Adult Conviction Expungement and Record-Sealing Eligibility in New York

At a glance

Requirements one by one

Relief name and legal effect

Both routes seal records; neither destroys the conviction. CPL § 160.57(7) and § 160.59(10) expressly keep a sealed conviction within the definition of a conviction when a later criminal proceeding uses the prior conviction to enhance a penalty or as an element of the charged offense.

Automatic or clean-slate relief

CPL § 160.57 directs the Office of Court Administration to identify and seal eligible convictions without an application. The statute requires at least quarterly rechecks when a conviction has reached its time threshold but remains blocked by a pending charge, supervision, or the specified out-of-state-record conditions.

The rollout is not yet complete. Chapter 631 took effect November 16, 2024, and § 160.57(6) gives the court system three years after that date to finish sealing the pre-effective-date backlog. The Unified Court System states that eligible convictions will be sealed by November 16, 2027 and that its manual- review form will be available no later than that date.

Convictions eligible by petition

CPL § 160.59 remains a separate route. A person with no more than two eligible offenses, and no more than one felony among them, may apply to seal those convictions. Multiple eligible offenses from the same criminal transaction count as one eligible offense under the statute's definition.

The application route is narrower than Clean Slate. It excludes Penal Law article 130 sex offenses, article 263 offenses, article 125 felonies, violent felonies under § 70.02, class A felonies, specified conspiracy and attempt offenses, and offenses requiring sex-offender registration.

Waiting period and when it starts

For automatic sealing, the clock is three years for a misdemeanor and eight years for a felony. It begins at release from incarceration, or at sentence if there was no incarceration. A new conviction before sealing resets an older conviction's clock to the new conviction's start date.

For the petition route, ten years must pass from sentence on the latest conviction or the latest release from incarceration. Time spent incarcerated after the target conviction is excluded and extends that ten-year period.

Sentence, restitution, and new-record conditions

Automatic sealing cannot occur before the incarceration, parole, probation, or post-release-supervision sentence ends. A pending New York criminal charge and current probation or parole supervision for the target conviction also block sealing. Sealing does not discharge restitution, reparation, fines, surcharges, or fees, or automatically seal a collection proceeding.

The § 160.59 court must summarily deny a petition for an undisposed arrest or charge, a later conviction after the last target judgment, or a record that exceeds the statute's crime and felony caps.

Petition process and decision standard

The § 160.59 application goes to the court of the most serious target offense, or the court of the latest conviction when the offenses have the same classification. It includes disposition records, sworn disclosures about other applications and target convictions, and the reasons supporting discretionary relief. The applicant serves the district attorney, who has 45 days to object.

An objection requires a hearing. Without an objection, no hearing is required. The court considers elapsed time, offense circumstances and seriousness, the person's character and rehabilitation, victim statements, reintegration, public safety, and public confidence in the law.

Who can still see or use the record

Clean Slate sealing removes the record from ordinary public and private access, but § 160.57(1)(d) has a long exception list. It includes the person and counsel; courts, prosecutors, and defense counsel in specified proceedings; law-enforcement and qualified agencies; certain criminal and civil cases; required or authorized fingerprint-based screening; vulnerable-population work; police hiring; firearm licensing and background checks; specified professional licensing and misconduct review; and other enumerated government uses.

The petition route preserves access for the person or designated agent, qualified and law-enforcement agencies, gun-licensing officials, prospective police or peace-officer employers, and the FBI for firearm checks. DCJS retains fingerprints, palmprints, and photographs.

What trips people up

The three- and eight-year clocks do not mean every eligible old record is already sealed. The court system has until November 16, 2027 to complete the backfile rollout. A person should verify the record rather than assume the clock alone completed sealing.

The ten-year petition and Clean Slate are different routes. A conviction outside § 160.59's two-offense/one-felony limits may still qualify for automatic sealing. Conversely, a person seeking relief before the automatic rollout reaches the record may need to evaluate the existing petition statute.

Sealed does not mean erased. Both statutes preserve later-criminal-case use, and each keeps specified government, licensing, screening, and firearm access.

Common questions

Must a person file for Clean Slate sealing? Ordinarily no. OCA identifies and seals eligible records, though the law provides a form-based correction process for a record that should have been sealed and was missed.

Does unpaid restitution prevent automatic eligibility forever? The statute does not make payment a separate eligibility clock, but sealing does not erase the obligation or seal an otherwise public collection proceeding.

Can a person use the ten-year petition for two felonies? No. The current petition statute caps relief at two eligible offenses and no more than one felony. Pending bills would change that limit, but they are not current law.

Statutes and sources

• N.Y. Crim. Proc. Law § 160.57 — automatic eligibility, clocks, exclusions, rechecks, rollout, record treatment, access exceptions, retained criminal effect, sentence completion, and monetary obligations. https://www.nysenate.gov/legislation/laws/CPL/160.57 (accessed 2026-08-08)
• N.Y. Crim. Proc. Law § 160.59 — ten-year application eligibility, offense exclusions, process, decision factors, sealing effect, access, and retained criminal use. https://www.nysenate.gov/legislation/laws/CPL/160.59 (accessed 2026-08-08)
• 2023 N.Y. Laws ch. 631 — enactment and one-year effective-date clause. https://www.nysenate.gov/legislation/bills/2023/A1029/amendment/C (accessed 2026-08-08)