Time for NCIS
The National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) was founded on June 19, 1947 with the enactment of Republic Act No. 157. The NBI was patterned after the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), which started as a division of the US Department of Justice. To date, the NBI is a line agency of the Department of Justice (DoJ) and its head is a presidential appointee.
Under RA 157, the NBI can investigate crimes. It also acts as a “national clearing house of criminal and other information for the benefit and use of all prosecuting and law enforcement entities of the Philippines; identification records of identifying marks, characteristics, and ownership or possession of all firearms as well as of test bullets fired therefrom.”
As the agency moves towards its 70th year, I hope it can initiate a program on developing an honest- togoodness National Criminal Information System (NCIS) that correctly, completely, and efficiently collates all criminal information detailing any and all charges, investigations, convictions, and dismissals, etc. — down to the level of police blotters.
The NBI has gone a long way in the last 70 years. It has even improved the clearance system to now allow online renewals, for free. Technology has allowed it to move services and functions towards 21st century status. However, it appears to maintain a standalone system separate and distinct from the national police service.
This, to me, requires intervention. The NCIS should be a single system for all investigative agencies, and its information should be accessible to a broader range of investigators. Anyway, the NBI is civilian in character, and national in scope, just like the Philippine National Police ( PNP). And both are at bureau level under specific departments.
To build the infrastructure for a combined system, and to connect the NBI and PNP databases, will obviously take a lot of time and resources. But, segments of the project can be proposed for funding with international aid. Other parts can be funded by what is presently collected as fees for NBI and police clearances. Other segments can be funded through the national budget.
In the US, the FBI maintains the National Crime Information Center (NCIC) in Clarksburg, West Virginia. NCIC is a “computerized index of criminal justice information ( i. e. criminal record history information, fugitives, stolen properties, missing persons)” that is made available to federal, state, and local law enforcement and other criminal justice agencies.
ccording to the NCIC Web site, “the purpose for maintaining the NCIC system is to provide a computerized database for ready access by a criminal justice agency making an inquiry and for prompt disclosure of information in the system from other criminal justice agencies about crimes and criminals.”
“This information assists authorized agencies in criminal justice and related law enforcement objectives, such as apprehending fugitives, locating missing persons, locating and returning stolen property, as well as in the protection of the law enforcement officers encountering the individuals described in the system.”
FBI is the agency “authorized to acquire, collect, classify and preserve identification, criminal identification, crime, and other records and to exchange such information with authorized entities.” Data going to the NCIC come from the FBI; federal, state, and local agencies; foreign criminal justice agencies; and, authorized courts.
The point here is that under RA 157, the NBI is already designated as the “national clearing house of criminal and other information for the benefit and use of all prosecuting and law enforcement entities of the Philippines.” But, at this point, this has not happened. Why are people still made to secure separate “clearances” from the NBI and PNP?
I believe the initiative to develop a true and real national clearinghouse for criminal information can go a long way in addressing criminality, as what the Duterte Administration intends. I consider a well- established, working, and updated NCIS as a necessary component of an effective criminal justice system.
Information is now a tool more powerful than a firearm, and cyberspace has become a new battleground. Other than maintaining a complete and updated database, an NCIS with knowledge-management capabilities can provide a more effective and efficient front against criminality, and even transnational crimes.
Other than the US NCIC, I think we should also look into the ECRIS or the European Criminal Records Information System, which was established in April 2012 “to create an efficient exchange of information on criminal convictions between [EU] Member States.”
According to available information, the ECRIS establishes an “electronic interconnection of criminal records databases to ensure that information on convictions is exchanged between [ EU] Member States in a uniform, speedy, and easily computer- transferable way. The system provides judges and prosecutors with easy access to comprehensive information on the criminal history of persons concerned, no matter in which [ EU] Member States that person has been convicted in the past.”
ECRIS was reportedly put together given the realization that “national courts frequently pass sentences on the sole basis of past convictions featuring in their national register, without any knowledge of convictions in other [EU] Member States. Consequently, criminals were often able to escape their criminal past simply by moving to another [ EU] Member State.”
In the case of the ECRIS, however, the system is “decentralized” and criminal records data are stored solely in national databases and exchanged electronically between the central authorities of the EU Member States upon request. In January 2016, ECRIS also started looking into listing as well the convictions in EU states even of “third-country nationals.”
A third-country national refers to “individuals who are in transit and/ or applying for visas in countries that are not their country of origin ( i. e. country of transit), in order to go to destination countries that is likewise not their country of origin.”
A comprehensive study of the US NCIC and the EU NECRIS will help us make a more informed decision on how to go about improving our own criminal information system here in the Philippines. The objective is to create and maintain a secure computerized data base that is readily accessible by any criminal justice agency.
We are now at 100 million people. Maintaining a database will not be that easy, despite technology. But, improvements in existing systems are now urgently necessary. The speed by which credible, reliable, proper, correct, and comprehensive information can be easily disseminated or accessed by law enforcers can mean life and death in many situations.