44-7-126. Criminal justice data warehouse -- purpose, MCA

Montana Code Annotated 2025

TITLE 44. LAW ENFORCEMENT

CHAPTER 7. BOARD OF CRIME CONTROL

Part 1. General Provisions

Criminal Justice Data Warehouse -- Purpose

44-7-126. Criminal justice data warehouse -- purpose. (1) (a) There is a criminal justice data warehouse housed in the board of crime control. The purpose of the criminal justice data warehouse is to receive, store, secure, and maintain data and information from contributing entities to facilitate analysis to assist state and local officials to make data-informed decisions about the criminal justice system.

(b) To fulfill this purpose, the legislature intends that the criminal justice data warehouse provide a complete and integrated criminal justice database that includes information that will allow, among other topics, the analysis of:

(i) the complete criminal history of all convictions and offenses committed by each offender convicted in district court in the state;

(ii) the date and term of each sentence and whether an offender was in custody or on probation at the time of the offense;

(iii) the length of time between a prior conviction and a successive crime for which an offender is convicted and sentenced;

(iv) the length of time between release from custody, probation, or parole to an arrest for a new offense;

(v) programming an offender received while in custody of the department of corrections and which entity provided the programming;

(vi) for offenders who committed offenses that involved a dangerous drug as defined in 50-32-101, which dangerous drug was involved in the offense; and

(vii) whether an offender convicted of a crime in district court was on pretrial release at the time of the successive offense.

(2) (a) An agency and the court administrator shall contribute data and information to the criminal justice data warehouse on request by the board. A local government entity, a nongovernment entity, a tribal government, or a federal government entity may submit data and information to the criminal justice data warehouse.

(b) A contributing entity retains ownership of the data it contributes to the criminal justice data warehouse.

(3) As the administering agency of the criminal justice data warehouse, the board shall:

(a) adopt a memorandum of understanding with the department of administration for the provision of any technical assistance or services required to establish and maintain the criminal justice data warehouse;

(b) work in conjunction with the department of administration to assure the confidentiality of all records and data collected in the criminal justice data warehouse and to assure compliance with the applicable state and federal laws governing the privacy of records, data, and personally identifiable information;

(c) consult and collaborate with the council to prioritize data to request from contributing entities, data requests, and research using data from the criminal justice data warehouse;

(d) (i) identify and seek federal grant money that may be used for the purposes of establishing and maintaining the criminal justice data warehouse and achieving priorities established in law;

(ii) prioritize distribution of funds received pursuant to subsection (3)(d)(i) to contributing entities;

(e) adopt a memorandum of understanding with each contributing entity. The memorandum of understanding must describe the data and information being submitted and the schedule on which the data will be submitted and identify the confidentiality of the information and any conditions or restrictions on the use of the data or information; and

(f) grant the legislative fiscal analyst and the legislative services division director direct access to the criminal justice data warehouse in a manner that complies with the regulations of the respective federal programs.

(4) The board may:

(a) require an entity that contributes data or information to deliver the data or information in a certain format and on schedules established for the criminal justice data warehouse;

(b) collaborate with the council and contributing entities to establish policies to address the creation of reports generated through the query of records and data in the criminal justice data warehouse. A nongovernment entity may only collaborate with respect to the data or information contributed by that nongovernment entity; and

(c) adopt a standard memorandum of understanding that state and local criminal justice entities and the courts may use to govern data-sharing agreements.

History: En. Sec. 2, Ch. 641, L. 2023; amd. Sec. 2, Ch. 669, L. 2025.