If you are convicted of an offence it may result in you having a criminal record. A criminal record is simply a document held by police that lists all of the offences you have been convicted of (excluding parking and speeding fines).
Naturally, many of our clients are concerned about the effect a criminal record may have on their future. These clients are right to be worried as having a criminal record may affect your ability to secure employment, join the defence forces or certain government departments, gain access to mining sites and travel overseas. However, if your conviction is spent you generally do not need to disclose that you were convicted of the offence and it will not appear on your National Police Certificate.
There are some exceptions where you will need to disclose that you have spent convictions including when you apply for a Working With Children Check or for a firearms licence. There are a number of other exceptions as well.
You can make an application for a spent conviction order at the time you are sentenced for the offence, and there are obvious advantages in having a specialist criminal lawyer assist you with this.
In order to have a conviction spent there are certain criteria that the Court must first be satisfied of. These include -:
– that the offence was trivial or that you are otherwise a person of good character,
– that you are not likely to reoffend; and
– that you should be relieved immediately of the adverse effect that a conviction may have on you.
The Court is not obliged to grant you a spent conviction order and the granting of these orders is discretionary. If you are not successful in having your conviction spent you usually have to wait at least 10 years before you can apply again. It is therefore important that you make the most of your initial application as the consequences of a conviction can be severe.
At Kate King Legal our team of experienced criminal lawyers can make this application on your behalf in court and can help you in advance of the court hearing in gathering all of the evidence that will most assist. For a free 15 minute telephone consultation with one of our solicitors call us now on (08) 9467 3333 or click here to fill out an online enquiry.
