Washington Record Expungement

An expungement proceeding is one in which a first-time offender of a prior criminal conviction seeks that the records of that earlier conviction is sealed, making the records unavailable through the state or federal repositories.

Filing a motion to vacate the conviction with the court starts the process for removing a conviction from your record. An expungement in Washington requires a judge to sign a court order.

It would depend on what the convictions were for. Yes, more than one felony can be expunged so long as you were not imprisoned and you collect proof that you complied with probation.

It would depend on what type of violation occurred and when. A felony conviction can be expunged in Washington so long as the following requirements are met: If your conviction is for a Class C felony, you must wait five years from when you were sentenced, released from confinement, or released from Department of Corrections supervision, whichever happened last.

This usually depends on several factors, including the amount of time that has passed since the arrest or conviction and the severity and nature of the event for which expungement is sought.

In Washington, the process of expunging or sealing a criminal conviction is called "vacating a judgment." If your non-conviction record is expunged, or if a court vacates your conviction, the information will no longer be visible to the general public, including potential employers.

Expungement directs the court to treat the criminal conviction as if it had never occurred, essentially removing it from a defendant's criminal record as well as, ideally, the public record.