NCJ Number
79087
Date Published
1981
Length
19 pages
Annotation
This guide assists court administrative personnel in assessing case processing times. It explains how individual courts can assemble information both on their case flow and on delay factors so that these data can be compared with those from other courts.
Abstract
The guide specifically discusses keeping records, identifying data elements, sampling cases, conducting statistical analyses, and using the results to make policy choices. A case numbering system that distinguishes case types and file summaries that report the major characteristics and events of the case are among suggestions for improved recordkeeping. The system uses the date of the verdict, dismissal, plea of guilty, or entry into pretrial diversion as the optimal measures of case termination. The study period should be based on the time the charges were made and the case population should be defined in terms of either cases initiated or cases disposed within that period. Sample size for courts with little or no information on case processing time should be moderately large -- 500 cases per year -- to provide reliable estimates of the values of population characteristics. Statistical analysis should yield average and standard deviation of processing time as well as distribution in terms of peakedness and skewness. It may also be useful to calculate and plot monthly mean and median case processing times. A model is needed to explain the differences in case processing times. A sample model, using an ordinary least square regression equation, is recommended. The benefit of formulating and estimating a model of case processing time is discovering information about the size of the effect of each of the influences on case processing time. Tables and eight references are given.