Any conclusions expressed herein are those of the author and do not reflect the views

of the U.S. Census Bureau. The Census Bureau has reviewed this data product to ensure

appropriate access, use, and disclosure avoidance protection of the confidential source data.

An Overview of the Criminal Justice

Administrative Records System

Keith Finlay

Business Development Sta

Economic Reimbursable Surveys Division

U.S. Census Bureau

October 25, 2023

1/14
Criminal Justice Administrative Records System

(CJARS)

I Data infrastructure project to develop a platform for the next generation

of statistics and research on criminal justice system and the

justice-involved population

I Partnership between Census Bureau and University of Michigan started

in 2016

2/14
Current criminal justice data infrastructure is

incomplete

I Limits how performance is measured, which policy questions are asked

I Leads to varying definitions of recidivism

I Makes it dicult to identify eective policy levers

I Prevents comprehensive benefit-cost analyses

3/14
Goal: develop a more complete criminal justice data

infrastructure and enable its use

I Collect, harmonize, and link longitudinal, multi-jurisdictional criminal

justice data to track individuals and cases across space and time

I Enable timely and innovative federal statistical products about criminal

justice system and justice-involved population

I Provide national research platform for qualified researchers on

approved projects

4/14
Goal: develop a more complete criminal justice data

infrastructure and enable its use

I Collect, harmonize, and link longitudinal, multi-jurisdictional criminal

justice data to track individuals and cases across space and time

I Enable timely and innovative federal statistical products about criminal

justice system and justice-involved population

I Provide national research platform for qualified researchers on

approved projects

4/14
Project scope and data collection

Arrest Pre-trial detention Adjudication Probation Incarceration Parole

18k police

departments

3k sheri’s

oces/3k jails

50 state

departments

of corrections

community

corrections

agencies

3k prosecutor’s

oces

50 state court

admins/3k

criminal courts

50 state

criminal

records

repositories

5/14
Project scope and data collection

Arrest Pre-trial detention Adjudication Probation Incarceration Parole

18k police

departments

3k sheri’s

oces/3k jails

50 state

departments

of corrections

community

corrections

agencies

3k prosecutor’s

oces

50 state court

admins/3k

criminal courts

50 state

criminal

records

repositories

5/14
Project scope and data collection

Arrest Pre-trial detention Adjudication Probation Incarceration Parole

18k police

departments

3k sheri’s

oces/3k jails

50 state

departments

of corrections

community

corrections

agencies

3k prosecutor’s

oces

50 state court

admins/3k

criminal courts

50 state

criminal

records

repositories

5/14
Project scope and data collection

Arrest Pre-trial detention Adjudication Probation Incarceration Parole

18k police

departments

3k sheri’s

oces/3k jails

50 state

departments

of corrections

community

corrections

agencies

3k prosecutor’s

oces

50 state court

admins/3k

criminal courts

50 state

criminal

records

repositories

5/14
Project scope and data collection

Arrest Pre-trial detention Adjudication Probation Incarceration Parole

18k police

departments

3k sheri’s

oces/3k jails

50 state

departments

of corrections

community

corrections

agencies

3k prosecutor’s

oces

50 state court

admins/3k

criminal courts

50 state

criminal

records

repositories

5/14
Project scope and data collection

Arrest Pre-trial detention Adjudication Probation Incarceration Parole

18k police

departments

3k sheri’s

oces/3k jails

50 state

departments

of corrections

community

corrections

agencies

3k prosecutor’s

oces

50 state court

admins/3k

criminal courts

50 state

criminal

records

repositories

5/14
Project scope and data collection

Arrest Pre-trial detention Adjudication Probation Incarceration Parole

18k police

departments

3k sheri’s

oces/3k jails

50 state

departments

of corrections

community

corrections

agencies

3k prosecutor’s

oces

50 state court

admins/3k

criminal courts

50 state

criminal

records

repositories

5/14
Project scope and data collection

Arrest Pre-trial detention Adjudication Probation Incarceration Parole

18k police

departments

3k sheri’s

oces/3k jails

50 state

departments

of corrections

community

corrections

agencies

3k prosecutor’s

oces

50 state court

admins/3k

criminal courts

50 state

criminal

records

repositories

5/14
Project scope and data collection

Arrest Pre-trial detention Adjudication Probation Incarceration Parole

18k police

departments

3k sheri’s

oces/3k jails

50 state

departments

of corrections

community

corrections

agencies

3k prosecutor’s

oces

50 state court

admins/3k

criminal courts

50 state

criminal

records

repositories

5/14
CJARS stakeholders and roles

I University of Michigan acquires and harmonizes data from criminal

justice agencies, including law enforcement, judicial, and corrections

agencies

I Census Bureau links CJARS with other socioeconomic data to build data

products for data providers, develop new data products, and improve

operations

I Qualified researchers on approved projects analyze CJARS in the FSRDCs

I Communities and policymakers use CJARS-derived statistical products

to understand the performance of the criminal justice system

6/14
CJARS data coverage

Source: CJARS data at the University of Michigan, not from data protected by 13 USC §9a.

All records (back to 1970s)

I > 300 data providers

I 3.5b records

I 216m CJ events

I 40m unique individuals

Statewide records

I States with coverage of state

court, state corrections, and/or

state repository represent

>80% of U.S. population

States where CJARS covers statewide

data for at least 10 years

Statewide

coverage,

1 domain

Statewide

coverage,

2+ domains

7/14
Growing CJARS ecosystem of researchers

I Platform enables a community of researchers

I Rapid growth in research proposals and use by FSRDC researchers

I CJARS team has prototyped research applications

I Children living with justice-involved adults

I Self-employment as an alternative to employer-based jobs

I Impacts of financial sanctions

I Safety net enrollment and justice involvement

I Research is a critical tool for improving data quality

8/14
Growing CJARS ecosystem of partners

I Research will assess whether CJARS data can be used as an alternative

data source for enumeration/imputation/testing of Group Quarters in

2030 Census

I Partnership with Council of State Governments will support

development of agency performance dashboards

I Design panel for next National Longitudinal Survey of Youth cohort

recommended that BLS consider use of administrative data, including

CJARS

9/14
Session highlights growing CJARS ecosystem

I Justice Outcomes Explorer statistical product will report on reentry

experiences of justice-involved people

I Oer new insights about this population using population-level linkage

I Provide value back to agency data providers and create an incentive for

agencies to join

I Reimbursable work with CDC measures incidence and impacts of

adverse childhood experiences

I New population measures previously only available in retrospective

surveys

I Demonstrates the value that CJARS brings to the Census Bureau Data

Linkage Infrastructure, which in turn adds value to CJARS

10/14
Session highlights growing CJARS ecosystem

I Justice Outcomes Explorer statistical product will report on reentry

experiences of justice-involved people

I Oer new insights about this population using population-level linkage

I Provide value back to agency data providers and create an incentive for

agencies to join

I Reimbursable work with CDC measures incidence and impacts of

adverse childhood experiences

I New population measures previously only available in retrospective

surveys

I Demonstrates the value that CJARS brings to the Census Bureau Data

Linkage Infrastructure, which in turn adds value to CJARS

10/14
Additional references

I Project website at Census Bureau: https://census.gov/cjars

I Project website at University of Michigan: https://cjars.org

I Data documentation:

https://cjars.org/data-documentation-download

11/14
Thank you

Keith Finlay

keith.ferguson.finlay@census.gov

301-763-6056

12/14
Additional slides

13/14
CJARS stakeholders and data exchange

Data

providers University of Michigan U.S. Census Bureau

University of Michigan CJARS

Secure Enclave Server

U.S. Census Bureau

and

Federal Statistical

Disclosure

Research Data Centers

review

Administrative

data

U-M CJARS

roster file

U-M CJARS

database

CJARS

statistical

reports

Federal, state, and local

criminal justice agencies

14/14
CJARS stakeholders and data exchange

Data

providers University of Michigan U.S. Census Bureau

University of Michigan CJARS

Secure Enclave Server

U.S. Census Bureau

and

Federal Statistical

Disclosure

Research Data Centers

review

Administrative

data

U-M CJARS

roster file

U-M CJARS

database

CJARS

statistical

reports

Federal, state, and local

criminal justice agencies

University of Michigan

acquires data via

I Data-use agreements

I Public-information

requests

I Downloads/scraping

14/14
CJARS stakeholders and data exchange

Data

providers University of Michigan U.S. Census Bureau

University of Michigan CJARS

Secure Enclave Server

U.S. Census Bureau

and

Federal Statistical

Disclosure

Research Data Centers

review

Administrative

data

U-M CJARS

roster file

U-M CJARS

database

CJARS

statistical

reports

Federal, state, and local

criminal justice agencies

I Harmonization to

national schema

I Entity resolution to

identify unique

individuals, assign

CJARS IDs

I Episode resolution to

identify linked

processes

14/14
CJARS stakeholders and data exchange

Data

providers University of Michigan U.S. Census Bureau

University of Michigan CJARS

Secure Enclave Server

U.S. Census Bureau

and

Federal Statistical

Disclosure

Research Data Centers

review

Administrative

data

U-M CJARS

roster file

U-M CJARS

database

CJARS

statistical

reports

Federal, state, and local

criminal justice agencies

After Census processes

roster through Person

Identification Validation

System (PVS), CJARS can

be linked anonymously by

Protected Identification

Key (PIK)

14/14
CJARS stakeholders and data exchange

Data

providers University of Michigan U.S. Census Bureau

University of Michigan CJARS

Secure Enclave Server

U.S. Census Bureau

and

Federal Statistical

Disclosure

Research Data Centers

review

Administrative

data

U-M CJARS

roster file

U-M CJARS

database

CJARS

statistical

reports

Federal, state, and local

criminal justice agencies

After disclosure review,

agencies receive

aggregate statistical

products based on linked

data

14/14