‘Clean slate’ plan would erase convictions

A so-called “clean slate” bill, which would wipe certain criminal convictions from a person’s record if they don’t reoffend, has moved forward with no Republican support in the General Assembly.

The Judiciary Committee advanced the bill Monday, as the Democratic majority in the state legislature seeks to pass criminal justice reforms they’ve been working on for years.

Sen. Gary Winfield, D-New Haven, co-chair of the committee, who has pushed for these reforms since taking office in 2009, has argued that these convictions are often barriers to finding employment and housing, and hamper people from fully moving on with their lives.

Under the bill, all misdemeanors would be erased from a person’s record seven years after their most recent conviction. Class C felonies would be erased 15 years after the most recent conviction, and Class D or E felonies would be wiped after 10 years. Unclassified felonies would also be erased after 10 or 12 years, depending on the length of someone’s prison sentence.

Family violence, sexual offenses and other crimes would not be eligible for automatic erasure.

State Rep. Craig Fishbein, R-Wallingford, ranking member of the committee, said while the bill contains “some good things,” the “bad certainly overtakes the good.”

“Philosophically I agree that for some low-level misdemeanors perhaps this should happen, but this bill deals with C, D and E felonies automatically being erased,” said Fishbein, a family law attorney.

“If we were to look at the list of those crimes, some are quite distressing. Strangulation is one of those that jumps off the page at me.”

Republicans have argued that the state already has a Board of Pardons and Paroles through which someone can request to have their records expunged. The bill would require the board to explain in writing its reason for denying someone’s request.

The bill would also ban discrimination based on the wiped criminal record information when someone went to apply for a job and seek housing — a provision Rep. Cara Pavalock-D’Amato, R-Bristol, took issue with.

“A lot of this bill I find very disturbing, that somebody who committed a crime against another individual, they would not be able to deny that person housing ... That’s crazy,” she said.