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Case Records
Please read ARS § 13-911 in its entirety. These Info Sheets are intended to help those who are seeking to file a petition or have had a ruling on a petition to seal a criminal case record under ARS § 13-911. Nothing in these Info Sheets supersedes what is provided in statute and does not restrict local rules and practice of a particular court in processing petitions.
 
What is a Case Record?

A “Case Record” means all records related to your arrest, conviction and sentence for a specific offense. This includes:

  • Court records (but not Arizona Supreme Court or Arizona Court of Appeals records)

  • Department of Public Safety, Central State Repository records

  • Prosecuting agency records

  • Law enforcement agency records

The court’s “case record” related to an incident includes only charges that were actually filed with the court. If you are seeking to seal arrest records for an arrest that occurred without charges being referred by a prosecutor, you must specifically file a petition to seal those arrest records. If separate incidents resulted in multiple arrests with no charges being filed or resulted in multiple arrests with multiple filings, you will need to file a separate petition for each arrest or filing unless the cases were consolidated by the court into a single case.

EXAMPLE: If you have 3 cases (that were not consolidated) with separate plea agreements, you must file 3 separate petitions.
 
Are Appellate Court Records Sealed Too?

The ability to seal case records under ARS § 13-911 does not extend to case records in the Supreme Court or Court of Appeals.