DC · state guide

District of Columbia background screening law

How the courts here are organized

The District of Columbia is not a state, and its court structure is the clearest place that shows. There is one trial court of general jurisdiction, the Superior Court of the District of Columbia, and it is given criminal jurisdiction in a single sentence. Section 11-923(b)(1) provides that "Except as provided in paragraph (2), the Superior Court has jurisdiction of any criminal case under any law applicable exclusively to the District of Columbia." There is no county court layer, no municipal court layer and no separate felony court, so the question of which court holds the file has one answer here.

Prosecution is split by offense type rather than by court, which is a structural feature that follows from the District not being a state. Section 23-101(a) provides that "Prosecutions for violations of all police or municipal ordinances or regulations and for violations of all penal statutes in the nature of police or municipal regulations, where the maximum punishment is a fine only, or imprisonment not exceeding one year, shall be conducted in the name of the District of Columbia by the Corporation Counsel for the District of Columbia [Attorney General for the District of Columbia] or his assistants." Section 23-101(c) then provides that "All other criminal prosecutions shall be conducted in the name of the United States by the United States attorney for the District of Columbia or his assistants, except as otherwise provided by law." A felony therefore runs through the U.S. Attorney in the name of the United States, while a police or municipal-type offense runs through the Attorney General for the District.

The prosecutor's identity does not change where the record sits, and that is the point a search protocol turns on. A felony prosecuted by the U.S. Attorney is still a D.C. Code offense tried in the Superior Court, so it appears on the same court docket as a misdemeanor prosecuted by the Attorney General. The D.C. Code also supplies criminal offenses of general applicability of its own at Title 22, §§ 22-301 to 22-4517, so there is no gap in which conduct is criminal only under federal law and therefore invisible to a District court search.

Appeals go to the District's own court rather than to a federal one. Section 11-701(a) provides that "The District of Columbia Court of Appeals (hereafter in this subchapter referred to as the "court") shall continue as a court of record in the District of Columbia." It is the D.C. Court of Appeals, and the structure it sits on top of is a single trial court with a criminal division rather than a hierarchy of county and municipal courts.

There is no District repository in the state sense, because the District is not a state. There is no D.C. equivalent of a state police criminal-history file open to private employers, and the Code supplies no register of its own: a search for "criminal justice information system" returns nothing in the D.C. Code. The definition the Code does carry is about routes rather than about a file. Section 4-1501.04(5) provides that ""Criminal background check" means the investigation of an individual's criminal history through the record systems of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Metropolitan Police Department, or other law enforcement agencies."

The three routes are therefore a federal fingerprint-based system, a local police department, and a court clerk. The Code shows the shape of authorized access rather than a commercial one. Section 4-1501.04(a) provides that "The Mayor may obtain criminal history records maintained by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Metropolitan Police Department, and traffic records maintained by the Department of Motor Vehicles, to investigate a person applying for employment with any covered child or youth services provider." That gateway is tied to covered child or youth services provider roles and it names the Mayor as the obtaining party, so it is not a route a private employer or its screening provider can read across into general hiring.

How a search routes follows from the court structure rather than from a repository. One trial court of general jurisdiction, the Superior Court, Criminal Division, hears every D.C. Code criminal case, felony and misdemeanor alike, so there is no county layer to search and no need for multi-court aggregation within the District. Felonies are prosecuted federally by the U.S. Attorney in the name of the United States, but they are D.C. Code offenses tried in the Superior Court, so they appear on the same docket. The D.C. Code supplies general criminal offenses at Title 22, so there is no gap where conduct is criminal only under federal law.

Sealing is now part of what a District search has to account for, and it changed recently. Title 16, Chapter 8, §§ 16-801 to 16-807, carries automatic sealing that is operative and applicable as of March 1, 2025. Section 16-805(a)(1) seals non-conviction citations, arrests and charges automatically, and (a)(2) seals misdemeanor convictions automatically after 10 years since completion of sentence, subject to 17 categorical exclusions at § 16-805(b), with sealing deadlines of October 1, 2027 or within 90 days, whichever is later. Sealed records remain available to courts, prosecutors and law enforcement, including for "Employment decisions" under § 16-806(b)(1)(F), and to certain listed entities under § 16-801(11)(D) to (F).

The dispute that follows from sealing is specific and worth planning for. Section 16-806(c) lets a person rely on the clerk's "no records are available" response, so a report that carries a conviction the clerk will not confirm is a report the subject can answer with the clerk's own position. The routing conclusion is that a District answer has to say whether it came from a law-enforcement record system or from the Superior Court, and a court answer has to state the sealing position as of the search date. Nothing in the District aggregates the two, and that absence is structural rather than a matter of access policy.

The federal baseline

Federal law sets the floor here as it does everywhere. It is at 15 U.S.C. §1681 et seq., it binds the agency and the employer separately, and it does not vary by state. The FCRA article covers it section by section, including the seven-year limits, the salary threshold and the adverse action sequence, so that this page does not restate any of it.

What follows is only the overlay: what District of Columbia adds on top of that floor, and where it departs from it.

What District of Columbia law adds

Reporting limits at a glance

Every figure below is against District of Columbia law. Where a row says “federal only”, the state has set nothing and 15 U.S.C. §1681c governs.

Adverse action here

The federal sequence applies unchanged: pre-adverse action notice with a copy of the report and the summary of rights, a reasonable opportunity to dispute, then the adverse action notice with the agency's details and a dispute route. The FCRA article sets it out in full.

The District's addition runs after the decision rather than before it. Section 32-1342(e) provides that an applicant who believes a conditional offer was terminated or an adverse action was taken on the basis of a criminal conviction "may request, within 30 days after the termination or adverse action, that the employer provide the applicant within 30 days after the receipt of the request: (1) A copy of any and all records procured by the employer in consideration of the applicant, including criminal records; and (2) A notice that advises the applicant of his or her opportunity to file an administrative complaint with the Office of Human Rights." There is no state pre-adverse-action notice to pair with the federal one, and the state clock only starts once the decision has been communicated.

That record-copy right is the one place a screening provider is directly in the employer's path. The employer has 30 days from receipt of the applicant's request to supply a copy of any and all records it procured in consideration of the applicant, including criminal records, together with the Office of Human Rights notice. Where the records came from a consumer reporting agency, the employer cannot answer inside its own window without the agency's cooperation, so the request should be routed to the agency on receipt rather than at the deadline. This is an operating obligation that survives whether or not the decision itself was sound.

The remedy is administrative and it is exclusive, which changes how a challenge is defended. Section 32-1343 provides that a person claiming to be aggrieved may file an administrative complaint with the Office of Human Rights, that the administrative remedies referenced in § 32-1344 are exclusive, and that the person "shall have no private cause of action in any court based on a violation of this subchapter". The filing deadline that governs the route is the Human Rights Act deadline at § 2-1403.04(a): "Any complaint under this chapter shall be filed with the Office within 1 year of the occurrence of the unlawful discriminatory practice, or the discovery thereof." A demand letter that offers to litigate the conditional-offer decision is not offering a route the subchapter creates.

A credit component carries its own exposure that attaches before any decision is made. Section 2-1402.11(a)(4)(D) prohibits the request itself, so a report ordered with a credit component in a District process where no exception at § 2-1402.11(d) applies is the unlawful practice whether or not it contributes to an outcome. Where it does contribute, the Commission on Human Rights orders a fine of $1,000 for the first violation, $2,500 for the second and $5,000 for each subsequent violation, and the exceptions are narrow: a District-law requirement, police and law enforcement positions, named District financial offices, a District-law security clearance, disclosures by District employees to two oversight bodies, financial institutions where the position involves access to personal financial information, and a lawful subpoena, court order or law enforcement investigation.

Sealed records are the dispute to expect next. Automatic sealing is operative and applicable as of March 1, 2025, and § 16-806(c) lets a person rely on the clerk's "no records are available" response. A report that carries a conviction the court will not confirm is therefore answerable with the clerk's own position rather than with a dispute about accuracy, and § 16-806(b)(1)(F) shows where the record does remain available, which is to courts, prosecutors and law enforcement, including for "Employment decisions". There is no District adverse-action notice duty for a criminal-history report, no District lookback rule and no District pre-request notice for a criminal-history search; the overlay is the post-adverse-action request right at § 32-1342(e) and, where a credit component runs, the prohibition at § 2-1402.11(a)(4)(D) itself.

Screening in District of Columbia: what your process needs

• Do not plan around the cannabis chapter. Every operative section of Chapter 9B is marked "[Not Funded]" and the Code states that the amendment "has not been implemented", so an off-duty-use protection cannot be relied on by a candidate or asserted against an employer.
• Apply the cannabis rule that is in force, and apply it as a timing rule. Section 32-931(a) allows marijuana testing of a prospective employee only after a conditional offer has been extended, and (b)(4) preserves the employer's ability to deny the position on a positive result.
• Move the conviction inquiry to after the conditional offer. Section 32-1342(b) bars it "until after making a conditional offer of employment", and § 32-1341(3) defines a conditional offer as one conditional solely on the criminal-record inquiry or on some other employment-related contingency expressly communicated to the applicant at the time of the offer.
• Read the "inquiry" definition before deciding what is caught. Section 32-1341(8) covers "any direct or indirect conduct intended to gather criminal history information from or about an applicant using any method, including application forms, interviews, and criminal history checks", so the rule is not confined to a box on a form.
• Keep the arrest and non-conviction restraint in place after the offer. Section 32-1342(a) stands on its own, so the offer that unlocks the conviction inquiry does not unlock an inquiry about an arrest or about an accusation that is not pending or that did not result in a conviction.
• Document the decision against the six factors, not against the record. Section 32-1342(d) requires a legitimate business reason that is reasonable in light of the specific duties of the position, the bearing of the offense on fitness to perform them, the time elapsed, the applicant's age at the time of the offense, the frequency and seriousness of the offense, and any information the applicant produced on rehabilitation and good conduct.
• Build the records-on-request process before it is needed. Section 32-1342(e) gives the applicant 30 days after the adverse action to ask for a copy of any and all records procured and the Office of Human Rights notice, and gives the employer 30 days from receipt to answer, so the agency that supplied the records has to be inside that window.
• Do not expect a state pre-adverse-action step. The federal sequence is the whole of the pre-decision duty, and the District's rights attach after the termination or adverse action.
• Route a complaint to the right forum. Section 32-1343 makes the Office of Human Rights route exclusive and removes any private cause of action, and the filing deadline at § 2-1403.04(a) is one year from the occurrence or discovery of the practice.
• Check the employer count and the entity. The threshold is more than 10 employees in the District, the District government is covered, and the courts are excluded, so an entity that assumes it is outside the Act on size should verify the count and the coverage.
• Check the (c) exclusions before assuming a gap is available. The subchapter does not apply where a federal or District law or regulation requires consideration of an applicant's criminal history, to a position designated as part of a federal or District government program or obligation designed to encourage the employment of those with criminal histories, or to any facility or employer that provides programs, services or direct care to minors or vulnerable adults.
• Do not apply a seven-year employment lookback. Section 32-1342 contains no time limit, and the seven-year rule at Title 42, Chapter 35B belongs to housing and reaches only 48 enumerated serious offenses.
• Do not run credit for a District role unless an exception applies, and treat the request itself as the prohibited act. Section 2-1402.11(a)(4)(D) is an antidiscrimination provision, so the analysis is the Human Rights Act analysis rather than the FCRA analysis, and the penalties are ordered by the Commission on Human Rights.
• Check the wage-history and pay-posting rules if the process collects pay information. Section 32-1452(4) and (5) bar screening on wage history and seeking it from a previous employer, and § 32-1453.01(a)(1) requires the minimum and maximum projected salary or hourly pay in all job listings and position descriptions advertised.
• Scope a court search to the one court and abandon the county model. Every conviction, felony and misdemeanor alike, is adjudicated in the Superior Court of the District of Columbia, so a single court search covers the jurisdiction and there is no county file to add.
• Say where the answer came from. There is no District repository in the state sense, so an answer is either a law-enforcement record system answer or a Superior Court answer, and only the second is a court record. Check the sealing position as of the search date, because § 16-806(c) lets the person rely on the clerk's "no records are available" response.
• Do not look for an AI-specific rule. There is none, and the Human Rights Act together with the method-neutral definition of "inquiry" still governs how a screening tool may be used.

Related states

• Virginia. Virginia repealed its private-sector ban-the-box in 1985 and never replaced it, and it regulates the screening provider instead: a business screening service must register with the State Police to receive sealing notifications, must delete a sealed record regardless of the source it came from, must carry the record’s collection date on every dissemination, and is liable for $1,000 or actual damages. Its sealing sections moved to a new chapter on 1 July 2026 and its cannabis employer-disclosure ban was repealed the same day.
• Pennsylvania. Pennsylvania limits how a conviction may be used rather than whether it may be asked about: 18 Pa.C.S. § 9125 lets an employer consider a felony or a misdemeanor conviction only to the extent it relates to the applicant’s suitability for the position applied for, and requires a written notice when a decision not to hire rests in whole or in part on criminal history record information, which the Third Circuit read in January 2026 to reach a conviction the applicant volunteered. The State Police repository answers against Pennsylvania law enforcement records only and never federal ones, a Pennsylvania court docket sits outside the state criminal history statute altogether, and the docket number that identifies a case carries a county code where a judicial district number would be expected. Philadelphia then bans the inquiry, reaching research conducted for an employer by a third party, and sets a seven-year felony and four-year misdemeanor window measured from the underlying arrest or release from incarceration, whichever is later, with ten business days to answer a provisional decision.
• New York. New York sets its salary threshold at $25,000, so the seven-year limit reaches jobs federal law exempts, and its bar on reporting arrests has no time limit attached to it.

What we do

The District is one jurisdiction with one trial court, and the two rules that catch people out are a cannabis chapter that was never funded and a ban-the-box that ends at the offer rather than before the decision. Chapter 9B carries the Cannabis Employment Protections Amendment Act of 2022 with every operative section marked "[Not Funded]", so what is live on cannabis is only the 2015 rule that bars testing before a conditional offer while leaving a positive result a lawful reason to refuse hire. The Fair Criminal Record Screening Amendment Act triggers on that same offer, bars arrest and non-conviction inquiries at every stage, requires a "legitimate business reason" tested against six enumerated factors, and gives the applicant a post-adverse-action right to the records the employer procured inside two 30-day windows, which puts a consumer reporting agency's cooperation inside the employer's deadline. Credit information is prohibited by the Human Rights Act rather than by a consumer-reporting statute, with the exceptions turning on the position. There is no District repository in the state sense, because the District is not a state; the routes are the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Metropolitan Police Department and the Superior Court clerk, and because every conviction, felony and misdemeanor alike, is adjudicated in the one Superior Court, a single court search covers the jurisdiction. Our District work keeps the conditional offer, the legitimate-business-reason test and the post-adverse-action request window in the right order, and states whether a law-enforcement record or a court record answered the question. If your current vendor quotes the cannabis protections as live law, or applies a seven-year lookback that belongs to the housing statute, this is where that shows.

Sources

• D.C. Code § 32-1342, the Fair Criminal Record Screening Amendment Act of 2014, including the inquiry bans at (a) and (b), the legitimate-business-reason factors at (d) and the two 30-day periods at (e)
• D.C. Code § 32-1341, definitions, including "Conditional offer" at (3), "Employer" at (6) and "Inquiry" at (8)
• D.C. Code § 32-1343, the administrative complaint route and the exclusion of a private cause of action, and § 32-1344, the tiered penalties
• D.C. Code Title 32, Chapter 13B, Subchapter I, §§ 32-1341 to 32-1346, read as a whole
• D.C. Code Title 32, Chapter 9B, the Cannabis Employment Protections Amendment Act of 2022, every operative section marked "[Not Funded]"
• D.C. Law 24-190, including the applicability condition at § 401 and the employment protections at § 102
• D.C. Code Title 32, Chapter 9A, §§ 32-931 and 32-932, the 2015 restriction on pre-employment marijuana testing
• D.C. Code § 2-1402.11, the Human Rights Act credit information prohibition at (a)(4)(D), the exceptions at (d), the definitions at (e) and the unfunded medical marijuana provision at (b-1)
• D.C. Code § 2-1403.04, the Human Rights Act one-year filing deadline for a complaint with the Office of Human Rights
• D.C. Code § 11-923, the criminal jurisdiction of the Superior Court, and § 11-701, the continuation of the D.C. Court of Appeals as a court of record
• D.C. Code § 23-101, conduct of prosecutions, including the split between the Attorney General for the District of Columbia at (a) and the U.S. Attorney at (c)
• D.C. Code § 4-1501.04, the definition of "Criminal background check" at (5) and the authorization to obtain records at (a)
• D.C. Code Title 32, Chapter 14A, §§ 32-1451 to 32-1457, the wage-history inquiry ban and the pay-range posting mandate
• D.C. Code § 16-805, automatic sealing, including the applicability note recording that D.C. Law 25-175 has been funded
• D.C. Code § 16-803, the motion-based sealing waiting periods
• D.C. Code § 16-806, the availability and effect of sealed records, including the employment decisions exception at (b)(1)(F) and the clerk response at (c)
• D.C. Code § 42-3541.02, the housing seven-year rule for 48 enumerated serious offenses
• D.C. Code, full-text searches of the official Code for "Fair Credit Reporting Act", "artificial intelligence", "algorithmic", "automated employment decision", "automated decision" and "criminal justice information system"
• Route note: all findings rest on the official D.C. Code and on District acts, read 23 September 2026 with the Code current through 5 September 2026. Deep paths on code.dccouncil.gov, including the search endpoint and per-title aggregate pages, return HTTP 404, so the Code and the enacted laws were read through the Council's own law-xml corpus, obtained as a branch tarball from codeload.github.com and searched as one concatenated text corpus. Justia, casetext, LegiScan and codes.findlaw.com are blocked from this environment and were not used. No D.C. Court of Appeals or Office of Human Rights decision resolving the questions left open on this page was found.

Last reviewed 23 September 2026. This page is checked on a quarterly cycle, because state screening law changes every legislative session. Nothing here is legal advice; see the terms of use.