Arizona Criminal Record Expungements

Arizona, however, abides by the rules of the FCRA. This means background checks in the state won’t go back further than the seven previous years. In Maricopa County, a criminal background check will look back over your whole life, providing information relating to convictions and deferred judgments.

If you have been convicted of a misdemeanor or felony crime and have completed your sentence (probation or prison), then you may be qualified to have your Arizona conviction set aside. In Arizona, the closest process to expungement is ARS 13-905, which deals with setting aside a conviction.

• A crime involving the infliction of serious physical injury.
• A crime involving the use or exhibition of a deadly weapon.
• A crime that was motivated by sexual desires.
• Any crime where the victim was younger than 15 years old.

In order to clear your record in Arizona, you may petition the court to enter on your record that you have been cleared of all charges. If successful, the judge will order all law enforcement agencies and courts to cease from distributing your arrest record to anyone. The arrest will be treated as if it never occurred.

Arizona does not have an expungement law, but you may be able to have a felony or misdemeanor conviction set aside. A set aside won’t remove the charge or conviction from your criminal record.

If you’ve been convicted of two or more felonies and/or sentenced to prison, you have to wait two years before applying for a judgment to set aside your conviction, to restore your gun rights and other civil rights.

A Set Aside is not the same as an expungement: Arizona has no expungement laws. You interactions with the court system can be found on-line. Anyone searching your history will still see the conviction but also the designation of Set Aside.

What is the difference between expungement and having a criminal conviction dismissed? An expungement proceeding basically results in a court order sealing all records of a criminal conviction. When a court sets aside a conviction it dismisses the conviction, the penalties are dismissed and disabilities are vacated.

Convictions for non-specified offences will be eligible for filtering after 5.5 years for under 18s and 11 years for those aged 18 and over. As with convictions, multiple cautions can be filtered, as long as the offences in question are eligible for filtering and the relevant period of time has elapsed for each one.

A standard DBS check is suitable for certain roles, such as a security guard. The certificate will contain details of both spent and unspent convictions, cautions, reprimands and warnings that are held on the Police National Computer, which are not subject to filtering.

A DBS check only shows your criminal record. In other situations, your employer might ask for a credit check. This is common practice for the banking and finance industry. To put it bluntly, they don’t want someone with extensive debt being tempted by having access to cash.