Are Arrest Records Public? Everything You Need to Know
Cindy Ellis - December 30, 2022
Anyone can find themselves in the wrong place at the wrong time. Even the most conscientious, law-abiding person may find themselves as the suspect of a crime. They may even be arrested.
Arrest and conviction, of course, are two very different things. While criminal convictions are easily available in state public records, you may wonder whether arrest records are as easily obtainable.
In this article, we’ll discuss how arrest records are kept, as well as who can access them and under what circumstances.
What Are Arrest Records?
First, it is a good idea to clarify some terms.
Arrest Record
An arrest record documents information surrounding someone’s arrest. It will say when someone was arrested and what charges they were being arrested on. Arrest records will not state whether that person was later found guilty, but may say that the charges were dismissed.
Court Record
A court record will detail the outcome of a trial and the resulting verdict around someone’s guilt. Court records will be filed in whatever municipality the court case was tried. These records are usually searchable by the public.
Criminal Record
Criminal records will be filed when someone is convicted. A criminal record may also include outstanding warrants for someone’s arrest and police incident reports.
Criminal records are publicly available for viewing. The result of court cases are also available for the public to read, so if someone was found guilty, it’s not too difficult to find that information in a state database.
How Can You Find Someone’s Arrest Records?
While it’s relatively easy to discover whether someone has faced jail time for a previous conviction, it’s a little more complicated to find out if someone was merely arrested. There are some ways you can find someone’s arrest records.
Background Checks
Background checks are meant to give a fuller picture of an individual’s past and character. This means that it gives a lot more information than a basic Google search and even beyond what public records will have.
Many employers will require a background check for all new employees, particularly if it’s a job where the person will be dealing with money or sensitive information. In jobs where employees will be working with children or people with disabilities, employers will want to especially ensure the safety of their clients and protect the business from liability as well.
Landlords may also choose to run a background check on potential tenants to help them choose the most reliable renters, especially when there’s a lot of demand for an apartment. Background checks will often include some financial information, such as employment history and financial history, such as filing for bankruptcy. This can be important information when you’re looking to receive steady monthly payments from someone.
Someone will need to give their consent for a background check to be run on them since it does give so many personal details. One of those details will be arrest history. Unlike public records of conviction, even arrests that did not lead to a guilty verdict or even a court case will show up on a background check.
Search Court Records
As previously mentioned, all courts will keep a record of the cases that came before them. If a person was tried for a crime, but not found guilty, the court will still have a record of the proceedings in that particular case.
If you know where an arrest took place, you can always look at the local court records from the time when a case would have gone to trial and see who was being accused. Of course, it can be a big hassle to comb through records from months or even years.
While court records are typically considered public, that doesn’t mean the process for obtaining them is very user-friendly.
Search News Articles
Another option is to search through news articles. You can search for a person’s name in a large search engine to see if any articles come up. Of course, news articles will not always disclose someone’s name when arrests are made, but sometimes there will be information about the alleged perpetrators in news coverage.
If you know the area where the arrest may have happened, you can search specifically through local news outlets. Often, there will be a search feature on news sites that will allow you to look for a specific name in previous articles. This may turn up a story relating to a crime someone was arrested in connection with.
If someone is still being pursued in connection with a crime, their name may also turn up on wanted lists. Though someone may not have been arrested yet, if they are wanted by the police, it may only be a matter of time.
Other Official Options for Finding Arrest Records
Like many things in the US, your options and availability can vary greatly from state to state. Certain states are more locked-down than others when it comes to what personal information is publicly accessible. But most states will have some way to request information outside of a formal background check.
New York, for example, has a Criminal History Record Search form that allows people to request information. There is a $95 fee when you submit this application. Overall, though, they treat the information as private and strictly limit who can access it and for what reasons. Such information is kept by the Division of Criminal Justice Services.
Individuals who want to obtain their own information, perhaps to see what employers and landlords might find on a background check, are encouraged to reach out to the DCJS and follow their instructions for requesting information.
In most states, it is a more complicated matter to search for someone else’s information outside of a background check, but there are more options for accessing your own records.
Information About Sex Offenders
No doubt, if you are moving into a new area and hoping it will be a safe place to raise your family, you may be concerned about having sex offenders nearby. Megan’s Law requires those convicted of certain crimes related to sexual abuse to register, and this information is made available to the public. However, if someone has never been found guilty of this sort of crime, not just arrested, they are not required to register.
Some states have more proactive laws in this regard, releasing the names of people are arrested on such charges, even before a court has ruled on the case. This is in only a handful of places, however.
Just as you want to protect your family, people who are wrongfully accused and found not guilty of crimes want to be safe and have their privacy.
Arrest Records and Privacy
While information on criminal convictions is considered to be public information, arrest records are not. This helps protect innocent people from facing harassment or carrying a stigma due to wrongful arrests for crimes that it turns out they did not commit.
There are several legitimate ways to see the records of someone’s arrest, such as through a background check. If you are curious to see what records there are in your name, there are also options to go through your state’s services. And, of course, some information about arrests may be found on news outlets or through court records.
While citizens have a right to know about criminal cases in their community, even innocent people can be arrested sometimes. By keeping that information private, it can help people go on with their lives normally after such an event.
