Illinois enacts law to clear arrest records of those not convicted

World Today

Chicago is the third most populous city in the United States.  Last year, 415 people were murdered there, the highest in any American city.

Now the state of Illinois has pushed through what some view as a counter-intuitive idea to curb the violence. A new law that gives juvenile offenders a clean arrest record once they turn 18. CCTV’s Roza Kazan reports.

Rian King dreams of becoming a professional R&B singer. She has a medical billing job and can now afford to rent a recording studio for practice. But several years ago all that seemed next to impossible.

King was arrested when she was 16 but never charged. The incident came to haunt her when she was turned down for a job five years later.

She didn’t get the job and had to apply for an expungement, which took six months. Now, Illinois lawmakers have voted to make this process automatic, wiping clean arrest records for those juveniles who were arrested but never convicted.

Rian King believes the new law will help prevent arrest records from becoming stumbling blocks on the road to success.

New law: clean arrest record to curb violence

Chicago is the third most populous city in the United States. Last year, 415 people were murdered there, the highest in any American city.