Every week, I am approached by someone who wants to talk about the effects of their misguided youth. Having a charge on your criminal record can have long lasting effects even when the charges are dismissed. Imagine getting arrested for assault when you’re 18 and having those charges dismissed but it’s on every background check and CORI that’s run on you? So when you’re going for that dream job and they say they have to run a routine background check, they are going to see that charge on your record. When you want to volunteer in your child’s school or coach your child’s baseball team, they will run a mandatory CORI check every two years and will see that charge on your record.

There is a solution. Your attorney can do a motion to seal your record. If approved, the charge would no longer be seen except by law enforcement.

A motion to seal is also necessary for immigration matters. In order to apply for citizenship or green card status, you cannot have any criminal matters on your record including traffic violations. An experienced attorney can help you with this.