Barone Defense Firm Expunges Financial Felony from Client’s Record

Our client in this case called the Barone Defense Firm looking for an expungement attorney after hearing about the Clean Slate Act. He wanted to expunge a felony off his criminal record. The Client was a family man who had moved out of state to better his life after running into some trouble as young man. On his criminal record were convictions for felony use of a financial transaction device, misdemeanor operating while intoxicated, and misdemeanor filing a false police report. Times were tough for him at the age these convictions happened, and he, admittedly, made some bad decisions.

The most important conviction to get off his record was the felony use of a financial transaction device. This mistake in his life had prevented him from getting jobs. But he had grown up and matured from those days. He had stayed out of trouble, started a family, and established a career. The felony was preventing him from advancing his career and being more involved in his kids' extracurricular activities.

Upon hearing that there was more access to expungements in Michigan, the client set out to find the best expungement lawyer. He had a consultation with associate attorney and intake specialist at the Barone Defense Firm, Ryan Ballard. Mr. Ballard listened to his goals, how the conviction was affecting his life, and gave him a game plan to give him his best chance at expunging the felony. Mr. Ballard also explained, in detail, the process of the expungement and how the Barone Defense Firm's Senior Attorney, Ryan Ramsayer, would help him through the process. With this information, the client felt it was in his best interests to hire the Barone Defense Firm to help him with his expungement in Michigan.

Expungement cases, in general, are composed of two phases: (1) preparing and filing the petition and (2) appearing at the expungement hearing. Within these phases, careful and diligent work must be done by the attorney to prepare the petition and advocate for the client at the hearing.

In this particular case, the client lived out of state. This meant that much of the work preparing the petition had to be done through the mail. We had to prepare a fingerprint card for the Michigan State Police, get a certified copy of the judgement from the court, and obtain an FBI background check. Then, the petition had to be prepared. The petition is the highly personalized, written opportunity to convince the judge that the expungement should be granted.

Mr. Ramsayer assisted the client with the work getting everything done through the mail, making it as painless as possible. Mr. Ramsayer took a great deal of time to get to know the client; what his life was when the conviction happened, what it is now, and what it would be if the felony was expunged. These personal conversations allowed Mr. Ramsayer to craft a convincing written petition and a persuasive oral argument for the hearing.

After filing the petition in Bay County Circuit Court, a hearing was held by Zoom a couple months later. The judge was moved by both Mr. Ramsayer's advocacy and the client's statements to the court. At the end of the hearing, the judge granted the petition for expungement. This result cleared the felony off the client's record. It will no longer show up on background checks for jobs and he will no longer have to disclose it if asked if he's ever been convicted of a felony.