South Carolina Criminal Records

South Carolina sells its state criminal history to anyone for $25 through SLED, searches its courts county by county through one public index, and expunges under an act whose name, the Uniform Expungement of Criminal Records Act, promises more uniformity than the county solicitors deliver. This page gives the South Carolina rule and the South Carolina search for each record, with government sources only.

The South Carolina Law Enforcement Division sells a name-based check of the state repository through CATCH, the Citizens Access to Criminal Histories. Its request form states the price: "The fee is twenty-five dollars ($25) unless you are a charitable organization approved for a fee of eight dollars ($8)," and the site adds that "effective July 1, 2026, customers submitting online CATCH Report requests will be responsible for the applicable service fee," $1.43 on a $25 report, which "SLED does not retain any portion" of. Anyone may run it on anyone, online with a card, by name and date of birth, and the report covers South Carolina arrests and dispositions reported to the Division. It is a name search, and the criminal records page explains why a name match is a guess; the fingerprint version is for the person's own review and the employers and licensing bodies the statutes name.

The South Carolina Judicial Branch's case records search lets anyone "search case records for all counties in South Carolina" through the public index, one county at a time, by name or case number, covering the circuit courts, which try general sessions criminal cases, the magistrate and municipal courts for the summary offenses where they participate, and the family and probate courts, with the note that "some Municipal Court records are available in the Public Index Search." The appellate courts have their own C-Track public access. The clerk of court in each of the 46 counties holds the file and provides the documents. A background check company's "South Carolina criminal record" is a SLED report or a copy of the public index, and the criminal records page explains what a copy misses.

South Carolina expunges under section 17-22-910 of the Code, the Uniform Expungement of Criminal Records Act, which the Eleventh Circuit Solicitor describes: "An expungement is a court order that removes criminal arrests/dispositions from your criminal record. It is also called an Order for Destruction of Arrest Records." The application goes to the solicitor of the circuit where the case was heard, with the fees the section sets and none for a charge that was dismissed or ended in acquittal, and the eligible convictions run from first-offense fraudulent check and minor offenses to, as Horry County's solicitor explains, a first-offense conviction carrying "thirty days imprisonment or one thousand ($1,000.00) dollars, or both," which "a person may apply after three years" to expunge "providing the person has had no other conviction(s) within three years," with longer periods for the first-offense felonies the Youthful Offender Act and the later amendments reach. An expunged South Carolina case is destroyed at the court, the solicitor, the arresting agency and SLED, and a copy that left before the order is reached through the federal rule on complete and up to date public records.

South Carolina's Freedom of Information Act, sections 30-4-10 through 30-4-165 of the Code, gives every person "the right to inspect, copy, or receive non-exempt Public Records," as Spartanburg County puts it, and the Department of Public Safety applies it to its own records; incident reports and arrest records are public under section 30-4-50, and the investigative file may be withheld while it would harm a prosecution. Who is in custody is in the Department of Corrections' inmate search, which "displays photographs and public information on inmates currently sentenced to and incarcerated in the South Carolina Department of Corrections (SCDC) as of midnight the previous day," with a separate released inmate search, and in the county detention centers' rosters, Charleston's and Greenville's among them, linked from the county pages. The arrest records page covers the rest.

A South Carolina judgment is a lien on the debtor's real property in the county where it is enrolled for ten years, under section 15-35-810, "judgments lien on real estate continue for ten years," and is enforceable for the same ten years under section 15-39-20, with no renewal. A South Carolina judgment older than ten years is neither a lien nor collectible. The court records page covers where the judgments are searched.

South Carolina is a single federal judicial district, the District of South Carolina, under 28 U.S.C. 121, in eleven divisions. Court sits at Charleston for Berkeley, Charleston, Clarendon, Colleton, Dorchester and Georgetown; at Columbia for Kershaw, Lee, Lexington, Richland and Sumter; at Florence for Chesterfield, Darlington, Dillon, Florence, Horry, Marion, Marlboro and Williamsburg; at Aiken for Aiken, Allendale and Barnwell; at Orangeburg for Bamberg, Calhoun and Orangeburg; at Greenville for Greenville and Laurens; at Rock Hill for Chester, Fairfield, Lancaster and York; at Greenwood for Abbeville, Edgefield, Greenwood, McCormick, Newberry and Saluda; at Anderson for Anderson, Oconee and Pickens; at Spartanburg for Cherokee, Spartanburg and Union; and at Beaufort for Beaufort, Hampton and Jasper. A federal case from any South Carolina county is on that court's docket and on PACER, whose prices and gaps are on the criminal records page.

Whether a person has a South Carolina record: SLED CATCH answers it for $25, by name and date of birth, from the state repository.

Whether a person was charged in a county: the public index answers it, free, one county at a time, with the docket.

Whether a person is in custody now: the county detention center roster answers it, and the Department of Corrections for state prison.

Whether an old case can still be found: an expunged case is destroyed everywhere the order reaches, a judgment dies at ten years, and a copy that predates an expungement is reached through the federal rule.