Solution

The

		Solution Main Aims Features Overview Documents

UK Police Service approach to the investigation of serial and serious crimes is based on a standard process that has proved its success over the last two decades. The information management systems that support this process have also been standardised. The UK Police Service and Unisys have made a significant investment in the HOLMES 2 project that underpins this standard approach. The result of this investment is the HOLMES 2 solution.

HOLMES 2 is a single application which provides total compatibility and consistency between all the UK Police Forces. It uses a combination of COTS (Commercial Off-The-Shelf) components and purpose-built software to provide the most cost-effective system for the Police Service. Existing software technology in the form of Microsoft Windows and the i2 Analyst Notebook was used to provide familiar components to assist in the user acceptance of the system.

In addition, new but maturing technologies introduced computer intelligence into HOLMES 2. For example, the Dynamic Reasoning Engine (DRE) from Autonomy Limited, offers crime investigators the opportunity to combine their skill and experience with the acquired knowledge of the system to identify new lines of enquiry in an investigation.

Main Aims

In a typical major investigation, many documents, in the form of Statements, etc., are produced; all of these have to be carefully processed to ensure that vital clues are not overlooked. This mass of information in text form can prove extremely difficult to analyse, so HOLMES 2 includes a unique facility that presents information graphically alongside the original documents; using this facility, users can easily identify important information and link key items together very quickly.

Many documents will generate further tasks, for example, obtaining Statements from newly-associated persons; HOLMES 2 enables the prioritisation of document management and the associated Actions.

In addition, HOLMES 2 provides a flexible environment that allows the system to be tailored to the needs of each law enforcement organisation. For example, the document workflow can be changed to suit individual work practices, and additional user definable fields are included to allow for specific local requirements.

A further refinement allows the organisation to track and manage the resources and costs involved in an investigation.

The main aims of HOLMES 2 may be summarised as:

1. to collect and manage vast amounts of information and intelligence data
2. to process and prioritise information to assist in the identification of suitable lines of enquiry
3. to manage the allocation and progress of tasks assigned to investigating officers
4. to analyse information through graphical representation
5. to produce documentation suitable for presentation in court

Features

HOLMES 2 incorporates the following features:

Document Management enables the flow of all documents to be monitored and controlled throughout the investigation. Senior investigating officers can view the state of each document and quickly identify any bottlenecks in the process.

Workflow Management allows law enforcement organisations to tailor HOLMES 2 to suit their individual work practices.

Graphical Indexing provides the facility to visualise the indexing of document data by the automatic generation of a link chart. The user can index directly from a typed copy of the document thus eliminating the need to re-key the data.

Record Management enables all structured data to be quickly retrieved for research and analysis. Powerful search facilities include exact matching, truncated matching, synonym matching, boolean and wild card searches.

Task Management facilities allow the user to allocate actions to investigating officers and monitor the progress of those actions. Actions can be prioritised and the priority level of an action can be modified at any time. HOLMES 2 provides the facility to view a graphical representation of outstanding actions and officer workload to assist in the assessment of work outstanding, staffing levels and bottlenecks in the process.

Exhibit Management provides a facility to manage and track the movement of all crime-related property throughout the investigation. A full movement history is maintained for each exhibit. Whenever an exhibit is taken from its storage place, the details of the removal are recorded. This maintains an audit trail that can be presented to anyone questioning the integrity of the exhibit.

Research and Analysis combines the powerful facilities of the i2 Analysts Notebook and the Dynamic Reasoning Engine from Autonomy Ltd to produce sequence of events charts and association (link) charts. A database comparison function helps to identify potential links with similar investigations.

Disclosure Management provides a facility to manage the disclosure of unused material in an investigation. It allows the Disclosure Officer to perform primary and secondary disclosure to assess the material and produce the relevant schedules for the Crown Prosecution Service.

Court Preparation facilities allow all material required for court, including all documents, to be prepared efficiently and professionally. Lists of exhibits can be created and identified for court. The graphical presentation allows the system to be used in court to show how complex information flows are linked.

Overview Documents

For further information, click on the .PDF document symbol for the file you would like to open. Note that you must have Adobe Acrobat Reader to be able to view these files. This reader is available free at www.adobe.com, if required.

	Function Overview of Incident Room
	Major Crime Investigation Suite