Thursday, December 18, 2014

Can you expunge your record after completing probation for petit theft in FL? Will it appear on background check? / AVVO / Best Answer / Michael A. Haber, Esq. **ARRESTED / **MIAMIDUI

Q:     I was charged with misdemeanor - petty theft and I'm finished with probation program That is possible expunge this for my record?  I was accuse of pretty-theft and I signed up for the probation program and Next week is the last of it! I live in Miami FL and I heard that even if you expunge the charge with a lawyer it is still visible from a background check and state investigation . Is it true that can never have my record clean again? If I try to get whatever type of license can be denied? If I am in a good job interview can they find out what happened?


A:  Chosen as "Best Answer" by Asker!

Michael Adam Haber

PRO


Contributor Level 20

Best Answer
chosen by asker
Answered Sealing is available in a case where you received a withhold of adjudication, and expunction is available in a case which was dismissed, nolle pros'd, no actioned or where you were found to have been not guilty. In Florida you can only seal or expunge one eligible (non-disqualified) offense in your lifetime.

If you look at the following website you will learn everything you ever wanted to know about the sealing / expunction process:

http://www.fdle.state.fl.us/content/getdoc/c83d...

The procedure is both quite detailed and somewhat painstaking but is also far from being rocket science. You can attempt to navigate it yourself (FDLE has tried to simplify it - again I refer you to the website above) but, assuming your eligibility, any criminal defense lawyer (anywhere in Florida - this can be done remotely and does not necessarily require a local attorney, although a local attorney may or may not be less expensive) will be able to accomplish the task with greater ease and likely in a shorter time period.

That said I suspect that it doesn't much matter where you were arrested, what you were arrested for, what the final disposition was or whether or not you sealed / expunged the record. This is 2014 and we are forehead deep into the internet age, where nothing is private, sacred or truly hidden from public scrutiny.

Sadly, sealing (and expunging) only applies to certain (not even to all) government agencies and has no effect whatsoever on private (er, extortionist) enterprise, who compile and maintain arrest information and then demand that you pay them off to remove your information from their database and public access. Worse still, after you "buy back your information", then you can count on there being another private company lurking, somewhere, sometime, somehow, just waiting for you to pay them off as well. Its a seemingly never-ending vicious cycle.

For better or for worse you are probably best advised to take the wind out of the sails by admitting your past issues / indiscretions to your present (or potential) employer, lender, landlord, etcetera, rather than waiting for them to find out on their own.

I hope that I have been helpful in answering your question.
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For more than 23 years Michael A. Haber, P.A. has been providing creative, effective and zealous advocacy and counsel in cases ranging from DUI to drug trafficking and from misdemeanors to first degree murder.  

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