Anyone with a serious criminal conviction in Niagara Falls understands that a felony record can represent a major barrier to employment, housing or educational opportunities. Even misdemeanor convictions can cause trouble for people in the job market or those whose professional license applications include a character evaluation component. For dependable advice about your options for sealing criminal records or expungement of old arrest information in Niagara Falls, contact New York Lawyers Team today!
Public access to criminal records is covered in detail under New York law, which regulates access to what’s known as the Criminal History Record Search, or CHRS. The The New York State Office of Court Administration (OCA) administers requests for criminal records data in background checks, considers applications for correcting errors on CHRS reports, and generally monitors the CHRS system to make sure that public information is freely available while keeping confidential information about a given offender private.
A CHRS report (your criminal record) will not only include information about a person’s criminal convictions, it will also cover matters such as arrests, dispositions, periods of incarceration or probation, restitution orders, and other data. It should not include information such as psychiatric evaluations or parole board commentary. It’s entirely possible to accumulate a fairly large CHRS file without ever having been convicted of anything.