Doing a Maryland Criminal Records Search? You've Got to Follow This Advice!

There are lots of reasons why you would need to see if someone had a criminal history, but no matter why you’re searching through Maryland’s criminal records, you need to know exactly how to proceed. Otherwise, your search could end up being a complete waste of time and money!

Here’s what you need to do to prevent that from happening:

– Hire a licensed private investigator

A license gives an investigator access to records and other information that are normally just reserved for law enforcement. By hiring a licensed private investigator, you’ll end up with a much more thorough — and more up-to-date — Maryland criminal records search.

You have to be really careful, though, because many of the websites that offer criminal records searches AREN’T run by licensed private investigators. In fact, they’re not run by anyone with any kind of investigative background! They’ll make it sound like they have access to all the information that you need, but they don’t.

Maryland Criminal Court Records

– Find out which resources your investigator is going to dig through

A good investigator will do your entire Maryland criminal records search by hand. That’s a major upgrade from those websites that have everything automated. With them, there’s no human oversight to make sure you don’t get a false positive or other inaccurate information.

That being said, though, your Maryland criminal records search will only be worthwhile if your investigator looks through:

– Records from the Maryland Administrative Office of Courts, which is made up of monthly updates on nearly three million people who have gone through the state criminal court system. Your investigator will be able to get official information — including a case number, a tracking number, and a CJIS code. He’ll also be able to show you a description of the offense committed and the current court disposition.

– Records from the Maryland Department of Corrections, which includes details about the offense committed and the holding facility where the person in question served his sentence. Like the court records, this information is also updated monthly.

– The Maryland Sex Offender Registry, which includes bi-weekly updates on offenders and the offenses they have committed. These records also contain an absconder status — meaning the offender is in violation of his parole, probation, or other conditions.

– An entire index of prior criminal records searches, including those done at the state level and through federal requests.

– Records that detail certain traffic offenses.

Maryland Criminal Search

– Don’t waste your time with instant results

At first, it sounds like the perfect solution. After all, when you’re trying to out if someone has a criminal history, the sooner you get an answer the better. However, these instant results make it impossible for you to get thorough results.

How so?

In order to give you instant information, all of the data already has to exist on a server. And remember, these websites can’t access the same things that a licensed private investigator can, so there’s no way for them to have comprehensive, current information on their server. Instead, they buy up old public records and load them onto the server. Unfortunately, the results you’ll get from them are likely to be several years old!

– Don’t wait longer for answers than you have to

Just because you need to wait for a licensed private investigator to comb through a variety of resources by hand doesn’t mean you need to sit around for long. A good investigator knows how to make his search as efficient as possible so that you can get the results as soon as possible. Here at Docusearch, we can perform a Maryland criminal records search by hand and get the results to you within one business day.

– Find out about fees and costs before you commit to anyone

A reputable investigator is going to run an honest business — meaning he won’t sneak a bunch of hidden fees into his service. You’ll be asked to pay a one-time fee, your investigator will run the search, and then you’ll get the results. Easy, right?

Unfortunately, it’s not nearly that easy when you deal with most websites. They’ll reel you in with promises of very cheap — or even free — searches. But then when it comes time for you to actually see the results, they’ll ask you to pay an expensive fee or force you to sign up for a costly subscription service. In the end, dealing with one of these websites can cost you a whole lot more than hiring a licensed private investigator!

Looking for a great team to hire? Let the team of investigators at Docusearch handle your next Maryland criminal records search.