SAIC to FBI: Use our system

Science Applications International Corp. is urging the FBI to fully deploy the Virtual Case File case management system the San Diego company provided in a pilot version.

The troubled VCF project has been the subject of several critical reports and investigations by the Government Accountability Office, the Justice Department Inspector General's Office, the National Science Foundation and Congress.

"We certainly believe they could deploy VCF," said Mark Hughes, president of SAIC's system and network solutions group. Scuttling VCF, a move the FBI is considering upon recommendations from the Justice IG, would delay the bureau's adoption of modern case-management software by three years or more, he said.

The FBI has paid SAIC $113 million for VCF so far, Hughes said. The bureau said it budgeted $170 million for the case-management system.

Hughes rejected conclusions of Aerospace Corp.'s December report, prepared for the FBI, that VCF should be abandoned. The Justice IG also has said that VCF is inadequate and should be abandoned in favor of a new system, the Federal Investigative Case Management System.

Hughes elaborated on previous statements by SAIC executives that the bureau's shifting requirements and frequent management changes during the project hindered the effort. But SAIC bears some responsibility for the project's problems, he said. "We should have communicated with the FBI's senior levels more aggressively than we did," he said.