Court-ordered expunction of criminal history records

Plain-language summary

This is Florida's court-ordered expungement statute. Expungement is the strongest remedy: the court orders your record destroyed. FDLE keeps one confidential copy, and only a court order can open it. Every other agency's copy is destroyed. After that, with narrow exceptions, you may lawfully deny the record exists.

No court will look at your petition until FDLE issues a certificate of eligibility. The statute sets what the application takes: a certified disposition of your case — the paper that shows how it ended — a written, certified statement from the state attorney confirming your record qualifies, and a $75 processing fee paid to FDLE. FDLE's own instructions add a fingerprint card, taken by law enforcement. The certificate is not the relief itself. It says your record is the kind a court is allowed to expunge.

The eligibility test is strict. As a rule, the charge must have ended without an adjudication of guilt — dropped, dismissed, never filed, or a judge or jury found you not guilty. Your whole record counts, not only this charge: if a Florida court has ever adjudicated you guilty of a crime — or, when you were a juvenile, adjudicated you delinquent for a felony or certain misdemeanors — you do not qualify. A conviction for an offense on the section 943.0584 list closes the door, even if adjudication was withheld. You must be done with court supervision. And Florida allows one sealing or expunction in a lifetime: if you have sealed or expunged any record before, you cannot expunge another — unless it is that same sealed record, after 10 years (below). Each order covers one arrest, in one proceeding.

One path starts elsewhere. A record sealed under section 943.059 for 10 years may then qualify for expungement. Once FDLE certifies you, you petition the court. The statute says "a court of competent jurisdiction"; in practice, file in the county where your original case was filed — that court already has your case file, so it can take up the petition directly. The judge decides, and may grant or deny an eligible petition.