Can I expunge a newspaper or online article about my arrest? A Minnesota expungement attorney explains
If you are asking government agencies to expunge an arrest record, the law in this area is covered by Minnesota Statute § 299C.11. If you are asking government agencies to expunge your conviction, those laws are covered in Chapter 609A. But if the information you want expunged is on the internet, or being published by a private newspaper, what to do becomes more tricky. The information you want gone is not possessed by the government. At the time this blog is being written, you cannot get a court order to require a private company to expunge a record.
The right to be forgotten does not exist in the United States
In Europe, they have a concept called “the right to be forgotten” where people charged with certain crimes can have the internet and newspaper articles wiped out. See Newspaper Expungement by Brian Murray. Google has been forced to honor the court orders and purge certain records. The catch, is that Google is only purging it for people who are searching in Europe. And Google has no compulsion to purge any records for people in Minnesota or anywhere in the United State of America. People have tried to use legal action after expungement to force newspapers to purge their data. In Martin v. Hearst Corp., a woman who had her record expunged in court, subsequently sued multiple media outlets for continuing to keep up records of her arrest. 777 F.3d 546 (2nd Cir. 2015). The federal court dismissed the lawsuit because the expungement orders were only directed at the government agencies and they could not compel a private agency to do so. Part of the reasons for this is the freedom of the press as protected under our constitution. But there are also arguments that expungement under a just process does not infringe on this. Getting into the nuances of this argument is beyond the scope of this blog article. But suffice it to say that you cannot get a court order to compel a private agency to expunge the record. However, that does not mean that you don’t have any options.
Petition the newspaper or online source to take down the article
Many newspapers, print or online, are opening up avenues for people to petition to take down an old news story about their crime. It’s important to keep in mind that this is not a legal process in a court of law. It’s completely up to the newspaper whether they will do it or not. But many newspapers in recent years have developed criteria similar to what you would see in a court of law to help them determine whether they will take down the article or not. If you are suffering because of an old newspaper article about you, you can ask them to take it down. But you also may want to talk to an expungement attorney first. Similar to court expungement, there is strategy involved in getting a newspaper expungement.
Hire an attorney who has had success getting a newspaper article expugned
I’ve worked with a client to get an online newspaper article to take down about his arrest. He was incredibly relieved because he didn’t want his daughter to ever stumble upon the dumb mistake while surging the web. It was an old offense and a judge had already expunged the court records. Some lawyers would stop as just getting a court ordered expungement. But I knew it was important to the client to purge this record as well as the government agencies, and we were able to successfully get it off the web.
Conclusion
If you want to expunge your old records, you want an attorney who is knowledgeable, experienced, and well versed in the law on expungements and pardons. There are many attorneys in the state of Minnesota who offer to do expungements and pardons, but don’t practice in the area enough to know the intricacies of the law and how to utilize that to their client’s advantage. Contact Jack Rice Defense today for a free consultation. 651-447-7650
Peter Lindstrom
Peter is the head of the appellate and expungement departments at Jack Rice Defense. He has successfully expunged cases involving challenging issues with DWI, felony, and violence against family member cases. At the district court level, he has tried two felony jury trials to verdict, and successfully dismissed a felony gun case on 4th amendment grounds. Peter is particularly known for his intelligence, creativity, and legal acumen.
