New Law Allows Complete Expungement of Felonies
HB 3024
A new law allows the complete expungement of two felony deferred sentences. I’m Oklahoma Lawyer James Wirth, and we’re talking about some new laws that have recently gone into effect. This one is HB 3024. It’s already in effect in the state of Oklahoma, and it changes the expungement statute regarding eligibility if you’ve got a deferred on a felony.
And that statute for expungement in Oklahoma, it’s Title 22, Section 18. It’s got various subsections that determine what qualifies for an expungement. And the existing one that’s relevant here was subsection nine, which says that the person was charged with a nonviolent felony offense, the charges were dismissed following the successful completion of a deferred sentence, and the person’s never been convicted of a felony, no charges pending, and five years have passed.
So if you got a deferred sentence on a felony charge under this statute, as long as you complete the terms of that probation, at the end of that, because it’s deferred, the court case is expunged. But it’s still gonna be on your arrest record. But according to that section, after five years go by, you can petition the court to get an expungement of the arrest record, and once that happens under Title 22, Section 19, it says the event under Oklahoma law never occurred.
Changes in the Law
However, that statute listed it as being a nonviolent felony offense. So there could be an argument that you cannot have more than one to qualify under that statute. I can tell you historically with my office, we have been successful in getting multiple ones done under that because we get one done under that, and then we do the other one under that, and the other one under that doesn’t prohibit multiples. However, some other judges, some other courts, and some other attorneys may have had it interpreted differently.
So a new change in the law makes it clear that if you have up to two felony deferred sentences that are completed, then you can get that complete Section 18 expungements. But if it’s two, you have to wait 10 years instead of five years after the successful completion of the deferred.
The other implication of this is that it would presume that if you have more than two felony deferred sentences that are completed, you cannot get a complete expungement on those. However, that is open to interpretation, because just based on a plain reading, I would say it still could be argued that Section 9 applies, but this new Section 14 would imply that maybe it doesn’t. So that’s still gotta be decided, but regardless, what is clear is that if you’ve got two felony deferred sentences completed, you can get a complete expungement, but you’ve gotta wait 10 years to do that upon successful completion of the deferred.
Get Legal Advice specific to Your Circumstances
If you’ve got questions regarding expungement in the state of Oklahoma, getting your records cleaned up, is something we do a lot, but don’t just take information from this video scheduling an appointment with somebody at my office where you can get legal advice specific to your circumstances. To get that scheduled with a Tulsa expungement attorney at my office, go online to MakeLawEasy.com.
