Category
County Level Searches
Our county criminal history search reveals a subject's criminal history, including felony and misdemeanor convictions, retrieved directly from the originating source at the county court level. Most counties are available online, however, for those remote counties that do not operate a publicly accessible website, we have a network of onsite researchers that can check for criminal records directly. Reported information typically includes dates associated with the offense, charges, charge classification, disposition, and sentencing.
The county criminal search is recommended as the primary criminal history search since it contains the most current case status and disposition information. The courts will also reflect cases for which there was not necessarily an arrest. The EEOC and FTC (via FCRA) both designate that the most up-to-date information should be used in employment-related decisions.
State Level Searches
The Statewide criminal history search is conducted through the state criminal repository. Not all states make this information available to the public and access may be restricted to companies with a regulatory requirement to access this data. But whenever we can, we access those state repositories to give you the most comprehensive check for criminal record information for that state. State repository information typically contains arrest records that may lack a final disposition. The scope, availability, requirements and turnaround time may vary greatly from state to state.
The Federal Criminal Search is recommended as a companion search to the county criminal history search and for those companies with a requirement to check federal data sources.
Federal Level Searches
The Federal Criminal Search is a national search of your applicant through the US District Courts (federal court) PACER system, which includes at least one in each state. Examples of Federal Criminal cases include bank robbery; child abduction; mail tampering; tax evasion; cybercrime; drug trafficking; terrorism; wire fraud; money laundering; immigration law violations; espionage. Reported information includes dates associated with the offense, charges, charge classification, disposition, and sentencing.
The Federal Criminal Search is recommended as a companion search to the county criminal search and for those companies with a requirement to check federal data sources.
National Searches
Our National Criminal Index (NCI) is a nationwide, multi-jurisdictional database comprised of hundreds of sources including criminal data (Department of Corrections, county, state), state-level sexual offender registries, national and international security sources (OFAC, Denied Person, Interpol). Information returned will align with our guidelines for each data set and in some instances will require additional investigation to confirm the accuracy of information retrieved with the originating source of the record.
The National Criminal Index is recommended as a companion search to the county or state criminal search as it greatly expands upon the areas searched.