To assess how the structure of the D.C. criminal justice system affected systemwide operations, we first compiled a detailed description of the system’s structure, including its unique attributes. In doing this, we conducted interviews with and obtained and reviewed documents and data from, among other agencies, MPDC, Superior Court, USAO, Corporation Counsel, CJCC, the U.S. Department of Justice, the D.C. Mayor’s Office, D.C. Council, Court Services, Pretrial Services, Corrections Trustee, Defender Service, U.S. Marshals Service, and the D.C. Office of the Chief Medical Examiner. We then compiled a list of potential issues. After discussing these potential issues with the committees of jurisdiction, it was agreed that we would rely on other studies for some issues, such as scheduling of cases in Superior Court and forensics, that were the subject of ongoing or recent reviews. We also excluded juvenile justice, an area that involved noncriminal justice agencies such as the D.C. Department of Human Services. However, as requested, we did develop a description of the juvenile justice case flow process (see app. VI). As a case study of coordination issues, we examined D.C.’s method of processing cases from arrest through initial court appearance before Superior Court—an area of concern for many D.C. criminal justice system officials. We compared this process to the methods used in Philadelphia and Boston. These cities were judgmentally selected because they were both large East Coast cities that had recently revised their methods of processing cases from arrest through initial court appearance. To assess the mechanisms that exist to coordinate the D.C. criminal justice system, we interviewed agency officials and reviewed agency organizational charts, policies, and procedures. To identify initiatives planned or under way to improve D.C.’s criminal justice process, we requested that each CJCC member agency with responsibilities for adult offenders provide us with a list of initiatives, as of November 2000, and include the goal of each initiative, other participating agencies, the status of the initiative, and any results to date plus any planned or completed evaluations of each initiative. We compared the information provided by participating agencies about individual initiatives to determine whether they were in agreement and contacted agencies to clarify and reconcile these differences. A more detailed description of our objectives, scope, and methodology is found in appendix I. We performed our work between October 1999 and December 2000 in accordance with generally accepted government auditing standards. We requested written comments on a draft of this report from the Mayor of D.C., Chair of the D.C. Council, Chair of the D.C. Control Board, Chief of the Metropolitan Police Department, U.S. Attorney General, U.S. Attorney for D.C., D.C. Corporation Counsel, Chief Judge of Superior Court of D.C., U.S. Marshal of the Superior Court for D.C., Interim Director of Court Services and Offender Supervision Agency for D.C., Director of D.C. Pretrial Services Agency, D.C. Corrections Trustee, Chief Medical Examiner of D.C., Director of the D.C. Department of Corrections, and the Director of Public Defender Service for D.C. The D.C. criminal justice system involves a number of D.C. agencies, federal agencies, and private organizations. These agencies and organizations are funded with congressionally appropriated federal funds and local D.C. funds. Table 1 shows the agencies of the D.C. criminal justice system, whether the agencies are D.C. or federal agencies, and each agency’s principal source of funding. Appendix II provides additional information on the agencies involved in the D.C. criminal justice system. The current structure of the D.C. criminal justice system reflects a number of changes that the National Capital Revitalization and Self-Government Improvement Act of 1997 (D.C. Revitalization Act), as amended, made to D.C.’s criminal justice system. The D.C. Revitalization Act brought a number of D.C. functions, such as sentenced felon incarceration and community supervision, that are normally the responsibility of states rather than cities or counties, under federal funding. Areas affected by the D.C. Revitalization Act included (1) Pretrial Services, (2) Defender Service, (3) Superior Court, (4) sentencing, (5) incarceration, and (6) offender community supervision and parole. Specifically, within the time schedule specified in the D.C. Revitalization Act, these changes included federally funding Superior Court, Pretrial Services, and Defender Service; transferring sentenced felons from D.C.’s Lorton Correctional Complex to BOP custody and supervision; transferring responsibility for parole decisions from the D.C. Parole Board to the U.S. Parole Commission; and creating a new federal community supervision agency, Court Services, for those convicted of crimes in D.C. courts. Appendix III includes details on certain changes made by the D.C. Revitalization Act, as amended. In many ways, the structure of the D.C. criminal justice system is unique. For example: Because of its status as the nation’s capital, over 30 law enforcement agencies other than MPDC have a significant presence in D.C. These include the U.S. Capitol Police, the Federal Protective Service, the U.S. Secret Service, and the U.S. Park Police. These and other agencies may make arrests for crimes committed within D.C., and MPDC assists these other law enforcement agencies by performing functions such as fingerprinting, photographing, and housing arrestees prior to their initial court appearance. D.C. has two prosecutors for local crimes. USAO prosecutes felonies, such as homicide or armed robbery, and “serious” misdemeanor violations committed by adults in D.C. Examples of the types of misdemeanors prosecuted by USAO include petty theft, assault, weapon offenses, and narcotics possession. Corporation Counsel, a D.C. agency, prosecutes “minor” misdemeanor violations, such as drinking in public or disorderly conduct, in addition to criminal traffic offenses and offenses committed by children. The Criminal Division of Superior Court is responsible for processing matters that are in violation of the D.C. Code and some related U.S. Code provisions, and municipal and traffic regulations. USAO may, at its discretion, prosecute certain eligible criminal offenses in either Superior Court or U.S. District Court for D.C. In practice, however, USAO brings a large majority of criminal prosecutions in Superior Court. According to a D.C. USAO official, D.C. is the only jurisdiction in the United States in which USAO may prosecute crimes in both local and federal courts. Only in D.C. does BOP assume responsibility for all felony offenders sentenced to prison terms in local (i.e., state, county, and city) courts. The D.C. criminal justice system also has different case flow processes for handling arrestees, depending on which agency is prosecuting the case and the status of the arrestee. Appendix IV contains a detailed description of the process for cases prosecuted by USAO. Appendix V contains a detailed description of the process for cases prosecuted by Corporation Counsel. Appendix VI contains a detailed description of the process for juvenile cases. According to most officials we interviewed and our own analyses, an overarching problem within the D.C. criminal justice system has been the lack of coordination among all participating agencies. Its different sources of funding, reporting structures, and organizational perspectives have complicated the task of coordinating systemwide activities, reaching agreement on the nature of systemwide problems, and taking a coordinated approach to addressing any problem areas that balances competing institutional interests. One reason for this is that the costs of coordinating activities and corrective actions may fall on one or more federally funded agencies, while any savings may accrue to one or more D.C. funded agencies, or vice versa. In the absence of a single hierarchy and funding structure, agencies have generally acted in their own interests rather than in the interest of the system as a whole. Typically, federal and nonfederal criminal justice systems include the following stages: (1) arrest and booking, (2) charging, (3) initial court appearance, (4) release decision, (5) preliminary hearing, (6) indictment, (7) arraignment, (8) trial, (9) sentencing, and (10) correctional supervision. Most stages require the participation of several agencies which need to coordinate their activities for the system to operate efficiently while also meeting the requirements of due process. That is, all involved agencies need to work together to ensure that their roles and operations mesh well with those of other agencies, and to identify any problems that emerge and decide how best to resolve them. Table 2 shows the stages in D.C.’s criminal justice system and the agencies that participate in each stage. As shown in the table, 7 of the 10 stages typically involve multiple agencies with different sources of funding, which results in different reporting structures and different oversight entities. For example, as many as six agencies—one D.C. (MPDC), three federal (USAO, U.S. Marshals Service, and Pretrial Services), and two federally funded D.C. agencies (Superior Court and Defender Service)— need to coordinate their activities before the arrestee’s initial court appearance for a felony offense can occur. At the latter stages of the system, an offender’s sentencing and correctional supervision may require the participation of as many as eight agencies—one D.C.-funded agency (DOC), five federal agencies (USAO, BOP, U.S.