DC Expungement Factors

In an actual innocence case where a DC expungement lawyer is working on behalf of a client who was never convicted of the crime, the main factors are going to be what is in the police reports. When the government goes to review the case, what they do is they get the police reports from the police and see what the police took down at the time. They get any witness statements that the police collected. They get the police officer’s notes, perhaps the government reaches out to the police officer and ask them questions if something’s unclear if they think the police officer will remember. Facts from the arrest are always going to have a big impact on whether the individual can get their record sealed.

Sometimes just the basic contours of the crime are going to have a huge impact on their eligibility in an innocence case. If the facts are really heinous, if somebody committed a really violent crime or at least was alleged to have committed a violent crime, the reality is the judge who’s reviewing this is going to take a much more skeptical view of this person’s innocence claim than they would for somebody who was alleged to have gotten in a bar fight or some low-level crime like that.

Judges are people too and they’re going to have opinions about certain crimes and maybe one judge really doesn’t like drug offenses and another judge doesn’t like assault offenses. But vice versa they like the other kind, they think defendants for those kinds of cases shouldn’t be held to such a high standard. It’s really a fact-based question that’s going to vary for each client.

In an interest of justice case, the facts in the previous criminal case actually have – typically have much less bearing because the whole motion is focused on is it fair for this person to leave that behind based on what they’ve done since then. So those cases are very different than innocence cases.

Preemptive Measures to Take Before Beginning the Record Sealing Process

The main thing that we would counsel anybody looking to seal their record is to try and beef up your positive accomplishments since the time of arrest. You know, get involved at your local church or get involved before a non-profit that you really believe in their mission.

Go volunteer at an animal shelter, whatever it is that that person loves to do or cares about, they should really get involved with because a big part of these motions on the interest of justice side is what has that person done since they were arrested. That’s definitely the best preemptive measure that a potential record-sealing client could take.

On the actual innocence side, clients could consider contacting witnesses or friends or if the person knows the alleged victim of the crime and has stayed friendly with them, contact them let them know that they’re looking to do this and perhaps they would like them to write some sort of statement that would support their innocence claim.

But for the most part, you know, this evidence is really gathered and these motions are put together once the process began, there’s not a huge amount of things that can be done except for a person really getting committed to some community service or volunteer work or something like that.