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ADMINISTRATIVE OFFICE OF
PENNSYLVANIA COURTS
Information
Technology
Department:
A Retrospective
Pennsylvania’s Statewide Case Management Systems
The centralization of data and documents in statewide case management systems
provides for sharing of court information across jurisdictions and court-related
entities. The result is more consistent practices, the creation of programs and
initiatives based on standardized data, and promotion of a uniform system of justice.
Magisterial District Judge System (MDJS) –
a comprehensive statewide case management system
that serves all Magisterial District Courts, including central
and night courts and the Pittsburgh Municipal Court.
Common Pleas Case Management System (CPCMS) –
provides case management, accounting and reporting
functions to the criminal division of the Courts of Common
Pleas, and to dependency and delinquency cases.
Pennsylvania Appellate Court Case Management
System (PACMS) – a statewide case management system
used by the three appellate courts – Supreme, Superior
and Commonwealth.
Pennsylvania was the second state in the country to automate all appellate courts on
a single statewide case management system.
Pennsylvania was the first state in the country to automate
any level of court on a single statewide case management system.
Court Applications
®
P E N N S Y L V A N I A C O U R T S
PACFile
PACFile
P E N N S Y L V A N I A C O U R T S
®
PAeDocket – A free mobile app, supported on iOS and
Android platforms that provides court case information.
• The first-of-its-kind application for state courts
nationwide, allowing the public to search and view
court case information on a mobile app.
PAePay – An application that allows the public to securely
pay court fines, costs and restitution entirely online.
PACFile – A service that provides the option to file
documents with the courts electronically on both new
and existing cases.
• Integrated into the PACFile system, the Electronic
Records Management System (ERMS) is the
foundation of the document-management system
implemented by the AOPC.
Administrative Support Application Program (ASAP) –
provides payroll, human resources, procurement,
accounting, and budgeting functions to AOPC, appellate
court staff and certain Supreme Court boards and
committees.
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Court Websites
UJS Website – The Pennsylvania Judiciary’s website provides up-to-date information
for the Unified Judicial System.
Web Portal – A component of the UJS website that provides public access to court
information, and specialized web services to court users and the public.
Some of its applications and services include:
• Docket Sheets & Calendars
• Judicial Expenditures
• PAePay Bail and Secure Bail County Portal
• Attorney Registration
• Guardianship Tracking System (GTS)
Data Dashboards – provides the public with interactive views of caseload statistics
and financial data from a combination of sources.
Online Bar Application (OBA) – a public-facing website through which Bar
applications are submitted to the Pennsylvania Board of Law Examiners.
Bar Exam Applicant Registry (BEAR) – used by the Pennsylvania Board of Law
Examiners to accept applications and track Bar applicants.
SharePoint Content Management – houses over 50 websites supporting UJS
departments, teams and projects, providing users with the ability to store and
collaborate on content and tasks.
Online Services – a website that interacts with the ASAP application to provide
services to UJS employees, and perform other employment-related functions.
Data Exchange
The Data Hub/Public Access team puts in place data exchanges and file publications
to support inter-agency electronic communication and public access requests for
data from AOPC’s three statewide case management systems. They also provide data
to AOPC’s justice partners through JNET.
In 2019, AOPC/IT staff processed 664 such requests. Analysts review each request and
work to develop the datasets that will be provided to requesters from the public,
the legislature, other government agencies and the media. A few of these services
and subscribers include:
• Bail & Civil Judgments
• Crime Victim Claim Management Services
• Guardianship Tracking System Integration (GTS)
• PA Board of Probation and Parole
• Jury Bill Candidate List
• Warrant/Criminal History Reporting Interface
Cybersecurity Measures
AOPC/IT is continuously engaged in multiple efforts to ensure that all online court
data and information is secure, a few of which include:
• Protection of judiciary network, applications and data by implementing and
maintaining layers of security controls, processes and products.
• Regular vulnerability assessments and penetration tests.
• Maintenance of two separate data centers for redundancy.
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CASELOAD STATISTICS
PROBLEM-
SOLVING
COURTS
ORPHANS’
COURT
CASES
CRIMINAL
CASES
JUVENILE
DEPENDENCY
JUVENILE
DELINQUENCY
CASES
CIVIL
CASES
PROTECTION
FROM ABUSE
CHILD
CUSTODY
AND
DIVORCE
FINANCIAL DATA STATISTICS
MONEY COLLECTED
FOR FEES, FINES,
COSTS AND
RESTITUTION
COLLECTION
RATES
OVER TIME
AOPC IT DEPARTMENT FUNCTIONS
The primary function of AOPC/IT is to develop and maintain statewide case management
systems for Pennsylvania’s Unified Judicial System (UJS), while providing other court-related
applications and technology services and support to the UJS and its 60 judicial districts.
Application Development
All AOPC case management systems currently in place have been primarily
developed, deployed and maintained by in-house staff.
The Application Development teams perform all aspects of the software
development process:
analysis
coding
training
maintenance
database
design
testing
deployment
Application Design
With extensive experience in court operations, this team participates in the development
of all new applications and features. Analysts regularly engage with users, development
staff and management while providing day-to day-support for each application.
Network
The AOPC/IT staff has designed and supports the UJS telecommunications network.
This team is also responsible for procuring circuits, managing network security and
configuring all network-related equipment.
The UJS network provides connectivity to all levels of courts in Pennsylvania.
Operations Teams
These teams are responsible for designing, maintaining and supporting the
technology infrastructure used to deliver all AOPC/IT services and applications
to judiciary personnel and the public.
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Enterprise User Services
AOPC/IT staff directly support all Supreme Court jurists and staff, several boards
and committees and all AOPC staff in the use of technology.
This team is responsible for designing, maintaining and supporting a wide
variety of user services including installation, relocation and support services for
computers and related equipment including video conferencing.
Network Operations Center (NOC) – provides 24/7 monitoring, support and
notification for over 600 court locations, 2 data centers and all AOPC-provided
services.
End User Support
The User Interface group is comprised of help desks, system trainers, and
documentation writers who provide support and training to thousands of court
users at all levels of courts including Supreme, Superior, Commonwealth, Common
Pleas, and Magisterial District courts. Additionally, the teams provide help and
support to the general public, court appointed guardians, and attorneys. The
following statistics are based on calendar 2019.
Annual workshops were presented for court staff and similar presentations for
district judges at continuing education and regional meetings.
• 742 magisterial district judge staff attended workshops at 29 locations
throughout the Commonwealth.
• 650 magisterial district judges and perspectives attended presentation at the
minor judiciary continuing education school.
• 25 county court auditors received system updates from the system trainers.
ERMS/PACFile training and support is offered to counties who implement
Electronic Records Management Systems (ERMS), and PACFile, eFiling of
documents in the common pleas and appellate courts.
• 20 counties received customized demonstrations, training, and support for
criminal, delinquency, and dependency rollouts.
• 5 counties went live and received support on eFiling original record into the
xtensive training documentation including workbooks, training manuals, and
videos designed by course and topic are used during training sessions.
• Documents, resources, context-sensitive help and bulletins are published and
inventoried in each case management system.
• The UJS Web Portal used by public users, court assigned guardians, and
attorneys have self-guided help, video tutorials, and many reference documents
available for assistance.
appellate courts.
E
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Rules of Court and Legislative Impacts
From 2016 through 2019, AOPC/IT made numerous system updates to address
changes to procedural rules of court from the Appellate, Criminal, Juvenile, Orphans’
and Minor Courts rules committees.
Each year, AOPC/IT reviews recommendations made by the Supreme Court’s
procedural rules committees or boards; and pending legislation for impacts to the
AOPC-supported systems. Implementing these items are considered mandates and
the top priority for the department.
ACTS
These mandates required significant updates to the case management systems:
• Safe Harbor for Sexually Exploited Children (Act 130 of 2019)
• Overhaul of Truancy Statutes (Act 138 of 2016)
• Restitution Disbursement Schedule (Act 145 of 2018)
• DNA Expungement (Act 147 of 2018)
• Lottery Intercept (Act 40 and 44 of 2017)
• Order of Limited Access (Act 5 of 2016)
• Clean Slate (Act 56 of 2018)
• PFA/Firearm Relinquishment (Act 79 of 2018)
• Cameras in Work Zones (Act 86 of 2018)
• Child Protection (Act 92 of 2018)
• Tax Refund Intercept (Act 93 of 2016)
• Removal of License Suspension for Drug Convictions (Act 95 of 2018)
Recent Recognition
AOPC/IT staff have won awards and received accolades over the past decade and
the department is seen as a leader in building technical solutions to automate and
facilitate efficient court business processes.
Received the annual
National Association
for Court Management
(NACM) Cross-
Boundary Partnerships
Award for the Clean
Slate initiative in 2020.
Received the annual
NACM Court Process
Innovation Award
for the Guardianship
Tracking System in 2019.
Received the CITOC Court
Technology Innovation
Award in 2012 for
re-engineering aspects of
CRM to provide customizable
applications for internal
court departments.
Received the annual
NACM Court Process
Innovation Award for
the Language Access
Data Collection system
in 2020.
Received the CITOC
Emerging Technologies
Award in the Court
Technology category
in 2019 for the PDF/A
electronic document
archival solution.
Awarded the
Computerworld
Honors Laureate in the
Government area for the
Case Study for CPCMS.
5
STATEWIDE SYSTEM STATISTICS
UJS Web Portal
End User Support
Court Applications
74,000
attorneys
register online
annually.
25 million
web page hits
per day.
11 million
docket sheets
generated
per month on the
UJS web portal.
193,000
secure login UJS
web portal users.
Over 100,000
calls recorded
each year in our help desk system.
83%
business related
questions/issues
10%
4%
meta data and
data fixes
system
issues
1%
enhancements and
software changes
The Network Operations
Center managed over
60,000 tickets
last year ranging from
user-reported issues to tickets
generated due to monitoring events.
Provide 24 X 7
network/status monitoring
of 60,000 interfaces, across
3,400 devices, in 630 court
locations statewide.
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PACFile
®
P E N N S Y L V A N I A C O U R T S
Pennsylvania courts collected over
$480 million
in fees, fines, costs and restitution
in 2019, including a record
$145 million
paid online through PAePay®,
more than an
11% increase
over the previous year.
®
P E N N S Y L V A N I A C O U R T S
PACFile
Over 15,000
e-filings
through PACFile
each month.
Data Hub
More than 1.1 million
traffic and
criminal e-filings
are completed every year
through the Data Hub.
76 million
case life cycle events
sent annually to justice
partners and state agencies.
1,000
interface feeds
exist with more than
300 agencies or departments
through the Data Hub. Each month,
90 data exchanges utilized by 635 state
and local agencies are completed.
STATEWIDE SYSTEM STATISTICS
Trainings
Case Management
Averaging over 800
unique video conferences
per year, as well as averaging
over 900 WebEx online meetings/
training sessions per year.
Over 2.6 million
cases
are docketed annually.
50 million
electronic
documents
stored in ERMS.
41,000
interpreter encounters
are recorded in our Language
Access Data Collection (LADC)
system annually.
14 billion
rows of data
stored for all systems.
287
court administrators,
judges and court staff
attended basic training
sessions.
362
court staff and judges
participated in webinar
sessions on 14 topics.
G T S
313
professional/lay guardians
attended Guardianship Tracking
System (GTS) training.
27 million
forms and reports
are generated from the
statewide case management
systems annually.
22,000
users statewide
for all case
management systems.
Over
3.5 million
cases processed
in our case management
systems annually.
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SIGNIFICANT MILESTONES
1992 – Magisterial District Judge Case
Management System (MDJS)
1999 – Appellate Courts Case
Management System (PACMS)
2006 – Common Pleas Criminal Case
Management System (CPCMS)
2007 – Created the Public Access
team to manage data requests
1996 – UJS content website
www.pacourts.us
2001 – UJS Web Portal in 2001
(including online appellate docket sheets)
2004 – Data Hub that sends case life cycle
messages from case management systems
through the PA Justice Network to many
justice partners
2007 – Adopted an enterprise approach for
building statewide systems and services -
enabling more efficient staff usage and reusability
of already developed software objects.
2010 – Dependency Module to the CPCMS
2010 – PAePay
PACFile
P E N N S Y L V A N I A C O U R T S
®
2012 – Rolled out Electronic Documents and
eFiling (PACFile) to the Appellate Courts
PACFile
P E N N S Y L V A N I A C O U R T S
®
2012 – Moved the annual attorney
registration process online
2013 – Implemented an online payment
option in PAePay for bail cases
2013 – Developed and made publicly
available the Interactive Data and
Statistical Dashboards
2015 – Developed and released the
PAeDocket Mobile App
2016 – Rolled out Electronic Documents and
eFiling (PACFile) to Common Pleas Courts
2018 – Completed and rolled out the
Guardianship Tracking System (GTS)
2015 – Added a Delinquency Model to the CPCMS
2018 – Developed Language Access
Data Collection (LADC) Dashboards
2018 – Implemented changes to the UJS Public
Access Policy to safeguard sensitive data
2019 – Developed PDF/A electronic
document archival solution
2019 – Launched Clean Slate
automatic record-sealing process
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