Louisiana Expungement: Clearing a Misdemeanor From Your Record
Search “Louisiana expungement” and half the results still cite a statute that stopped existing more than a decade ago.
R.S. 44:9 was repealed by Acts 2014, No. 145, effective August 1, 2014, and its substance moved into the Louisiana Code of Criminal Procedure, Articles 971 through 996. A motion built around the old statute number, or around waiting periods and frequency limits that have since been amended or repealed outright, gets returned or denied — and the applicant loses time on a process that already runs five years deep in the best case. Getting the current article numbers and eligibility rules right the first time matters more in expungement than in almost any other filing, because a rejected motion doesn’t just cost a filing fee; it costs the waiting period the applicant already spent.
1. Two Different Records, Two Different Articles
Louisiana treats an arrest that never became a conviction very differently from a conviction that has run its course. Confusing the two is the most common reason a motion gets filed under the wrong article.
Arrest without conviction — Article 976. If the person was arrested but never prosecuted (and the time limit to bring charges has expired), if the district attorney declined to prosecute for any reason including successful completion of a pretrial diversion program, or if the case was dismissed, a motion to quash was granted, or the person was acquitted, the arrest record itself can be expunged. In most cases there is no waiting period tied to this path — the record is eligible once the case is finally resolved in the person’s favor.
One exception matters, and it involves DWI. Under Article 976(B), a person arrested for operating a vehicle while intoxicated who was placed into a pretrial diversion program is not entitled to an expungement until five years have elapsed from the date of arrest. A DWI diversion case is therefore not the quick, no-wait expungement that other declined or dismissed charges are.
Misdemeanor conviction — Article 977. A person convicted of a misdemeanor can expunge that conviction record after more than five years have elapsed since completing any sentence, deferred adjudication, probation, or parole — provided the person has not been convicted of a felony during that five-year period and has no felony charge pending. A motion filed on this basis must include a certification obtained from the district attorney verifying that, to the DA’s knowledge, the applicant has no felony convictions during the five-year period and no pending felony charges under a bill of information or indictment.
Two points people get wrong here. The felony-free requirement is exactly that — felony-free. An intervening misdemeanor conviction does not, by the terms of Article 977, defeat eligibility. And the DA certification requirement attaches to the five-year path specifically; it is not a general prerequisite for every misdemeanor expungement.
Operational guardrail: These two records often exist for the same case. Someone arrested on two separate charges, one of which was dismissed and one of which resulted in a misdemeanor conviction, needs two separate motions filed under two separate articles — not one combined filing. Treating them as a single record is a drafting error that produces an incomplete expungement.
2. The Article 894(B) Shortcut
There is a faster path to expunging a misdemeanor conviction, and it depends on how the case was originally resolved. If the defendant’s sentence was deferred under Code of Criminal Procedure Article 894(B) and the defendant successfully completed the terms — probation, community service, whatever the court imposed — the court may set the conviction aside and dismiss the prosecution. The dismissal has the same effect as an acquittal. Once that happens, Article 977(A)(1) makes the record expungeable without the five-year wait that applies to everyone else.
Sequencing matters. The motion to set aside and dismiss under Article 894(B) has to be filed and granted before the motion to expunge is filed — they are not the same motion, and they are not simultaneous. Filing the expungement motion first, before the set-aside is in place, produces a denial the applicant then has to correct and refile.
One limit lives on this side of the process rather than in the expungement articles: under Article 894(B)(2), discharge and dismissal for a DWI offense may occur only once per person in a ten-year period. Article 894(B)(3) creates a narrow exception allowing a discharge on a single subsequent DWI conviction within that ten-year window where the offender completed a DWI or sobriety court program and met the court’s other conditions. The general once-every-five-years limit on Article 894 discharges was removed in 2021.
The marijuana exception. Article 977(D), added by Acts 2023, No. 342, allows a person to move to expunge a misdemeanor conviction for a first offense possession of marijuana, tetrahydrocannabinol, or chemical derivatives after ninety days from the date of conviction — notwithstanding any other provision of law. For a qualifying first-offense possession case, ninety days is the shortest route in the Code, faster even than the 894(B) path.
3. What Cannot Be Expunged
Certain misdemeanor convictions are categorically excluded under Article 977(C), regardless of how much time has passed:
- Convictions arising from circumstances involving, or resulting from an arrest for, a sex offense as defined in R.S. 15:541 — though an interim expungement may be available under Article 985.1
- Domestic abuse battery convictions
- Stalking convictions (R.S. 14:40.2)
A note on frequency limits. Older articles — and a fair number of law firm pages still online — state that a misdemeanor conviction can be expunged only once every five years, and a DWI only once every ten. That was Article 977(D), and it was repealed by Acts 2020, No. 78. Article 977 as it reads today contains no cap on how often a person may expunge a misdemeanor conviction. The ten-year DWI restriction that remains on the books is in Article 894(B)(2) and governs the set-aside and dismissal, not the expungement itself.
DWI still gets separate treatment, just not the treatment those older articles describe. A misdemeanor DWI conviction is expungeable, but Article 984 requires the applicant to supplement the motion with a certified letter from the Department of Public Safety and Corrections, office of motor vehicles, confirming compliance with that article’s requirements, and directs the clerk to transmit the plea records to OMV. Article 984 also carries an additional fee, and it is one of the two express exceptions to the general fee cap discussed below.
4. What Expungement Actually Does — and Doesn’t Do
An expunged record is not destroyed. Louisiana law defines expungement as removal of a record from public access, not destruction of the record itself. The record remains available to law enforcement agencies, criminal justice agencies, prosecutors and judges — including for use as a predicate offense or under the Habitual Offender Law — and to a specific list of professional licensing boards, among them the medical, nursing, dental, psychology, and social work boards and the Louisiana Attorney Disciplinary Board and Committee on Bar Admissions. For nearly every other purpose — employment background checks, housing applications, most licensing outside that specific list — an expunged record is treated as if the arrest or conviction did not happen, and the person may generally deny that it occurred.
Under Article 983(A), the total cost to obtain a court order expunging a record may not exceed $550, except as provided in Articles 894 and 984 — which is where DWI matters come in with their added fee. That cap applies per arrest. A person seeking expungement of records tied to multiple separate arrests generally needs a separate motion, and a separate fee, for each.
5. The Automated Expungement Law Isn’t Running Yet
In 2023, the legislature enacted Code of Criminal Procedure Article 985.2 (Acts 2023, No. 454, originating as Senate Bill 111), directing the Louisiana Bureau of Criminal Identification and Information to identify records in its criminal repository for individuals eligible for expungement under Articles 976, 977, and 978. The article contemplates a defendant submitting a request to the Bureau — name, date of birth, last four digits of the Social Security number, arrest date, and case number — with the Bureau then expunging eligible records within thirty days, no court motion required.
Two caveats, and they are the whole story right now. First, the article takes effect only upon appropriation of funds by the legislature, and its own terms tie implementation to the necessary funding being provided. Second, as of this writing the system still is not operating: implementation has been held up by the technology and case-management upgrades needed to connect the state police database to the Louisiana Supreme Court’s case management system and the district clerks of court. Reporting as recently as August 2026 describes eligible Louisianans still working through expungement clinics using the conventional process.
Until the automated process is actually operational, the manual motion process under Articles 976 through 986 remains the only functioning path to expungement in Louisiana, regardless of what the 2023 law eventually authorizes.
Arrest Record vs. Misdemeanor Conviction: Side-by-Side
| Feature | Arrest Without Conviction (Art. 976) | Misdemeanor Conviction (Art. 977) |
|---|---|---|
| Waiting period | None once the case is resolved — except DWI pretrial diversion, which requires 5 years from the arrest date under Art. 976(B) | 5 years from completion of sentence, probation, or parole — unless set aside under Art. 894(B), or a first-offense marijuana possession under Art. 977(D) (90 days) |
| Felony-free requirement | Not applicable | No felony conviction during the 5-year window, and no pending felony charge |
| Frequency limit | No statutory limit on separate arrests | None in Art. 977 — the former limits were repealed in 2020. A separate 10-year limit applies to DWI set-asides under Art. 894(B)(2) |
| DA certification required | Not required by Art. 976 | Yes, for the 5-year path under Art. 977(A)(2); not for an 894(B) set-aside expungement |
| Categorical exclusions | N/A | Sex offenses (R.S. 15:541), domestic abuse battery, stalking |
| DWI treatment | 5-year wait from arrest if resolved by pretrial diversion | Expungeable, with an OMV certified letter and added fee under Art. 984 |
Frequently Asked Questions
Do I need a lawyer to file an expungement in Louisiana? The process does not legally require an attorney, but the uniform forms and the DA-certification requirements under Articles 977 and 983 are detailed enough that most applicants who self-file encounter avoidable delays or rejected motions.
How many misdemeanors can I expunge? Article 977 no longer limits how often a person may expunge a misdemeanor conviction — the once-every-five-years and once-every-ten-years provisions were repealed in 2020. Each arrest still requires its own motion and its own fee, and DWI set-asides under Article 894(B) remain limited to once per ten years.
How long does the expungement process take once filed? Timelines vary by parish and by whether the district attorney’s office contests the motion, but the certification and review process under Article 983 typically adds several weeks beyond the initial filing before a court signs the order.
Can an expunged Louisiana record still show up on a background check? It shouldn’t for most civilian employers or landlords once the expungement order is executed, but the record remains visible to law enforcement, criminal justice agencies, and the specific licensing boards listed in the statute, and some private background-check databases can lag behind the official record update.
A Note From Bloom Legal
This article provides general information about Louisiana expungement procedure and is not legal advice. Eligibility depends on the specific offense, disposition, and timing involved in each case. Consult a Bloom Legal attorney before filing a motion to set aside a conviction or a motion to expunge.
Citation Reference Table
| Citation | Subject |
|---|---|
| La. Code Crim. Proc. art. 976 | Motion to expunge record of arrest that did not result in a conviction; 976(B) five-year rule for DWI pretrial diversion |
| La. Code Crim. Proc. art. 977 | Motion to expunge a record of arrest and conviction of a misdemeanor; five-year waiting period and DA certification (977(A)(2)); categorical exclusions (977(C)); 90-day first-offense marijuana provision (977(D), added by Acts 2023, No. 342) |
| La. Code Crim. Proc. art. 894(B) | Deferred sentencing and set-aside of a misdemeanor conviction; 894(B)(2) ten-year limit on DWI discharge and dismissal; 894(B)(3) sobriety court exception |
| La. Code Crim. Proc. art. 983 | Costs and fees; $550 cap except as provided in Articles 894 and 984 |
| La. Code Crim. Proc. art. 984 | Additional requirements and fee for expungement of DWI records; OMV certified letter |
| La. Code Crim. Proc. art. 985.1 | Interim expungement, available in certain sex-offense-arrest cases resolved as misdemeanors |
| La. Code Crim. Proc. art. 985.2 | Automated expungement process (Acts 2023, No. 454; SB 111; effective upon appropriation, not yet operational) |
| La. R.S. 15:541 | Definition of sex offense for registration purposes, referenced in Article 977 exclusions |
| La. R.S. 44:9 | Former expungement statute, repealed by Acts 2014, No. 145, §3, effective August 1, 2014 |
