Criminal Record Access Is Not As Easy As It Seems

Most employees see a check for criminal record as a part of their standard procedure when hiring a new employee. And although there are many companies that offer the service over the internet and some even offer a free service, real criminal record access needs to be done the old fashioned way, by accessing the database of city records.

Nationwide criminal record access is a thing of story books

There is really no way to have a criminal record access nationally as of yet. There is only one verifiable nationwide criminal record access company and that is the FBI, but it is not accessible by just anyone. It must be accessed by criminal justice agencies.

In fact it is illegal to access this data without authorization, and you are penalized if you try to buy information from this database as well. Although it is illegal to access this database, there is a huge black market for this information. It is usually made up of individuals who at one time were in the law enforcement world, and have a network of friends they used to obtain criminal record access.

Although there is not really a way to have a criminal record access nationally, there are many different criminal databases that are kept by different counties, cities, parish and townships. IF you wanted to get a nationwide search you would have to go through each of those databases, and this would be extremely time consuming.

Criminal Record Access across the State is Possible But not Every State 29 states in the US now allow a statewide search through criminal records. The only problem is that if you conduct a statewide search, it may take you several weeks or months to finish your search. That is why conducting county searches are still your best bet.

Most background checking companies have criminal record access at the county level. In some counties they index criminal records together, and in others they separate felonies and misdemeanors.

Another way to gain criminal record access is through the US district courts. They provide criminal record access through an online federal docket system. This information is not totally complete so it will require additional looking into.

Unfortunately the court system does not work like the SSN system. You cant just plug in someone's social security number and presto everything appears magically. Criminal records are stored based on the persons name, so getting a persons name spelled correctly and written correctly are essential when trying to get criminal record access. If a persons name has changed then that his criminal record should also be checked under his former name.

As you can see getting a full criminal background check on someone is not as easy as it appears, and to do it, it is probably best to hire a company or a person that specializes in this type of work.

Criminal Record