Virginia’s new Clean Slate law came into effect last Thursday, meaning that thousands of misdemeanor offenses will be automatically sealed to help residents move forward with employment or loan opportunities.
The law automatically seals criminal records for Virginians who were convicted in various cases including certain misdemeanors like petit larceny and trespassing, or underage alcohol and or cannabis use.
Every adult will remember making mistakes as a teen, and the Clean Slate law is designed to ensure that these mistakes don’t weigh down potential career or financial paths by automatically sealing records 7 years after a conviction provided no subsequent conviction has been made.
ABC 7 news reporting on the law, heard from Lauren Young, a record-sealing resource attorney.
“It’s helping our local economies, and it’s giving people their dignity back. Obviously people are concerned about it. They are worried that people are going to be able to hide scary and dangerous offenses. But most of those aren’t eligible for sealing now anyway.”
Young referred to DUIs, child-sex offenses, domestic abuse, and other violent acts.
One context in which the Clean Slate law will truly be welcome is in cases of deferred disposition: whereby a court, facing a suspect who’s plead guilty, postpones sentencing and potentially removes the possibility of an entry on someone’s criminal record, provided the guilty party completes certain probationary conditions like paying court fees or fines, fulfilling community service, or attending educational courses, such as on defensive driving.
If the point is to allow the perpetrator to admit fault and a willingness to repair their relationship with the community, the ability for background checkers to find that sentencing seems inordinately harsh.
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Regarding background checks, when criminal records are “sealed” they are not expunged, as other laws have mandated they be in other cases on which GNN has previously reported.
Instead, they are closed from public access. Background checking firms can still recover the records, as can government agencies under certain contexts, but it’s illegal to share the content of those records with others, such as a potential employer.
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Still others will benefit from this automatic sealing beyond those already mentioned. Whether charged with a misdemeanor or even some felonies, if an individual receives an acquittal, or if the judge orders the suit to be dismissed with prejudice—meaning it cannot be re-brought against the defendant—these records will also be sealed.
People whose records will not automatically be sealed may still have grounds to petition for them to be, as the law grants 2 new petitioning pathways detailed here.
Clean slate laws have been enacted in 14 states plus DC, according to a justice reform advocacy nonprofit the Clean Slate Initiative. They include diverse states such as Oklahoma, California, Virginia, and Utah.
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