The Criminal Information Center inside the Mississippi Bureau of Investigation is the state repository, established in March 1998 under section 45-27-5 of the code and charged under section 45-27-7 with keeping the criminal records file and running fingerprint identification for every law enforcement agency in the state. Its AFIS unit ties each arrest to a single fingerprint identity no matter what name, birth date or Social Security number was given at booking, which is how the center produces a complete rap sheet; its Applicant Processing unit runs the fingerprint and name based checks that clear teachers, nurses, daycare and nursing home workers, bankers and casino employees; and its Special Processing unit enters court dispositions and carries out expunction orders by removing offenses from a person's Mississippi rap sheet.
A person who wants the file completes the center's Authorization to Release Background Information, form CIC/SPU 2.0, signs it before a notary, attaches a copy of a state ID or driver license, and mails it with a $32 money order to the bureau at 3891 Highway 468 West, Pearl, MS 39208. The form warns that any check may take up to 30 days. It also lets the subject direct the result to a third party by name and address, or by fax, which is how an adoption agency or a foreign consulate receives a Mississippi check. For the sheriffs who hold the booking records and jail dockets, see the Mississippi county pages.
- $32 and a notary: the release form goes to Pearl with a $32 money order, a copy of a state ID and a notarized signature, and the center allows up to 30 days to answer.
- Fingerprint or name, your choice: the same form authorizes either a fingerprint based or a name based check, released to the subject or to the third party written on the form.
- Three years, not five: House Bill 1546, signed March 30, 2026 and effective July 1, 2026, lets a person with one felony conviction petition for expunction three years after completing the sentence instead of five.
- Dismissed means expunged on petition: section 99-19-71(4) says a court shall expunge the record of any case where the person was arrested and released and the case was dismissed, the charges dropped, no disposition entered or a not guilty verdict returned.
Written by SearchSystems.net from Mississippi's own systems: the Department of Public Safety Criminal Information Center page, the Authorization to Release Background Information form, the Department of Public Safety home page, House Bill 1546 of the 2026 Regular Session as sent to the Governor, the Mississippi Electronic Courts page, the Mississippi Electronic Courts registration page, the Mississippi Department of Corrections home page with the inmate and parolee searches, the Department of Corrections public records requests page, each read on October 15, 2026 by the SearchSystems editorial team.
Filling out the release form
The form asks for the subject's name, address, Social Security number, date of birth in year month day order, race, sex and phone, and a reason: adoption, immigration or other. Blocks 11 to 15 name the person or agency that will receive the result, block 16 takes a fax number, and the text the subject signs authorizes release of any and all criminal records information held by or accessible to the Mississippi Justice Information Center, including every charge and conviction, and waives claims against the state over the release.
A notary completes the jurat at the foot of the page. The center accepts only a money order, and the form, dated December 2019, is still the one in use. The department's home page lists Background Check among its services beside driver licenses and firearm permits, with headquarters at 209 Allen Stuart Drive in Pearl, open weekdays from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., and a switchboard at 601-987-1212.
Employers, fingerprints and the applicant unit
Statutes rather than the center decide which employers get a fingerprint check. The Applicant Processing unit lists the categories it clears, from government workers, teachers and healthcare and social services staff to corrections officers, elder care and daycare employees, bankers, physicians, pharmacists, nurses and casino workers, and because the AFIS search is independent of the name, birth date or license number supplied, an applicant check finds a record filed under another identity.
A private employer outside those categories has no claim on the center's file and is left with the court records and the signed release route. The Mississippi background check guide explains the licensing boards that use the unit, and the center also enters the mental health adjudications that bar a firearm purchase into the national instant check system and runs the state's sex offender registration division, covered in the Mississippi sex offender registry guide.
Expunction under section 99-19-71 after the 2026 amendment
House Bill 1546, approved by the Governor on March 30, 2026 with an effective date of July 1, 2026, rewrote the felony paragraph of section 99-19-71. A person convicted of a felony who has paid all fines and court costs may now petition the convicting court to expunge one conviction three years after completing every term of the sentence, where the old text required five, subject to a hearing at the court's discretion, ten days' written notice to the district attorney, and a finding on the record that the petitioner is rehabilitated.
The excluded list stays long: crimes of violence under section 97-3-2, first degree arson, trafficking in controlled substances, a third or later DUI, felon in possession of a firearm, failure to register as a sex offender, voyeurism, witness intimidation, abuse of a vulnerable person, embezzlement, and, new in 2026, felony procuring and promoting prostitution. One felony expunction per lifetime is allowed, with convictions from a common nucleus of facts counted as one.
A first offender convicted of a misdemeanor other than a traffic violation may petition the justice, county, circuit or municipal court that convicted him without any waiting period written into the subsection.
The arrest rule is mandatory. Subsection 4 directs a justice, county, circuit or municipal court, on petition, to expunge the record of any case in which an arrest was made, the person was released and the case was dismissed, the charges were dropped, no disposition was ever entered, or the person was found not guilty at trial. After any order the Criminal Information Center keeps a nonpublic copy solely to decide in a later case whether the person is still a first offender, the district attorney may keep a nonpublic copy for law enforcement, an employer may still ask whether an order of expunction has been entered, and a prospective juror must tell the judge in chambers about the expunged conviction.
No public official may expunge a conviction connected to official duties. The bill also lets human trafficking victims ask a court to expunge misdemeanor and nonviolent convictions that flowed from their victimization. The Mississippi criminal records guide covers the paperwork for the convicting court.
Reading the court file on MEC
Mississippi's circuit, county and chancery courts file electronically through the Mississippi Electronic Courts system, a version of the federal CM/ECF software, and the judiciary announced on July 2, 2025 that electronic filing was complete statewide; the appellate courts and the youth courts run on the same platform. The MEC page offers a court by court login, from Adams County Chancery Court to Yazoo County Circuit Court, and the registration page sets a $10 annual fee for an attorney or non attorney account, with online payment usually giving same day access and a mailed check delaying it until processed.
A registered member of the public can view docket entries and download documents in any participating court, which is where a felony indictment, a plea and a sentencing order live. Municipal and justice court matters, where most misdemeanor arrests are heard, are not all on MEC, and the Mississippi court records guide lists those clerks by county. The MEC help desk answers at 601-576-4650 or helpdesk@mec.ms.gov.
Prisons, parolees and records requests
The Department of Corrections runs two searches from its home page, one for inmates and one for parolees, each by first and last name or MDOC ID number, alongside death row statistics and a family and friends guide. A person held in a county jail on a new arrest is not in either search unless already sentenced to state custody, which the Mississippi inmate search guide explains county by county. Requests for inmate records or any other department record go through its public records page under the Mississippi Public Records Act of 1983, section 25-61-1 and following, in writing through the online request system and never by telephone.
The same home page keeps a Legislation section where the department posts the session's bills that touch its work.
Questions about Mississippi arrest records
Related Mississippi records
Mississippi readers can continue with the Mississippi criminal records guide for conviction files and petitions, the Mississippi court records guide for the circuit and justice court clerks, the Mississippi background check guide for licensing board checks, the Mississippi public records law guide for the Public Records Act, and the Mississippi county pages for every sheriff and jail.
Arrests that start with a traffic stop carry on at the Mississippi DMV, which keeps its own records and runs its own suspensions: what the Mississippi DMV does to the license after a DUI, your Mississippi driving record, Mississippi license reinstatement after a suspension, the crash report after a Mississippi collision and the rest of the SearchSystems Mississippi DMV guide.