4 years ago after graduating highschool I got into a terrible fight and got arrested and charged with assault and battery, I also had a prior charge due to messing around with a bb gun with some highschool friends.
I am now a college student in the avaition program. I am about to graduate and those past dumb mistakes are making really hard to get into the aviation field. I am waitlisted for an internship because of my record.
I need to either expunge my record or seal and since I was 18 at the time I was charged as an adult and not a juveinile.
Can I get my record sealed? and if I can how would I go about doing that?
this is in colorado btw
thank you
I have done a number of sealing both as an attorney and as a judge. The problem is that you need to make sure that you notify everyone - every link in the chain (the arresting agency, the agency that held you in jail, the local prosecutor (DA or city attorney), CBI (they control the CCIC computer system that tracts the charge within Colorado), and the FBI (they control the NCIC national computer system that has the information that CBI sends them). I have seen that if an attorney fails to notify or misses one of those agencies, the information is still out there.
Aside from that, Colorado changed several years ago regarding sealings. You can only seal a case if it was either: 1) dismissed by the prosecutor due to lack of proof, 2) not filed by the prosecutor at all (only an incident report and an arrest record exists), 3) you were found not guilty at trial, or 4) the case was dismissed upon you successfully completing a deferred judgment and sentence. If you plead guilty to an assault (3rd degree assault), a harassment, or a disorderly conduct (fighting in a public place) as a "straight" plea (it was reported as a conviction against your record) instead of as a deferred judgment and sentence, you are simply prohibited from sealing your record.
That is a huge change from the status in the 1990s, when I was able to get client's with felony Vehicular Assault pleas cases sealed. However, that is simply the status of the law now. Prosecutors will oftentimes offer "split pleas" in which you get a deferred judgment and sentence to a more serious charge (assault) and plead straight out to a less serious charge (harassment). If ANY charge in your case was reported as a conviction, you simply can NOT get the case sealed.
So, if your case got dismissed or resulted in only a deferred judgment and sentence that got dismissed ultimately, definitely contact an attorney for their guidance. Otherwise, you won't be able to get your record sealed here in Colorado. Long gone are the good old days.
Mr. Leroi is correct. The statutes allowing for sealing of adult criminal records do not have a current provision which would allow sealing of a non drug offense if there was an actual conviction (rather than a deferred judgment or dismissal on all counts). Unfortunately, the only way that I know to get the conviction removed from your record would be to apply for a pardon from the Governor. This is possible, but it is discretionary and relatively few pardons are granted in this state.
In addition to what Mr. Leroi and Mr. Harkess stated, you don't qualify for expungement since you were 18 and charged as an adult. Convictions are excluded from sealing.
Mary E. McCluskey
