Expunging a misdemeanor conviction in Georgia

I am Attorney Ryan Locke, and I represent people who've been injured and people who have been unfairly convicted. 41 States allow you to restrict and seal some convictions after a period of time has passed. This is also called expungement. Today, Georgia becomes the 42nd state to allow you to do this. That's because today is the effective date of Senate Bill 288, which amended a portion of the law dealing with expungements. That portion is OCGA 35-3-37. And this is really exciting because before today there was no provision in the law that allowed you to expunge a conviction. You could use the First Offender Act to not be convicted. You could also use the conditional discharge to do the same thing. And there was a Youthful Offender Act that was passed a few years ago to let you kind of go back and use your first offender if you had never used it before, and if you had a conviction that you could have used it on, but for whatever reason, you didn't. But today is the first day in Georgia history that you're allowed to take a conviction off of your record. 

You're only allowed to use it for certain misdemeanors and certain felonies after you've been pardoned. The misdemeanors are, most misdemeanors qualify, except for sex crimes, crimes against minors, family violence crimes, DUI, and a couple other ones. But otherwise, most misdemeanors qualify for this type of expungement. Now you have to have four years after you've completed your misdemeanor sentence. That means that in a lot of situations it will be five years after your conviction, thinking that if you were convicted for a misdemeanor, you were probably placed on a year of probation, and then after that year finishes you have to wait another four years. And in those four years, you can't have any pending charges or any other convictions. So if you currently have a pending charge or if you have a conviction in that intervening time then you're not eligible for this type of expungement.

The felonies that can be expunged after they're pardoned are most felonies, too, except for the really serious ones like murder, kidnapping, rape, armed robbery, child molestation, things like that. I'll post a full list of the misdemeanors and felonies that are available for this kind of expungement on my website and I'll put a link in the comments so you can go look. It can be most misdemeanors, many pardoned felons. If you have a felony and you have not been pardoned by the Board of Pardon and Paroles, then you cannot expunge a normal felony. You first have to go and apply for a pardon. You have to have it be granted. Then you can use this process to take it off your record. So for most people, this will only be able to be used for misdemeanors. So it must have been a misdemeanor or a pardoned felony. 

 

There must've been four years after your sentence completion with no other charges. That's five years for felonies, four years for misdemeanors. And you have a lifetime maximum of two misdemeanors that you can expunge using this process. Now, if you have those things, you can file a petition with the court, and the court will receive the petition, hear arguments for why it should or should not be granted, but in most cases, we expect that the court will grant these expungements. So what happens after your conviction is expunged? Well, it's taken off your record. It's sealed on your record, except for two important exceptions. One exception is for employers who deal with vulnerable populations. So if it's an employer who serves children, like a daycare center, if it's an employer who serves the mentally ill or the elderly, if it's a nursing home or something like that, those employers will still be able to see the misdemeanor conviction even though it's been expunged. 

The other important exception is law enforcement. Law enforcement can always see all of your convictions, whether they've been expunged, first offender, conditional discharge, pardoned, whatever. Law enforcement always sees the entire list. So what should you do if you are in this situation? One, make sure it was a misdemeanor that you were convicted of and that it's a qualifying misdemeanor. Check the list on my website. Number two, make sure that enough time has passed: four years from the sentence completion. Make sure that you haven't been charged with any crimes or convicted of any crimes in those four years. If you meet all that list of requirements, great. You can file a petition to have your conviction expunged. Shoot me an email, fill out the contact form on my website, give me a call, we'll be happy to do it for you. I really appreciate you taking the time to read my blog. Go to my website for a complete list of the misdemeanors that qualify. As always, if you have any questions, leave a comment or shoot me an email.