Driven by Commitment to Using Data to Make and Track Decisions, Three Great Lakes Prosecutor’s Offices join the Prosecutorial Data Collaborative
By Jennifer Ferone, Deputy Research Director
Each local prosecutor’s office across the country serves different populations, has different needs, and has different resources. But all need data-driven methods to make fair, efficient community safety decisions. Here’s how we’re supporting prosecutors in Lake County, Illinois, Hennepin County, Minnesota, and the City of Toledo, Ohio in doing so.
From City Prosecutors to State’s Attorneys to District Attorneys, each local prosecutor’s office across the country is shaped by the community they serve. Even within the same region, offices can serve everything from small suburban counties to big metropolitan cities, each with different socioeconomic factors, available resources, and other unique circumstances. That means their responsibilities and priorities vary widely, as do the data and infrastructural tools they have to address them.
But two things remain constant. The first is that prosecutors are the de facto gatekeepers to the criminal legal system; they have a considerable amount of discretion when it comes to who is charged, how they move through the system, and what the outcome is. The second is that to truly work toward safety, efficiency, and fairness, prosecutors need policies and practices grounded in data and evaluation.
To truly work toward safety, efficiency, and fairness, prosecutors need policies and practices grounded in data and evaluation.
Doing so requires a tailored, data-driven plan. Launched in early 2025, CUNY ISLG’s Prosecutorial Data Collaborative works with prosecutors to design and implement that plan. A partnership with the Prosecutorial Performance Indicators (PPIs) team, Collaborative staff work with local prosecutor’s offices to build the infrastructure and culture necessary to effectively use data in their offices, courtrooms, and communities. And as of summer 2025, the Collaborative is now powering a regional network of Great Lakes prosecutor’s offices, who can work alongside each other and ISLG to troubleshoot, share best practices, and more.
While each project varies, all Collaborative sites begin with an in-depth data review to assess the types of questions each office needs to regularly answer—particularly those tied to leadership priorities—and their capacity to do so with existing data, systems, and processes. Through interviews with leadership and staff, document reviews, and data system walkthroughs, CUNY ISLG identifies each office's challenges, strengths, and gaps. These findings inform strategies for using data to improve policies, practices, and outcomes for the communities they serve.
With this foundation in place, CUNY ISLG partners with the PPI team to implement a tailored data transparency plan. This includes developing a dashboard that tracks performance measures related to efficiency, accountability, and safety. In addition to surface-level metrics, deeper analytics are conducted to explore key factors driving trends in office priority areas. These insights help inform potential policy, practice, and operational changes. Offices also have the opportunity to:
Collaborate with a local research or academic partner for ongoing data and analytical support and
Join a learning community of fellow Collaborative prosecutors to share insights and strategies.
Read more about how we do it here.
As of summer 2025, three new sites in the Midwest joined the Collaborative. Learn more about their objectives and how we’re empowering them to work with data to get there.
City of Toledo Prosecutor’s Office in Ohio
City Attorney: Rebecca Facey
Geographic Area: Small city
Legal Jurisdiction: Misdemeanor cases only
Focus Area: Domestic violence charging and processing unit
Office Size: 15
Total Misdemeanor Cases: ~12,000 per year
Of the Great Lakes partners, CUNY ISLG began working with the City of Toledo Prosecutor’s Office first, completing our data review in late summer 2025. This effort included interviews with a majority of staff at the office, in addition to a regular series of meetings with leadership to establish key priorities for our assistance, which centered domestic violence charging and processing.
A new domestic violence unit was established in 2023, and the Office is interested in how the new approach has streamlined operations for these types of charges, as well as understanding the outcomes. In addition, given their small size, the office is operating with a very limited capacity for data and analytics, though they are anticipating the implementation of a new case management system over the next several months.
CUNY ISLG will draw on the findings from the data review to establish with the office a strategic plan to be carried out over the next year that will include:
Providing support to enhance the office’s data culture and analytic capacity (this may include support transitioning to the new case management system);
Partnering with the PPI team to design and release a data dashboard tracking trends across the various stages of the case trajectory and;
Conducting an analysis that will aim to investigate whether and to what extent the charging and processing of domestic violence cases has changed after 2023 and what the outcomes have been.
Hennepin County Attorney’s Office in Minnesota
County Attorney: Mary Moriarty
Geographic Area: Large county – includes Minneapolis
Legal Jurisdiction: adult felonies and all juvenile crime
Focus Areas: Measuring impact of strategic plan efforts, including diversion, post-conviction, young adult/youth, and identifying ways to improve office efficiency, including though trial calendaring improvements
Office Size: 500
Total Cases: ~14,000 felonies in 2024
Our work with the Hennepin County Prosecutor’s Office began next. Our team is currently in the midst of the data review and beginning interview outreach, as well as conducting several data system walkthroughs.
This office presents a contrast to our work with Toledo City given its size and scope. Leadership is most interested in detailing—with data—the progress that has been made on the City Attorney’s strategic plan, established when she was elected in 2023, in addition to providing data support to diversion, young adult processes, and post-conviction integrity initiatives, among others.
Lake County State’s Attorney in Illinois
State’s Attorney: Eric Rinehart
Geographic Area: Mid-size county – immediately north of Cook County/Chicago
Legal Jurisdiction: Misdemeanors and felonies
Focus Areas: Retail theft; Crime trend analysis; County-level impact of state-wide bail policy
Office Size: ~140
Total Cases: ~9,000 cases per year
The Lake County State’s Attorney’s Office is the newest addition to the Collaborative; the project is currently getting off the ground with the administrative approvals needed to obtain data and talk to staff. A meeting with leadership held at the start of the partnership took stock of some of the key priorities for the State’s Attorney, many of which centered on the specific impacts of statewide bail legislation on Lake County, in addition to a potential spotlight on retail theft.
Join the Collaborative
CUNY ISLG will provide updates as the work progresses in each site as well as announce new sites. If you are you a state or local prosecutor and want to become a Collaborative site, contact us today for an exploratory call! The Collaborative is flexible, adaptable, and grounded in the needs and goals of partnership offices; it brings together a team of data scientists, researchers, and practitioners to support offices in building the infrastructure and culture necessary to not only effectively use data in their offices, courtrooms, and communities to support decision-making and policy, but to enable compliance with broader statutory requirements that may impact the work of prosecutors (e.g., legislative changes to data and reporting). We would love to discuss the initiative with you and what it can mean to your office.
Photo by Leo Escala on Unsplash.