Under House Bill 377, additional felonies that could be expunged include first-degree trafficking in a controlled substance, trafficking in a controlled substance within 1,000 feet of a school, first-degree wanton endangerment, first-degree bail jumping and fraudulent use of a credit card.
A bill filed for consideration in Frankfort would expand the number of felonies that could be removed from a person’s criminal record by the state’s expungement law.
House Bill 377 was filed by Rep. Darryl Owens, a Louisville Democrat and Rep. George Brown Jr., a Lexington Democrat.[In Louisville over the weekend, some 500 individuals attended the Reily Re-entry Project, a clinic to help clients of the Louisville Urban League expunge their records so that they could re-enter the workforce, according to Stephen Reily’s tweet Sunday.]
The state’s expungement law, which was passed in 2016, allows certain class D felonies, or any number of misdemeanors, to be removed from a person’s record.
Some of the felonies that can be expunged under the current law include theft of a legend drug, first-degree possession of a controlled substance, receiving stolen property over $500, third-degree burglary, first-degree criminal mischief, theft by unlawful taking over $500 and tampering with physical evidence.
Under Brown’s and Owens’ bill, additional felonies that could be expunged include first-degree trafficking in a controlled substance, trafficking in a controlled substance within 1,000 feet of a school, first-degree wanton endangerment, first-degree bail jumping and fraudulent use of a credit card.
The bill would also lower the fee for applying for an expungement from $500 to $200.
Brown said we would prefer a bill where all class D felonies are eligible for expungement.
“It should go to the judge, and the judge should make the decision on the class D felony” to expunge it or not, Brown said Friday. The goal of the bill, he said, is “to make sure we include as many offenses as we possibly can, so we can give Kentuckians their lives back.”
The $500 fee to file for expungement has been prohibitive for some people, Brown said.
The bill would also make any offense that occurred before Jan. 1, 1975, eligible for expungement, as long as the incident was not punishable by more than five years in prison and did not result in a serious physical injury. A person who received a full pardon from the governor for an offense committed before Jan. 1, 1975 would also be eligible for expungement.
“If we don’t give people the opportunity to participate in the mainstream economy, they are going to participate in the underground economy, and that’s what gets them incarcerated in the first place,” Brown said.
The bill, which was filed Thursday, has not yet been assigned to be heard by a committee.
A challenge facing the sponsors is “whether the bill will be called or not,” Brown said. The expungement bill is a companion bill of sorts, with a second bill Brown has filed, which will would restore the voting rights of certain felons after they complete their prison sentence, probation or parole.
“People should not be relegated to second-class citizenship,” Brown said.
