Meeting Australian Government Investigations Standards with SAS Investigation Management System
The Australian Government Investigations Standards (AGIS) came into effect on 31 October 2022, replacing the 2011 standards to reflect significant changes in the operating environment. The standards apply not only to Australian Government entities conducting administrative, civil, or criminal investigations, but also to private organizations delivering investigation‑related services to government.
The AGIS states that agencies should have an electronic investigation management system (EIMS) to record, collate and manage investigations from report of allegation/information through to a Brief of Action (BoE) or other outcome actions (disruption), and finalization (referral, closure, or prosecution). SAS Investigation Management System is designed to support investigators in managing complexity at scale: from planning and evidence handling to ongoing review and reporting.
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An investigation is not a linear process. These steps offer an exponential number of possible paths to follow as you navigate the investigation from open to close. Each step uses data objects in the system to record and track the investigative information. Steps can be assessed and reworked and can even occur simultaneously with other steps. Let’s discuss these components as they are laid out in this flow chart.
- First, we have Planning. The Initiation Record consisting of case details that kick off the investigation. The Involved Resources record enables you to keep track of anyone involved in the investigation. The Investigation Plan is modular and flexible to fit the complexity of your investigation, as needed.
- Next, we have Investigative Activity, which can include an Avenue of Inquiry for reaching out to other groups or departments for additional information, as well as an Actions and Outcome to record the measures taken during the investigation and their specific outcomes.
- While performing investigative activities you may acquire material, whether digital or physical, that needs to be lodged in the system.
- If needed, Procedural Documents can be added using the Document Library and Embedded Forms. They can be templated (such as Word documents or PDF) or integrated forms with fields to complete. They are integrated with the document service.
- Occurrence Log Entries are created to capture information not suitable for describing in an Investigation Action. The Occurrences are Decisions, which are conclusions or resolutions, and Situation Reports, which is a situation status. As you see in the flow, either occurrence can be created from any component used in our investigation life cycle.
- Materials lodged during the investigative activity leads to the Evaluation section where Review Records are used to track each investigator’s review of the material and Conduct Events containing Entities of Interest are used to record the criminology of the crime.
- Entities of Interest are associated through events and are based on the POLE Model: People, Locations and Objects which are related to Events. Global entities of interest include person, location, phone, vehicles, organizations, crime groups, financial accounts, electronics, weapons, identity documents, currency, etc.
- For Outcomes, the Brief and Evidence is an .xls with an evidence pack that links to each line of evidence. Based on the outcome, the investigation can be reworked or closed.
To learn more about SAS Investigation Management System with SAS Law enforcement Intelligence see SAS Law Enforcement Intelligence Software | SAS.
To read more about the Australian Government Investigations Standard, click here.
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