As a former correctional administrator, responsible for the management and operation of 23 jails over his career and being responsible for creating a great deal of inmate programming, Mr. King has ample knowledge, and a strong commitment to making sure individuals who have served time, or have any form of a criminal record, can move on to lead productive lives.
Expungements are a way to clear your criminal record. Traditionally under Pennsylvania law, any charges that did not result in conviction were eligible to be expunged. This included (and still includes) all dismissed, withdrawn, nolle prosed, and not guilty charges, and if you completed a special program such as ARD, the Small Amount of Marijuana Program, and the like. Additionally, summary-level convictions were (and still are) eligible for expungement if you have been free of arrest or prosecution for five years following the summary conviction. Under the traditional expungement process, in order to obtain an expungement, you had to petition for expungement, attend a hearing in front of a judge, and send the appropriate documents to various state agencies. However, the relatively new Pennsylvania Clean Slate Statute, (Act 56 of 2018, Section 9122.1(a)(1), Section 9122.1(a)(2)(b), and Section 9122.1(b), and PA.R.Crim.P. 791), expanded and automated the list of offenses eligible to be expunged. Clean Slate uses technology to seal certain criminal records from public view. Arrest records will be sealed after charges are dropped and some minor conviction records will be sealed after 10 years. Automated sealing began on June 28, 2019. To date, almost 35 million cases have been sealed, without the cost of filing petitions in court. That is more than half of the charges in the court’s database. In addition to pioneering an automated sealing process, Clean Slate also expanded the number of misdemeanor convictions that can be sealed after a petition is filed in court. Sealed records are not available to the public, helping people access employment, housing and education. Clean Slate will allow hundreds of thousands of Pennsylvanians to move past their old, minor criminal records. Is a prior arrest or conviction preventing you from getting the job you want, from changing your immigration status, or just plain embarrassing ? You have come to the right place. |