The North Carolina State Bureau of Investigation describes itself on its background checks page as the central repository for criminal information in the state and offers checks to the public and to qualified organizations, each with its own scope and rules. The public's share is small. A person may see his or her own record through a fingerprint based Right to Review, and the bureau's employer page states that criminal history record information it maintains may be released only to entities with statutory authority or under a court order or subpoena; access for employment or licensing exists only where a state statute, a federal mandate or a local ordinance authorizes a fingerprint based check, and every authorized body signs an Access Agreement with the bureau.
The courts are the open side. The Judicial Branch's criminal background check page explains that anyone can search, view or email criminal records for any person, in one county or statewide, at no charge on the public access computers in the clerk's office at any courthouse, or pay $25 for a certified single county search by name. Because every charged arrest produces a court file with the clerk of superior court, and because the clerk's data is what the bureau's own page on checking others points the public to, the county courthouse is where a North Carolina arrest is found. The North Carolina county pages list each clerk and sheriff.
- $14 to see your own record: the SBI's fingerprint based Right to Review returns a state only check on bureau letterhead, while a national identity history summary from the FBI costs $18.
- $25 certified, free uncertified: a clerk of superior court runs a certified name search of that one county for $25 on form AOC-CR-314, and the courthouse public access computers search any county or the whole state at no charge.
- Expunged by operation of law: under G.S. 15A-146(a4) a case disposed on or after December 1, 2021 in which every charge was dismissed or found not guilty is expunged automatically 180 to 210 days after final disposition, unless a felony was dismissed under a plea agreement.
- $175, or nothing: a petition for expunction generally costs $175, but a dismissal or not guilty verdict is expunged without a fee unless the dismissal came through deferred prosecution or a conditional discharge.
Written by SearchSystems.net from North Carolina's own systems: the North Carolina State Bureau of Investigation background checks page, the bureau's personal review page, the bureau's page for employers and licensing entities, the bureau's page on background checks on others, the bureau's forms page, the Judicial Branch criminal background check help page, the Judicial Branch form AOC-CR-314, criminal record search, the Judicial Branch expunctions help page, G.S. 15A-146 on expunction after dismissal or not guilty findings, the eCourts Portal, each read on October 15, 2026 by the SearchSystems editorial team.
The Right to Review at the SBI
The bureau's personal review page puts the state check at $14, fingerprint based and answered with a letter on SBI letterhead, requested on the form titled Request for Access to Criminal History Record Information, Right to Review, available in English and Spanish from its forms page alongside a background check form for adoptions and a consent form for restoring firearm rights. A national check is not the bureau's to sell; the page sends applicants to the FBI's identity history summary at $18, mailed to the CJIS Division in Clarksburg, West Virginia.
The Right to Review is non certified, and the Judicial Branch lists it as the SBI's statewide check for yourself. The bureau's customer service unit at 3320 Garner Road in Raleigh answers at 919-582-8660, and a banner on the background checks page gives the date of the requests currently being processed, which in mid October 2026 stood about four weeks behind.
Who the SBI will and will not check for an employer
The bureau serves as the state's CJIS Systems Agency, the single criminal justice agency the FBI designates to manage the network, and it releases employment and licensing records only to qualified agencies the General Assembly defines. An organization that wants access emails the Access Integrity Unit with the statutory authority behind its checks and, if approved, signs the Access Agreement that governs use and audits; the bureau also runs an audit program for those non criminal justice agencies.
A business without such authority is told plainly that name based public record checks from online vendors are not associated with the bureau and are not as accurate as fingerprint based checks, and that many private companies buy North Carolina court information and furnish it online. The North Carolina background check guide lists the licensing statutes that do carry fingerprint authority.
The clerk's $25 search and the free terminals
Form AOC-CR-314, issued under G.S. 7A-109, 7A-308(a)(17) and 7A-343(3) and last revised in May 2026, is filed with the clerk of superior court with $25, by mail with a money order or certified check since personal checks are refused, or in person with cash, a card, a money order or certified check. The certified result covers that county alone. The same office keeps public access computers on which anyone searches any county or the state as a whole, prints for a small charge and leaves with an uncertified result.
Online, the eCourts Portal offers a Smart Search by name, case number or attorney, a hearings search, a judgment index under G.S. 7A-109(b)(6) and payments for some criminal cases, with a CAPTCHA every ten minutes and attorneys able to request elevated access on form AOC-A-264. The Judicial Branch says individuals performing background checks should use the clerk's office rather than the Portal, which is not the complete official record and omits new filings still being processed and anything confidential.
Businesses that need continuous statewide data license the Remote Public Access program for real time or bulk extracts. The North Carolina court records guide follows each clerk.
Expunction: the statutes, the fee and the hearing
North Carolina has no single expungement law but a table of them, and the Judicial Branch expunctions page lists each with its petition form: G.S. 15A-145 for misdemeanor convictions, 15A-145.4 for a nonviolent felony committed under 18, 15A-145.5 for nonviolent felonies and misdemeanors, 15A-145.6 for prostitution offenses, 15A-146 for dismissals and not guilty findings, 15A-147 for identity theft and mistaken identity, 15A-148 for DNA records after a reversal or pardon of innocence, and 15A-149 for a conviction after a pardon of innocence.
A petition is filed with the clerk in the county of the charge, generally with a $175 fee, waived on a form for those who cannot pay, and the process takes months because of the record checks and, for some statutes, a good character hearing. An expunction under certain statutes bars a later one under others, which the page flags as a reason to choose carefully. Once granted, the clerk hands over the order and then destroys the file, so the only later proof is a certificate verifying a prior expunction, available for petitions filed on or after December 1, 2017 by sworn application to the Administrative Office of the Courts. Private websites are not bound by the order and must be contacted directly.
G.S. 15A-146 covers the arrest that produced no conviction. A single dismissed charge, multiple dismissals and a not guilty or not responsible finding may be expunged on petition by the person or by the district attorney, without a hearing in most cases and with no fee unless the dismissal followed a deferred prosecution agreement or conditional discharge, in which case $175 is paid, with $122.50 going to the SBI for its record checks.
Subsection (a4) adds the automatic rule: where all charges in a case were disposed on or after December 1, 2021 and all were dismissed without leave, dismissed by the court or ended in not guilty or not responsible, the charges are expunged by operation of law not less than 180 and not more than 210 days after final disposition, with no petition, except that a felony dismissed under a plea agreement is never expunged this way.
The Administrative Office of the Courts was ordered to automate it, and civil license revocations tied to the charge can be expunged with it. An arresting agency may keep its investigative file. The North Carolina criminal records guide covers the conviction statutes in detail.
Prison, probation and the registry
The bureau's page on checking others points to two more state files. The Department of Public Safety keeps a public offender search of people serving or who have served a state prison sentence and those on parole or post release supervision, and the SBI runs the statewide sex offender registry, searchable by name, address, radius or registration number and feeding the national site. A person held in a county jail after arrest is in neither, which makes the sheriff's jail roster the right stop for a recent booking, covered in the North Carolina inmate search guide, while the registry's tiers and duration are covered in the North Carolina sex offender registry guide.
Questions about North Carolina arrest records
Related North Carolina records
North Carolina readers can continue with the North Carolina criminal records guide for conviction files and the expunction statutes, the North Carolina court records guide for the clerks and the Portal, the North Carolina background check guide for employer authority, the North Carolina public records law guide for chapter 132, and the North Carolina county pages for every sheriff and clerk.