Fulfilling All Aspects of Your Sentence for Expungement Eligibility
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| In order to be eligible for statutory expungement in Ohio, you must have first fulfilled all of the sentence the Court imposed upon you. Obviously, this means that you must have served your time in jail if any, and that you not be on probation from the offense you are trying to expunge. But what about orders of restitution?
Ohio's Tenth District Court of Appeals recently addressed this issue in the context of a person who had stolen a large amount of money. The Court held that an offender is not finally discharged for purposes of the expungement statute, R.C. 2953.32(A)(1) if the offender still owes restitution. |
In re White, 165 Ohio App.3d 288, 846 N.E.2d 93, at paragraph 7. See, also, Willowick v. Langford (1984), 15 Ohio App.3d 33, 472 N.E.2d 387, syllabus; State v. Wainwright (1991), 75 Ohio App.3d 793, 795, 600 N.E.2d 831; State v. Pettis (1999), 133 Ohio App.3d 618, 619-620, 729 N.E.2d 449.
In the case of State v. Jordan, 2007 Ohio App. LEXIS 5664 (November 29, 2007) Franklin Co. App. No. 07AP-584, it was undisputed that the person seeking expungement had not been finally discharged, pursuant to the expungement statute when he filed his application for sealing of his record of conviction, because he had not paid the ordered restitution (in the amount of a whopping $47,187.68. Thus, he was not yet eligible to apply to seal his conviction records, and the trial court did not err in denying his application.
Continue on to our complete guide to Ohio expungement law
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