In many cases, if your involvement with the criminal justice
system resulted in a misdemeanor conviction, you may be able to get that
conviction “expunged” or erased. California Penal
Code section 1203.4 provides that, in a case where you have fulfilled the
conditions of probation for the entire period of probation, or have been discharged
prior to the termination of the period of probation, and if you are not serving
any sentence for any other offense and are not on probation for any other
offense, and have no new cases pending, your record may be cleared. What
happens is this: upon preparation and filing of the appropriate petition, the
court will re-open the case, allow you to withdraw your plea of guilty or no
contest, or otherwise set aside the judgment of guilt, and then dismiss the
case. The Order “expunging” your record
will be disseminated to the appropriate criminal record keeping agencies and
with certain limited exceptions, when asked if you have ever been convicted of
a crime, you will be legally able to say, “no.”
The exceptions are if you are applying for employment with a government
entity, applying for a government issued license (like a real estate license),
or if you are applying to contract with the state lottery. Then, you would have to disclose the
conviction, but you would say that it has been expunged pursuant to law, or
pursuant to Penal Code section 1203.4.
Note that there are other remedies available if the conviction was a
felony as opposed to a misdemeanor, and there are certain offenses for which
this remedy is precluded altogether.
Depending upon which county the motion is filed in, this process may take anywhere between 30 to 90 days. When records of an arrest or conviction are expunged, a notation is made in the file that the records are off limits to all except law enforcement personnel. As such, for almost all purposes you can treat the conviction as though it never happened. Please note that this is generally how it works in California.However, the rules about who is eligible for expungement, and the effect of expungement, vary from state to state.
There are many reasons why it may be important to you to
have your record cleared. You may be
seeking employment or admission to graduate school. It may be as simple as the situation where
you and another candidate have similar credentials but you are the one with the
criminal record thereby giving another person a competitive edge. It may be as simple as a desire to clean up
the past so that the future looks even brighter. You decide the reason. Let me help with the nuts and bolts of
getting it done. It's not that expensive or time consuming, but you should have a qualified lawyer help you.
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