Justice delayed, inmates lost in system because of Dallas County software rollout

Before Dallas County implemented a new criminal case software system, Smith Noudaranouvong’s arrests for minor property theft, resisting arrest and possessing less than a gram of meth had resulted in jail stays of around six months or less.

After the new system was installed in May 2023, he spent nine months in jail on new charges before he ever appeared in court because no one in the court system knew he was there, defense attorney Alison Grinter Allen said. Noudaranouvong was arrested in April that year on misdemeanor charges of stealing a manhole cover and a water meter cover while carrying less than a gram of meth.

“I normally get put in a courtroom within three to four months,” he said in an interview with The Dallas Morning News while in the county jail. “This time it’s taken nine months.”

Grinter Allen said Noudaranouvong is one of many lost in the system after the software implementation went wrong.

“If I could have just a clipboard and talk to them — I would take four weeks off and audit that jail because there are hundreds of people in there who are lost,” Grinter Allen said.

Attorneys say their clients and Dallas County residents are suffering because of the bungled rollout of the software that tracks criminal cases. The system holds filings on all types of cases — everything from trespassing, theft and drug possession to DUI, aggravated robberies, assault or murder.

The unreliable system means lawyers often can’t figure out what their clients are charged with.

Dallas County switched to the new system against the advice of its IT department and with little staff training or IT involvement, causing months of chaos, according to a dozen attorneys, judges, defendants and prosecutors who talked to The News.

People have been stuck in jail past their release dates, others have been released without going to court, and criminal justice staffers have been scrambling to keep the courts running, they said.

The county spent $11.3 million on the software and its installation, and in January, commissioners approved nearly $1.5 million to work through ongoing problems. In 2020, the software was bought with little input from the county’s information technology department, and county commissioners acted against IT’s recommendations, according to a recent independent report.

The result is a system lawyers can’t navigate and staffers can’t use efficiently, according to county officials, attorneys and criminal justice staff. Among the major problems:

• There are an unquantifiable number of people who have been released from the Dallas County jail days, weeks and months later than they would have been before the software was installed, people throughout the criminal justice system say.
• It can take multiple days for the system to assign a case number, which limits lawyers’ ability to work with their clients.
• Paperwork can be difficult to file because the software doesn’t consistently say which judge has a case.
• Cases are frozen in place until courts and prosecutors are notified through the system that a case exists.

The Dallas County district attorney’s office has struggled with implementation, too. Prosecutors lack sufficient access, attorneys are incorrectly listed on filings, and open cases sometimes show up as “inactive” or “closed,” District Attorney John Creuzot said.

The initial contract, signed in August 2020, stipulated that the software be implemented in 2022, but the project steering committee — which consisted of County Clerk John Warren, District Clerk Felicia Pitre and various judiciary, law enforcement, county administration and IT staff — delayed its launch to May 2023.

As the software implementation approached in early 2023, the IT department urged commissioners to wait, saying more testing was needed before the software, called Odyssey, was ready. Commissioners pushed ahead. In May, the county clerk’s office froze the old database and turned the new system online.

“That is part of our responsibility to be part of the process, but in this case with technology, the committees failed to listen,” Commissioner Elba Garcia said about the commissioners’ decision.

By fall 2023, problems emerged and a consulting firm confirmed the IT department’s fears in a scathing December report.

“Lack of a clear governance structure has resulted in decisions being made or influenced without full understanding of the impact of those decisions, leading to increased costs and, in some cases, delayed or failed projects,” the report said.

For inmates, the costs are not monetary. Noudaranouvong is demoralized. He was arrested in April 2023 but he didn’t hear from anyone once the new criminal case software was implemented a month later. Noudaranouvong said he wrote letters to the courts, but no one responded.

Nourdaranouvong has been charged 19 times in Dallas County since 2014, largely for drug possession, evading or resisting arrest and related charges, according to court records. He said he’s never experienced such delays in the court system.

One of his friends recommended he contact Grinter Allen. Noudaranouvong wrote a letter to Grinter Allen’s home address, pleading for help.

“I’ve felt miserable, but I’ve gotta get used to it. There’s nothing I can do,” he told The News while in jail in February. “There’s some people that have already left and they’ve come back while I’ve been in here.”

Attorney Edwin “Bubba” King is fed up, too. As are many of his colleagues who are finding the system impossible to navigate.

After 47 years practicing law in Dallas County, King is closing shop and taking his business to Collin County. The new computer system he and hundreds of lawyers have to use to help their clients is a “dumpster fire,” he said.

“It takes forever to get anything done,” he said. “I’ve just given up.”

Some are optimistic the system will be more functional soon. “We are rounding a corner, and this issue should be fixed soon,” Commissioner Andrew Sommerman said in January.

The ongoing costs are difficult to quantify because staff time spent resolving issues with the software results in lost productivity that’s impossible to track. However, it’s clear Dallas County has spent a significant amount to resolve the integration issues, train court staff and increase pay for clerks.

“It’s just another example of how Dallas County drops the ball by not fully understanding and mapping out a process and then making sure to have all the resources necessary to implement what has to happen to make a process fully whole,” former county commissioner and current state District Judge J.J. Koch said.

The full effect of the transition on defendants also has been difficult to calculate: Case resolution data from May to July was not recorded as required by Texas law because of difficulties with the new system.

Waiting for justice

From the moment Mike Howard is hired to be someone’s defense attorney, it is a nightmare to navigate the case within the computer system.

“The first hurdle is just finding out what the case is and what level it is,” Howard said.

The old system would assign a case number and list the charges within hours of an arrest. Now the process can take a day or two, he said.

The old system also let Howard file paperwork to prosecutors and courts confirming he is representing a defendant. The new software doesn’t always say which judge is on the case and the electronic filing system often is down, Howard said.

His clients’ cases are at a standstill until the courts and prosecutors are notified, he said. There are no hearings, no communication.

Grinter Allen said if someone doesn’t have a court date, it’s nearly impossible to know they are in jail and waiting.

Some people have been released from jail before charges were filed because the state’s 90-day indictment deadline expired. Jail Population Manager LaShonda Jefferson told officials in the August Jail Population meeting that in a single week she had forwarded 25 such instances for review to prosecutors and attorneys.

“If something’s not on the calendar, it’s not going to be thought about — it’s forgotten,” Grinter Allen said.

Howard has lost clients because their case is not moving forward quickly enough or there has been a lack of faith because many of his answers are, “I don’t know,” he said.

“You can only tell the client so many times, ‘Well, there’s this new computer system and it’s a mess,’ before they think that you’re just making an excuse when that is actually the reality,” he said.

He called the system a “crapshoot.”

Lawyers’ problems are coupled with logistical challenges: The system continually kicks users out for inactivity, forcing people to log back in; and sometimes people can’t log in at all.

The software’s public-facing system also is plagued with problems: Cases post-May 2023 often don’t show up until an indictment is filed. The Supreme Court has ruled consistently that family members, media and the public have a First Amendment right to access judicial records in criminal cases. This information was readily available with the previous system.

Creuzot said he and his staff have been frustrated by the system. He said his prosecutors don’t have the level of access they need. Sometimes cases will be visible, but the wrong attorney or judgment is listed. Other times, open cases are deemed “inactive,” “closed” or vice versa.

“We don’t have the access that will allow us to go in and take a full look at what has been filed,” he said. “I am at a loss for why anybody said this is ready to go.”

When the commissioners’ IT committee recommended Tyler Technologies’ software Odyssey to be implemented for criminal courts, it was a 4-1 decision, with Commissioner Theresa Daniel voting against.

She wanted to continue with the decadeslong dream a handful of North Texas counties had of building a case management system, TechShare, that they could operate as a group of governments rather than using third-party software. Other commissioners have told The News they were tired of waiting for TechShare to pan out after devoting millions to a project with a continuously delayed start date.

Dallas County had success implementing Odyssey in its civil courts, so leaders felt Odyssey was a natural choice after a bidding process.

But the rush to implement Odyssey left countless people incarcerated longer than they should have been, officials said.

County Clerk John Warren is the custodian of county records and elected official who led the change to Odyssey. When asked why he did not run the previous system in parallel to the new software, Warren said that would have doubled the work for his staff because they would have had to enter data in two systems. He said that was not a feasible solution.

One person who sat in jail two months beyond his expected release date has filed a lawsuit. Creuzot said he would not comment on jail wait times because of pending litigation, but called the new software “cumbersome” for criminal cases. The case has since been settled out of court, requiring Dallas County to pay the former inmate $100,000.

Delays pile up even after judges make decisions

Attorneys say once a judge has made a decision, there is further delay.

When an individual’s release is approved, there is a stall getting paperwork to the jail and moving inmates out of custody.

“There are plenty of instances where people are there two or more weeks waiting on release,” Koch said.

Howard said it’s impossible to know when inmates will be released. A judge granted a personal recognizance bond to one of his clients in jail on a Thursday. His client was stuck in jail for another week because clerks had not processed the bond yet.

“The order was sitting in a tray for the clerks to process under dozens of other documents,” Howard said. “So had I not stayed on top of it, he probably would have stayed in days or maybe even a week more.”

Paperwork has been piling up in clerks’ baskets due to training for the new system and a high vacancy rate among clerks, attorneys say. Gartner, the IT consulting firm, found Dallas County has offered little training for those who use the software daily.

From mid-June to the end of October last year, district clerk criminal offices were closed Fridays. Pitre, the district clerk, oversees court clerks. She said Oct. 24 that clerk windows were closed while staff participated in training on the new case management system.

It was a challenge to train clerks because the courts remained open during the software migration while staff learned how to use the new system, Pitre said.

Staffing the courts with enough clerks has been an ongoing issue. County records said as of Jan. 22 there were 66 vacant positions, or 25.5% of the 191 total staff of clerks.

Many of Pitre’s clerks have opted to take clerical roles elsewhere in the county where the pay is higher. In January, commissioners approved salary increases for her clerks, increasing the lowest hourly pay to $18.24 from $15.59 for full-time clerks.

The sheriff’s department has also contributed to the delays, according to judges, Sommerman and attorneys.

“They’re not processing things fast enough,” Koch said of the sheriff’s department. “It’s kind of a black box on what’s going on at the sheriff’s office, and honestly, I’ve never really gotten fully the same answer twice.”

Grinter Allen said she has sent several emails and made calls to the sheriff’s department about processing paperwork for releases and transfers but has not heard back.

“There’s a lack of staffing and a lack of accountability,” Grinter Allen said.

The Dallas County Sheriff’s Department provided a statement that said it works in collaboration with the other criminal justice partners.

“We all have a common goal, and that is to make sure that all releases are legal and according to court order,” the statement said. “As such, all of us share some role in making sure that releases are not improperly delayed. When/If a delay occurs, we, along with our partners review and evaluate the individual incident for any areas of improvement necessary.”

Grinter Allen took Noudaranouvong on as a client in early February. Once she brought him to a courtroom and a judge ruled that he had already served his time for the alleged crimes, he still waited two weeks in jail after the judge’s ruling to be released.

How did Dallas County let this happen?

Other counties’ criminal courts don’t have the same problems as Dallas, even when using the same technology.

Koch, who was a county commissioner when the Tyler Technology contract was signed, said he did not expect the implementation to go this way, and he stands by the technology.

As a judge, rather than use the program to run reports on the jail population and status of cases like criminal justice staff and prosecutors do, Koch relies on Odyssey to review cases and look at a defendant’s criminal history, as well as scheduling.

“I use it every day, and there’s nothing wrong with the tool but it’s a matter of using the tool properly and understanding what it does and what it doesn’t do,” he said.

Howard said counties like Collin, Kaufman, and Denton are able to send texts and emails to attorneys and their clients using the same system as Dallas.

“It’s just a tremendous amount of wasted time and effort when every other county seems to be able to easily automatically notify the attorney and the defendant when their court settings are,” Howard said.

Attorneys point to a lack of training and transparency, and a new report by the Gartner consulting firm lays much of the blame on the Dallas County Commissioners Court and its IT committee.

Elected officials meddle too much in information technology, stripping the IT department from making important software decisions, the consulting firm found.

Gartner told commissioners in December that often Dallas’ IT staff believe their voice is “being squashed down” and they aren’t comfortable going to elected officials with their concerns.

“The problem with that is, when you have no power to make decisions, or limited power, in what software is purchased … IT is always playing catch up,” Alexandra Dmytriw, a Gartner senior director, told commissioners.

The county hired an interim IT director in December to fill a position that had been vacant since July. The former IT director, Melissa Kraft, left due to mounting tension with commissioners when some blamed her for bungled software migrations of two integral systems — criminal courts and payroll — paralyzing the county.

The payroll system has been crippled since April, delaying payments to tens of thousands of vendors and employees by months and leaving some unpaid. The county has allocated more than $15 million to resolve the issue. County officials say that all those affected have since been paid.

Before her departure, Kraft told commissioners and the committee that oversees IT changes in public meetings that she did not believe the county was ready to move forward with the new criminal case management system rollout in May.

Sommerman, who joined the court last January after it approved the software transition, said the report spotlighted a “symphony of problems.”

“I feel their frustration, and I couldn’t agree more,” he said. “The Odyssey integration was a complete disaster.”

Commissioner John Wiley Price said he is being realistic about the progress: “That’s four decades with one system, and change is difficult.”

County Judge Clay Lewis Jenkins and Commissioner Daniel, who also chairs the IT Executive Governance Committee, did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

The lack of testing has been Sommerman’s biggest takeaway from the report. The county should have slowly moved from one software project to the other, rather than completely shutting the old system down in May.

“It should have been done as follows: We take 10% of cases that we have, we keep 90% in the old system,” he said. “You would have realized quickly, ‘Oh dear God, there is no proper integration.’”

Koch told The News that courts are still struggling with the implementation, but that speaks to larger systemic concerns at the county.

“It’s a symptom of the same disease of very poor management,” he said. “There’s just death by a thousand cuts. There’s pretty major problems in a couple of places.”

Attorneys are not optimistic about improvements anytime soon.

“Everybody has resigned themselves to not expecting this to get any better,” Howard said. “This is just another example of Dallas County being Dallas County.”

Courts reporter Maggie Prosser contributed to this story.

Josephine Peterson is the former Dallas County government reporter for the Dallas Morning News.