FY 2015 NICS Act Record Improvement Program (NARIP)

The NICS Improvement Amendments Act of 2007, Pub. L. 110-180 ("NICS Improvement Act"), was signed into law by the President on January 8, 2008. The NICS Improvement Act amends the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act of 1993 ("the Brady Act") (Pub. L. 103-159), under which the Attorney General established the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS). The Brady Act requires Federal Firearms Licensees (FFLs) to contact the NICS before transferring a firearm to an unlicensed person for information on whether the proposed transferee is prohibited from receiving or possessing a firearm under state or federal law. The NICS Improvement Act authorizes grants to be made in a manner consistent with the National Criminal History Improvement Program (NCHIP).

Under the 2015 NARIP priority areas, the North Dakota (ND) Office of Attorney’s General Division of the Bureau of Criminal Investigation (BCI) will collaborate with the North Dakota Supreme Courts (Courts) and North Dakota Criminal Justice Information Sharing (CJIS) to address felony convictions and convictions for misdemeanors involving domestic violence and stalking.

ND State’s attorneys are obligated to provide disposition information to BCI. BCI is responsible for sharing the data provided by the state’s attorneys with the FBI. The disposition data reported to BCI by the state’s attorneys is often delayed or inaccurate. Data entry of the dispositional records is currently a manual process that takes a significant amount of time and effort. Most cases are processed for reporting to BCI by state’s attorneys using North Dakota’s State’s Attorney Records System (STARS). There is already a process in place to send data from STARS to BCI. Additionally, there is a process in place for BCI to transmit dispositions to the FBI. An automated process for STARS to receive disposition information from the Courts would enable state’s attorneys to process and send data to BCI much more quickly, accurately and completely.

CA/NCF