COURTING DISASTER

If information about a person’s criminal history is not available to a judge making, in some cases, life or death decisions about jail time or bail conditions, the information may as well not exist. That’s why it is distressing to Gov. John Baldacci and others that efforts to computerize the state’s criminal history records are progressing so slowly. While there are many reasons for the lack of progress, the governor’s restated commitment to fix the problem, coupled with a domestic violence task force’s focus on the inadequacy of the records system, should speed the process.

Only 10 percent of Maine’s criminal records are entered into the state’s two-year-old computer database, a recent Portland Press Herald investigation revealed. That leaves more than 400,000 records on paper stored away in local courthouses and at the Public Safety Department in Augusta. Clerks may spend weeks pulling information from rows of file folders to compile a single criminal history even though the law mandates that a defendant have a hearing within 48 hours. This leaves prosecutors to make initial court appearances armed with fragmentary knowledge about a defendant’s past. Worse, judges make decisions based on partial information.

For Lisa Deprez, the lack of information was fatal. The Portland woman was found unconscious in her apartment on May 13. She died three days later. Three days prior to her beating, her boyfriend, Gregory Erskine was in a Portland courtroom accused of threatening to kill Ms. Deprez. Superior Court Justice G. Arthur Brennan was unaware of Mr. Erskine’s domestic violence history, including convictions for terrorizing and violating orders to stay away from his former wife, which was documented in records at the Lincoln County Courthouse. He released Mr. Erskine on $200 bail.

“I think it’s fair to say a lot of times you’d like to have more information during this hearings,” Judge Brennan told the newspaper. The judge may be understated, but the point remains – information that is now filed away needs to be shared with the people making critical decisions about bail conditions, protection from abuse orders and other judicial matters.

Gov. John Baldacci has pledged to correct the situation. Earlier this week, he said he would again ask the Legislature to provide more money to the State Bureau of Identification’s criminal history system. A similar request, for $152,500 to hire five additional clerks to input data, was defeated by lawmakers earlier this year.

Instead, the department has asked its staff to work 210 hours of overtime a week (the equivalent of the hours that would be worked by five additional clerks). Since the computerization process started in October 2002, the Department of Public Safety has automated 20 percent of its nearly 360,000 records.

At the same time that it is working to computerize records, the department has seen huge increases in demands for records from the private sector and federal agencies. In the last two years, requests from private sector, mainly employers seeking background information on potential hires, have doubled. The department is also fielding growing numbers of requests from the federal government in the wake of Sept. 11 and passage of new regulations prohibit convicted felons from qualifying for subsidized housing.

More than money is needed to solve the problem, according to county prosecutors. “You can say more money and time is needed, but it’s a matter of will,” says Penobscot County District Attorney Chris Almy.

The governor now has the will, the Legislature should approve the money and the public safety department must find the time to complete the job.