Digital Judge Assistants for the Baden-Württemberg Judiciary
The Baden-Württemberg judiciary is launching an innovative project aimed at reducing the workload of judges in social courts by using AI to streamline the organization of court files.
This initiative is a collaboration between the Baden-Württemberg Ministry of Justice and Migration, Materna, Infora, and GovTech Campus Deutschland. The research project, known as AKIRA (General AI Judge Assistance), explores the potential of AI—specifically, a large language model (LLM)—to structure extensive court files. The project’s goal is to lay the groundwork for the development of a comprehensive AI-based judge assistant that will significantly ease the burden on judges across all courts.
Thousands of Pages of Court Files
In social courts, case files and documents from prior administrative proceedings often span hundreds or even thousands of pages. Judges must be familiar with the entire content of these files to make informed rulings. Manually processing the facts and understanding the dispute is a time-consuming task. The vision of AKIRA is to simplify and accelerate this process with the help of AI, allowing judges to manage the growing caseload more efficiently without additional staff. This would enable judges to focus on more critical procedural tasks, such as taking evidence and addressing legal issues or engaging in discussions with the parties involved.
Practitioners from the Social Court in Ulm are contributing their expertise to the project. In addition, the project is testing Aleph Alpha’s generative AI technology, PhariaAI.
“The requirements are challenging in several respects. The facts of the cases and legal issues vary widely, and the structure of incoming documents often differs significantly due to the different authorities involved in each legal domain. Beyond the technical aspects, the project offers valuable insights into systematically addressing complex AI use cases within the justice system,” explains Tobias Pelster, project manager at Materna.
AI Assistants for All Courts
“Our aim is to go beyond the current project and establish the foundation for easing the burden on judges dealing with complex proceedings on a daily basis. The long-term vision is to develop AKIRA into an AI assistant that can be used in all courts,” says Elmar Steinbacher, Ministerial Director at the Baden-Württemberg Ministry of Justice and Migration.
