Pennsylvania the First State to Seal Old, Minor Criminal Records Under Clean Slate Law

By

Image via State Sen. Camera Bartolotta.

On June 28, Pennsylvania became the first state to institute the Clean Slate Law, which allows the automatic sealing of old and minor criminal records, writes Bobbi Booker for Generocity Philadelphia.

Individuals with criminal records often have issues with finding work and decent housing. They also have a higher recidivism rate.

Around 30 million cases statewide will be eligible for the auto-sealing of criminal records, according to Katie Svoboda-Kindle, a staff attorney at Community Legal Services. This represents half of the court’s total database.

CLS believes that in the first month, this will wipe away more cases in the Keystone State than ever before anywhere in the nation.

“We don’t have the numbers of how many individuals are going to have their records sealed,” said Svoboda-Kindle, but “as many as 30 million cases and 40 million charges, because there can be multiple charges per case.”

The courts have a full year, until June 27, 2020, to finish the sealing of all the cases. The courts will start with the most recent eligible cases and work backward through time. It is expected that 2.5 million cases will be sealed each month.

Read more about the Clean Slate Law at Generocity Philadelphia here.

[uam_ad id=”80503″]

.

[uam_ad id=”80502″]

Connect With Your Community

Subscribe to stay informed!

"*" indicates required fields

This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.
Advertisement
Creative Capital logo