Whether endowing legal aid organizations with cost-saving automation or enabling local citizens to more easily connect with legal advice, legal technology has played a pivotal role in bridging the justice gap for those shut out of traditional legal services.
And increasingly, such technology is empowering attorneys addressing the justice gap by providing quick access to information. Through partnerships with technology companies, the New York State Defenders Association (NYSDA), a not-for-profit organization that supports New York state's public defenders' offices through training, technology and other support, is making this ability a priority.
The NYSDA recently turned to web application developer Contegra Systems and dtSearch, which provides text retrieval tools for such tasks as web searches, to embed advanced indexing and search functions in its document management platform and the case management system they offer to New York state public defenders' offices.
Representatives from the NYSDA were unavailable to comment for this article. But Robert Wiesenberg, president of Contegra Systems, noted that the updated search functions in the case and document management tools will better assist state public defenders in finding necessary information across many disparate local and statewide databases and repositories.
"Prosecuting and defending cases is all about access to information, and the search gives public defenders the ability to go after any data, whether it's in a document or database," Wiesenberg said.
He added, "The NYSDA's goal is to put as many tools in the hands of the public defenders to help them better manage the caseload and be more efficient and effective on an individual case basis."
The new search functionality installed in NYSDA's systems is based off a dtSearch search engine powered by propriety algorithms, which Wiesenberg called "almost similar to artificial intelligence." The engine enables the searching and filtering of any text document across multiple file formats such as emails, Microsoft Office files and database files.
The search engine has already been installed in NYSDA's case management system and document management platform, but Wiesenberg noted that Contegra Systems may continue to work with the NYSDA to update the search functionality with machine-learning technology.
Once such possibility being discussed is the addition of an "auto suggestor" feature, which will use machine learning to identify "the top 10 to 20 key phrases in every document," and use that as suggested search terms, he said.