NCJ Number
248456
Date Published
2009
Length
18 pages
Annotation
This is a report on the provision, sufficiency, and accuracy of data on drug offenders contained in Ohio's computerized criminal history database (CCH), and recommendations for improvement are offered.
Abstract
Approximately 46,000 drug crime arrests that involved approximately 36,500 individuals occurred in 2006. These individuals were arrested and charged with a drug crime, either alone or in combination with other crimes. Due to the magnitude of this population of offenders, a sampling was taken for the purposes of this project. Issues regularly encountered in the analysis were duplicate entries, missing or incomplete criminal codes, missing or unclear felony/misdemeanor codes, birth-date discrepancies, missing adjudication data, and missing disposition data. This report contains three general recommendations for addressing these deficiencies in CCH data on the processing of individuals arrested for drug offenses. First, in order to obtain accurate information on an individual's journey through the criminal justice system, criminal justice agencies must provide complete and specific data to the CCH. One example of failure to do this is that although CCH data forms allows for reporting agencies to specify the type of drug involved for many of the charges, few agencies provided this detail. A second recommendation is that CCH information be submitted and entered in a timely manner. Although electronic methods for delivering data are prevalent, some agencies still mail their arrest data, thus requiring the data to be manually entered into CCH. A third recommendation is to keep to a minimum multiple sources that provide overlapping data, so as to reduce duplicate information. In order to address these and other issues, Ohio's Attorney General's Bureau of Criminal Identification and Investigation is administering a Quality Assurance Program intended to improve data quality and completeness. 14 tables and appended Ohio Revised Codes for Drug Charges as well as adjudication definitions