Florida Criminal Records

Florida is an open state with a statute for almost everything, and its criminal records are public at every level: the state repository sells its file to anyone for $24, the 67 clerks of court publish their indexes online, and the public records law opens arrest reports the day they are written. The catch in Florida is not access. It is that each of those records is a different record, kept by a different office, and a search of one says nothing about the others. This page gives the Florida rule and the Florida search for each, with government sources only.

The Florida Department of Law Enforcement "is the central repository for criminal history information for the state of Florida," and says on its criminal history record check page that "it is our responsibility to provide public access to this information when requested." The fee "for public requests is $24.00." The instant online search returns results immediately, "costs $24.00, in addition to a $1.00 credit card processing fee," and "results will NOT be certified"; the Department adds that "demographic information is provided by customers," meaning the match is only as good as the name and date of birth you type. A certified search, for court or licensing use, runs through the Department's SHIELD system at "$24.00 against your debit or credit card for each name search of the Florida criminal history database, regardless of search results," and is mailed in six to seven business days.

The Florida file is the whole state history, arrests and dispositions, not just convictions, which makes it broader than Texas or Washington sell. It is also name-based for the public, so a common name returns other people's records, and the fingerprint version exists only for the person's own review and for the employers and licensing bodies the statutes authorize.

Florida's trial courts are the circuit courts, which hear felonies and civil cases above $50,000, and the county courts, which hear misdemeanors, county ordinance violations and civil cases up to $50,000, with small claims up to $8,000, per section 34.01 of the Florida Statutes as amended in 2023. The files of both courts in a county are kept by that county's elected clerk of court, and every clerk runs a website with a case search. There is no public statewide search: the clerks' Comprehensive Case Information System connects the 67 clerk's offices and the 20 circuits for judges, prosecutors and defenders, but the public searches one clerk at a time.

The large clerks are good examples of the range. The Broward County clerk's case search notes that "Florida law restricts access to some cases, documents, and information based on the record and the user's access level," under the Supreme Court's standards for electronic access, and that "not all court progress dockets will have electronic case records available for viewing online." The Miami-Dade clerk runs a separate criminal justice online case search, and its records page explains that "there are standard online services that are free as well as fee-based advanced online services." The Orange County clerk provides "electronic access to many court records as well as non-confidential documents" under Administrative Order AOSC16-14. Each of the other 64 is linked from the county pages on this site.

The clerks also sell in bulk, which is where the private databases get their Florida data: Miami-Dade, Broward, Polk and Lee, among others, offer commercial data services, daily files and interfaces for high-volume buyers, as the criminal records page describes. A background check company's Florida record is a copy of a clerk's index on the day it was bought.

Florida seals or expunges through the Department of Law Enforcement first and the court second. Under sections 943.0585 and 943.059, a person applies to the Department for a certificate of eligibility, with fingerprints, a certified disposition, and "a nonrefundable money order or cashier's check for $75.00 made payable to the FDLE," and only then petitions the court. The Department's rule is plain: "you are entitled to one court-ordered sealing or expungement in a lifetime." Since 2019 there is also an automatic route: the Department's seal and expunge page explains that for qualifying dispositions "the criminal history record maintained by FDLE will automatically be sealed (by operation of law) when the Clerk of the Court submits a qualifying certified disposition to FDLE," with no application.

An expunged Florida record is removed from the Department's public file and the court's index; a sealed one is closed to the public and open to the agencies the statute lists. Neither reaches a copy sold by a clerk before the order, and the federal rule on complete and up to date public records, on the criminal records page, is what forces that copy to catch up.

Florida's public records law, chapter 119, opens arrest reports and booking records from the day they are made. Its exemption for law enforcement covers "active criminal intelligence and criminal investigative information," which the statute defines as information "directly related to pending prosecutions or appeals," so the arrest itself, the charge, the booking photograph and the incident report are public while the detective's working file is not. Every sheriff posts the jail: the Miami-Dade Corrections inmate search is the largest, and the state library keeps a directory of county jail searches for all 67. A person already sentenced to state prison is in the Department of Corrections offender search, linked from the same directory.

Because the booking photograph is public, Florida passed one of the country's first mug shot laws. Section 901.43 says a publisher of arrest booking photographs "may not solicit or accept a fee or other form of payment to remove the photographs," gives the person the right to make "a request, in writing, for the removal of an arrest booking photograph to the registered agent" of the publisher, requires removal "within 10 calendar days after receipt of the written request," and penalizes every day after that. The arrest records page covers how to use it.

A Florida judgment is a court record with a long life. Under section 55.081, "no judgment, order, or decree of any court shall be a lien upon real or personal property within the state after the expiration of 20 years from the date of the entry of such judgment," and under section 55.10 a certified copy recorded in the county's official records is a lien on the debtor's real property there for ten years, extendable once for "one additional period of 10 years" by rerecording with a current address affidavit. A Florida judgment in a court index is therefore live for two decades, and a recorded one is a lien a title search will find.

Florida is divided into three federal judicial districts under 28 U.S.C. 89. The Northern District covers Alachua, Bay, Calhoun, Dixie, Escambia, Franklin, Gadsden, Gilchrist, Gulf, Holmes, Jackson, Jefferson, Lafayette, Leon, Levy, Liberty, Madison, Okaloosa, Santa Rosa, Taylor, Wakulla, Walton and Washington, with court at Gainesville, Marianna, Panama City, Pensacola and Tallahassee. The Middle District covers Baker, Bradford, Brevard, Charlotte, Citrus, Clay, Collier, Columbia, De Soto, Duval, Flagler, Glades, Hamilton, Hardee, Hendry, Hernando, Hillsborough, Lake, Lee, Manatee, Marion, Nassau, Orange, Osceola, Pasco, Pinellas, Polk, Putnam, St. Johns, Sarasota, Seminole, Sumter, Suwannee, Union and Volusia, with court at Fernandina, Fort Myers, Jacksonville, Live Oak, Ocala, Orlando, Saint Petersburg and Tampa. The Southern District covers Broward, Dade, Highlands, Indian River, Martin, Monroe, Okeechobee, Palm Beach and St. Lucie, with court at Fort Lauderdale, Fort Pierce, Key West, Miami and West Palm Beach. A federal case from any Florida county is on one of those three dockets and on PACER, whose prices and gaps are on the criminal records page.

Whether a person has a Florida record: the Department of Law Enforcement's $24 search answers it from the state repository, arrests and dispositions, by name and date of birth, certified through SHIELD when the answer has to stand up in court.

Whether a person was charged in a county: the county clerk's case search answers it, with the docket and disposition, one clerk at a time.

Whether a person is in custody now: the county sheriff's jail search answers it, and the Department of Corrections answers it for state prison.

Whether an old case can still be found: a sealed or expunged record is closed at the Department and the clerk, a judgment is live for twenty years, and a copy that predates a sealing order is reached through the federal rule.