Misdemeanor Expungement Law

Without fail I get at least one call a week concerning having a misdemeanor conviction removed from someone’s record.  Given how routine background checks have become, the negative consequences of having a prior conviction can seriously restrict employment opportunities.  Thus, anyone with a conviction should seriously consider having their record expunged.

Mississippi Law allows the following in regards to expunging a misdemeanor:

 

Any person who has been convicted of a misdemeanor, excluding a conviction for a traffic violation, and who is a first offender, may petition the…court…for an order to expunge any such conviction from all public records… The effect of such order shall be to restore such person, in the contemplation of the law, to the status he occupied before such arrest. No person as to whom such order has been entered shall be held thereafter under any provision of law to be guilty of perjury or to have otherwise given a false statement by reason of his failure to recite or acknowledge such arrest or conviction in response to any inquiry made of him for any purpose…

(2) Upon petition therefor, a justice, county, circuit or municipal court shall expunge the record of any case in which an arrest was made, the person arrested was released and the case was dismissed or the charges were dropped or there was no disposition of such case.