Davis County approves emergency Axon contract after evidence‑portal failure

Davis County commissioners voted May 5 to approve an emergency contract with Axon (evidence.com) to restore and manage the county’s electronic evidence portal after the county’s previous vendor was sold and stopped providing reliable service.

County Attorney Troy Rollins told the commission the vendor transition left the county with a critical backlog of evidence and “judges frustrated” and said the county’s evidence system was “on life support.” Rollins said the breakdown threatened timely discovery and could have led to dismissed cases if the county could not deliver files to defense counsel.

Rollins said staff vetted Axon as a widely used national vendor and that the contract was brought forward quickly to avoid legal and operational harm. “We pivoted quickly to a national leader in this area,” Rollins said, adding staff had worked long hours to provide discovery manually for the most critical cases while a solution was arranged.

Mike Kendall of the civil division summarized procurement details: the county used a NASPO cooperative arrangement (the state of Oklahoma served as lead procuring state and Utah participated) to speed the procurement. Kendall said the proposed Axon agreement is a five‑year contract with negotiated language allowing termination for non‑appropriation and an option to extend up to five additional years at the year‑one cost. He also listed features county staff expect to use, including large‑scale storage capacity and tools for transcription, translation, clipping and redaction.

Commissioners approved the contract by voice vote after a motion and second; the transcript records the motion passing but does not include a roll‑call tally. Rollins acknowledged the expense but told the public the emergency procurement was necessary to keep the courts and defense counsel supplied with discovery.

The commission’s approval directs staff to finalize and execute the contract. No dollar amount for the contract was listed in the meeting transcript; commissioners discussed the purchase as significant but necessary to prevent case backlogs.

What’s next: staff will complete the contract paperwork and begin integration work with county information systems to restore automated evidence ingestion and sharing with defense counsel.