Please Note: The material on this website is provided for informational purposes only. It is not a consumer reporting agency as defined by The Fair Credit Reporting Act and should not be used to determine an individual's eligibility for personal credit or employment, or to assess risk associated with any business transactions such as tenant screening.

It is possible to investigate the criminal history of a person as a member of the public or a private organization. This is done through searching the publically available criminal records. In many states, these are now available in online databases and this makes the search much easier and quicker than ever before. But how thorough and detailed will the information actually be? Let’s find out.
History Length
How far back the search can go depends primarily on local laws. Often, you can check for criminal offences conducted during childhood and adolescence as well as during adulthood. This is not always the case, however. The publically available criminal history information may be only for the period after the person has reached legal age.
In many jurisdictions, certain types of offenses, which are usually minor, can be deleted from the public records after a certain period of time has passed. There are certain requirements which have to be met for this to happen. For instance, the person must have not committed criminal offenses since the respective event. It is a good idea to look more closely into the regulations regarding the availability of criminal offense information before you conduct a search.
Level of Detail
While law enforcement agencies and courts have access to the full criminal history of any person with a criminal record, this is not usually the case with members of the public. How detailed the information provided to the public is depends primarily on the legal requirements in the respective state. Usually, there is a list of all criminal offenses which the person has committed. The details which you can find include the type of offense committed, the date of the event, the case number and the name of the court which the case has been appointed to. In many cases, traffic offenses can also be found in the public records. They are typically available along with the criminal offenses, but they may be listed separately as well.
You need to keep in mind that usually only the criminal offenses which the person has been convicted for are present on the respective record. It is less common for the publically available record to include arrests, pending charges and dismissed charges. Generally, this information can be quite valuable for any investigation. Another thing to note is that in some cases information about criminal offenses can be kept private for safety reasons and other relevant legal reasons.
Even if you cannot access all details which you are interested in, a properly performed criminal history investigation should give you enough information to judge the trustworthiness of a person.