Chapter Eight: Information Management and Technology

Case Management System

In his report on the Administration of Justice in the CAF, the Auditor General recommended that the CAF put in place a case management system that contains the information needed to monitor and manage the progress and completion of military justice cases. Prior to making this recommendation, the DMP had already begun to develop an electronic case management system to track cases throughout the court martial process with the aim of improving transparency efficiency, increasing accountability and reducing overall delays in the court martial system. In response to the report, the DMP committed to making the CMS operational by 1 June 2018.

Launched on 1 June 2018, the CMS is a file management tool and database used to monitor the progress of all cases referred to the DMP through the court martial process.  In addition, it allows for the tracking of all data in order to provide the DMP with the necessary statistics in real time about all cases in the court martial system.

The CMS tracks the status of files and collects data at pre-charge, referral, post-charge, the pre-trial phase and appeal period. In addition, it also tracks cases where there has been a custody review hearing and general file advice.  All important dates associated with these files are also recorded in the CMS, including but not limited to the dates when the file was referred to the DMP, when the file was assigned to a prosecutor, the date of the decision of the prosecutor on whether or not to prefer charges as well as key dates in the court process. In addition, the CMS also allows for the automatic creation of documents from compiled data, including but not limited to charge sheets and letters informing key actors when a charge has been preferred by a prosecutor. 

The design of the CMS is user-friendly and is meant to provide each prosecutor with a quick overview of each of their cases. To that end, each prosecutor has access to a dashboard that shows the status of all relevant files and allows quick access to the data as necessary. 

The CMS is intended to replace previous methods for the tracking of cases which has typically been done through a spreadsheet application. Currently, the DMP maintains both systems for tracking cases in order to ensure the quality control of all data. However, once the CMS undergoes a series of quality control tests in the upcoming reporting period, it is expected that the CMS will become the sole tracking system for all DMP cases in the court martial system. 

Further, in the next reporting period, work will continue with the developers of the Justice Administration Information Management System (JAIMS) in order to determine whether the CMS is compatible with JAIMS allowing files from JAIMS to be electronically transferred into CMS once a case has been referred to the DMP.