Bill OK’d by North Carolina House panel would end automatic removal of some criminal records

RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) — An effort that formally started four years ago to automatically get rid of many more North Carolina criminal court records would be eliminated if legislation approved by a House committee Wednesday gets enacted.

The bipartisan 2020 law in part directed state officials to develop a process under which criminal charges that are dismissed or that result in “not guilty” verdicts or “not responsible” findings are deleted from a person’s record without a formal request.

The changes were within a broader “second chance” movement in North Carolina and nationwide that has allowed people with some criminal convictions already to ask to get their records removed, helping them avoid obstacles to obtaining employment or housing.

The automatic expunction portion of the law began in late 2021, resulting in over a half-million total record deletions in just eight months — a massive increase and operational challenge for the court system compared with the original petition-based process.

So the legislature agreed to suspend the automatic expunctions in August 2022 and told the courts to create a group that makes recommendations to fix problems, which included handling and retaining paper records confidentially. The resumption, delayed twice, is now set for July 1.

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