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May 15, 2008

House slated to vote on criminal case expungement bill

PROVIDENCE -- The House is scheduled to vote today on a bill to "quash and destroy'' the records of criminal cases in which an criminal was given a "deferred sentence'' in exchange for sparing the state a trial by pleading no contest or guilty to a crime.

Unlike the state's current expungement law, the bill up for a vote today is not limited to non-violent offenses by first-time offenders. In fact, the Rhode Island Supreme Court decision last November that sparked this latest drive to erase criminal records concerned a man who had pleaded no contest to second-degree robbery and a woman who had pleaded no contest to a drug charge. Both were given deferred sentences.

A Superior Court judge -- and then the Supreme Court -- concluded that neither was eligible under the current expungement law: The man because he had commited a violent crime, and the woman because she got into further trouble, which meant she was no longer a first-time offender.

The bill up for a vote today would open the door for the immediate destruction of such records after the deferral period -- which usually runs five years -- has ended, regardless of the nature of the crime and the history of the offender.

After a short-circuited debate earlier this week, lawyer and House Majority Leader Gordon Fox promised to draft an amendment addressing some of the concerns raised by House members. The amendment has not yet been made public.

The bill, sponsored by Rep. Joseph Almeida, D-Providence, is the latest in a series promoted by prisoner-rights advocates, the criminal defense bar and the public defenders office this year to reach the House floor. More may be coming, including one giving judges the discretion to erase multiple misdemeanors from someone's record.

In 2003, The Journal reported Almeida was found guilty of shoving a man who was trying to repossess his girlfriend's car from her driveway in Federal Hill. He was sentenced to one year of probation, 25 hours of community service and ordered to have no contact with the man or his brother.

-- Katherine Gregg of the Journal State House Bureau

Posted by Mike McKinney  at 3:49 PM | Permalink

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Paul | May 15, 2008 8:11 PM link

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