A Long Awaited Solution To Felony Records
Anyone who has had an unfortunate run-in with the law and ultimately received a felony on their record has something to be hopeful about. The state of Missouri recently passed a new law that aims to relax the laws around felony expungements. The law, which went into effect on January 1st, 2018, lowers the number of years someone has to wait before being eligible for an expungement of their felony conviction. What is an expungement? Well, it’s a request from the convicted party to the state to have the original court records from your felony conviction and all records for the criminal conviction removed from your criminal record. There are multiple benefits to an expungement, however, the key reason to get an expungement is for employment purposes. Once an expungement is completed you will have the legal right to tell employers that you have not been convicted of a felony. Given the nature of most job applications today, that can typically be the difference in whether you get the job or not. Unfortunately, not all felony convictions are eligible for an expungement. However, the new change in the law now allows up to 1,900 eligible offenses, while the old law only allowed 13 offenses. The other big shift in the law is that wait time for eligibility is now just 7 years, while the old law required a wait time of 20 years. An expungement, however, doesn’t erase your record completely. Judges and prosecutors will be able to access and read your criminal case records in the event you run into legal issues in the future. It does mean, however, that anyone looking to hire you, give you a loan, or lease an apartment to you, will not have access to these expunged records. If you’re interested in cleaning up your record, contact the Combs Law Group today and we’ll help guide you through the process.
Why Use Combs Law Group For Your MO Expungement Lawyer
An expungement can be a very tricky legal process that takes knowledge and experience from a qualified St. Louis criminal defense lawyer. Working with a reputable Missouri expungement lawyer can help you successfully complete the process in an expedient manner. Otherwise, you might find yourself struggling to get the right paperwork to the right people at the right time. Especially with the new law in place, you’ll find that some of the processes and procedures are entirely new to all legal jurisdictions in Missouri. That means that anyone who is going through this new expungement process will likely run into procedural hurdles along the way. Combs Law Group understands this and we will work step by step to get the right paperwork filed quickly. The initial step is to do an evaluation of your case and review the new guidelines to see if you qualify. We would be glad to provide you with a free case evaluation, so please contact us today.
