State police say CJIS audit prompted tweak to background-check statute; committee likely to accept amendment

Senate Bill 568, a bill about background-check procedures tied to agency hiring and commissioner designees, drew testimony from Victor Muzzy, a captain who oversees the Justice Information Bureau at the state police.

Muzzy told the committee that a recent FBI Criminal Justice Information Services (CJIS) audit found the state needed clearer statutory language about who may receive criminal-conviction information. Under past practice, hiring managers and division directors had sometimes seen full criminal-history results. To align practice with the FBI CJIS guidance and avoid records being routed to an outside third party, Muzzy proposed language that would direct conviction information to "the commissioner or to a department of safety employee as designated by the commissioner who is authorized to receive criminal conviction information." He said the language keeps results within the agency while allowing internal flexibility and satisfies current FBI expectations so long as the records are not sent outside the agency.

Committee action: Senators asked whether the proposed text would preclude use of AI or "software designees." Muzzy clarified the draft explicitly anticipates a human department employee and stressed the need to keep disclosure inside the agency; the committee requested that Muzzy provide the amendment in writing for use as a committee amendment and signaled it may accept the change during executive action.

Outcome: No final bill vote was recorded in the public hearing; the committee collected the written amendment language and discussed adopting it as a committee amendment.