what is expungement of criminal records
In the common law legal system, an expungement proceeding is a type of lawsuit in which a first time offender of a prior criminal conviction seeks that the records of that earlier process be sealed, making the records unavailable through the state or Federal repositories. If successful, the records are said to be expunged. Black's Law Dictionary defines expungement of record as the Process by which record of criminal conviction is destroyed or sealed from the state or Federal repository..