminal justice systems with other regional criminal justice users. This creates efficiency for initiating new cases and improves communication between agencies and governments throughout the county.

Parts of BARS began going live last December, allowing for agency training and adoption of the new automated processes and tools. Full regional use of the system will make the BARS suite of tools available to approximately 4,000 officers from 50 regional criminal justice agencies.

“BARS opens up new opportunities for better managing criminal justice information within King County and within our region,” said King County Chief Information Officer David Martinez. “The system makes it easier to unlock data in legacy systems for broader use in a way that increases public safety for officers and citizens.”

The BARS project is a component of King County's long-term Law, Safety and Justice Integration Program.