After a prolonged but successful trial, the NSW Attorney-General has officially launched JusticeLink, an online judicial network allowing lawyers and judges to engage in some court hearings and proceedings over the Internet.
In the wake of a NSW Auditor General's report released late last year claiming the JusticeLink project had come in AU$18 million over budget and was running two years late, the state Attorney-General's department yesterday announced that the system will go live in the NSW District Court on 11 February, after its trial in the Supreme Court last year.
John Hatzistergos, NSW Attorney-General
Credit: NSW Parliament
"JusticeLink is the first multi-jurisdictional court computer system in the world," NSW Attorney-General John Hatzistergos said in a statement.
"While the time-honoured traditions of our legal system will remain intact, JusticeLink will streamline the process, saving millions of dollars in costs and countless hours spent in the courtroom," he said.
A spokesperson for the Attorney-General's department told ZDNet.com.au last year that the system was expected to be in the District Court by February 2008, and would then be rolled out across the state's Local Courts by July, after the project had originally been scheduled for completion some time in 2006.
While the initiative looks to be running to its amended schedule, the Attorney-General's department yesterday indicated that the Local Court rollout has been delayed, saying "within 12 months, the computer system is expected to be operating in every criminal and civil court in NSW, including 160 Local Courts".
"I really don't think there are any set dates, but my understanding is that it's going to be everywhere by 2009, it's a progressive rollout," a spokesperson for the Attorney-General told ZDNet.com.au today.
Over 160 electronic hearings were convened as part of the system's trial in the NSW Supreme Court last year; the trial and initial rollout of the system is confined to civil matters only, but will be used for criminal matters within the year.
"What this does is cut out the need for parties to be in court for rudimentary procedural matters such as setting a date for a hearing," said the spokesperson. "Any trials and committal hearings will still be heard in court."
"It's also a great windfall to people who live in rural and regional areas of the state," the spokesperson continued. "If you for instance live in western NSW, and need official matters attended to before a hearing in Sydney, your local lawyer would have to pay another lawyer there to handle proceedings, now it can all be done online."
Hatzistergos said the system will also be used by law firms to "e-file" documents, motions and evidence, enabling all authorised parties involved in the case access to the information.
Other authorised parties outside of court may include the NSW Police, the Director of Public Prosecutions, and the Department of Corrective Services.
"JusticeLink ensures that everything is filed correctly and nothing gets lost in the shuffle, it's also run as an Intranet, so it's very tightly secured," said the spokesperson.
"Document trolleys and ring binders will be replaced by laptops and CDs as thousands of pages will now be stored as soft copies," Hatzistergos said.
