Senate adopts conference report on S.12 to create statewide policy for access to sealed criminal records

The Vermont Senate accepted and adopted the report of the conference committee on S.12, an act relating to sealing criminal history records, after negotiators reached a compromise on access, use and disclosure rules for sealed records.

The conference report keeps the Senate's emphasis on privacy and judicial review while addressing operational concerns raised by the House. Under the compromise, criminal justice agencies may access sealed records in their possession for criminal-justice purposes without a court order, but using those records to develop or litigate a criminal case, or disclosing records to non-criminal justice entities, requires a court order. The compromise also requires creation of a statewide policy to govern access and use of sealed records and a record-keeping system that logs access to sealed records.

Committee conferees described the change as balancing government accountability and the real-world utility of records for ongoing investigations. The conference report also includes several specific amendments: a provision requiring an order of sealing to be sent to Vermont entities listed by the petitioner (section 7602); amendments to title 13 sections 7606 and 7607 requiring state entities that inquire about criminal-history to inform individuals that they do not need to disclose expunged records; and a requirement that the Secretary of Administration and the Judiciary notify applicable people of their right not to disclose sealed records (section 7611).

The report preserves the Senate's position that defense attorneys and defendants may use sealed records for litigation, and it leaves deferred-sentence treatment unchanged (the House had proposed eliminating expungement eligibility for deferred sentences, but the conference committee did not adopt that change). The Senate accepted the conference report by voice vote.