Check whether your Collin County record may qualify for clearing

• Free online eligibility check — no contact information until after you see your preliminary result
• Paralegal verification against the Collin County court record, then attorney approval
• $1,250 flat attorney fee for one standard matter; court filing fees separate

What we can help clear in Collin County

We handle the three main Texas record-clearing remedies for qualifying Collin County cases: expunction (removal of eligible arrest and case records under Chapter 55A of the Code of Criminal Procedure), orders of nondisclosure (sealing from ordinary public view under Government Code Chapter 411), and juvenile record sealing (Family Code Chapter 58). Which one fits — if any — depends on how the case ended, what you were charged with, the dates involved, and the rest of your record.

Collin County is inside our current service area, so a qualifying Collin County case needs no special arrangements. Our service area is a business decision about which matters we take on; which court a particular filing belongs in is a separate legal question that depends on the remedy and the underlying record.

Which court handles the filing

The filing court depends on the remedy, not on where our office is. An expunction petition is generally filed in a district court for the county where you were arrested or where the offense was alleged to have occurred; a fine-only case can instead be filed in a justice court or a municipal court of record in one of those counties. An order of nondisclosure is handled through the court connected to the underlying case — the court that placed you on deferred adjudication or community supervision, or that sentenced you. Juvenile record sealing follows separate Family Code procedures and is handled through the juvenile court served by the juvenile probation department your case was referred to. We confirm the proper court from the record before anything is filed.

Collin County situations that often qualify

These are the fact patterns we see most often from Collin County. Each one has conditions the screener walks through and the record review confirms; none of them is automatic.

• You were found not guilty. An acquittal at trial is one of the strongest expunction grounds, with no waiting period in the ordinary case. The main complication is a companion charge from the same incident that ended in a conviction or is still pending.
• You were arrested but never formally charged. If no information or indictment was ever presented, expunction can become available after a waiting tier measured from the arrest — 180 days for a Class C arrest, one year for a Class A or B misdemeanor arrest, three years where a felony was involved — or sooner if the prosecutor certifies the records are not needed.
• Your case was dismissed. Dismissals reached through pretrial intervention, a veterans treatment court or mental health court program, a finding that the charge rested on mistake or false information, or a void charging instrument can support expunction without waiting for limitations to run. Other dismissals generally wait for the limitations period to expire — usually two years for a misdemeanor, three for a family-violence assault misdemeanor, and offense-specific (often much longer) for felonies.
• You had a Class C ticket dismissed after deferred disposition in a Plano, Allen, Frisco, McKinney, or Wylie municipal court or a Collin County justice court. That is not a conviction and is often expungeable.
• You completed deferred adjudication. A completed misdemeanor deferred often supports an order of nondisclosure — immediately for many offenses, after two years for others; a completed felony deferred generally becomes eligible five years after discharge, subject to the statutory exclusions.
• You have one misdemeanor conviction and an otherwise clean record. Some misdemeanor convictions can be sealed after the sentence is complete, with a two-year wait for certain offense categories, if you have never been convicted of or placed on deferred adjudication for anything else beyond fine-only traffic offenses.
• Your case was a first DWI. Texas has its own DWI nondisclosure rules with specific waiting periods and exclusions (blood-alcohol level, an accident involving another person). The details matter, and the screener asks about them.
• The case was in juvenile court. Application sealing may be available at age 17, or under age 17 once at least one year has elapsed after final discharge, if nothing disqualifying is on the record.

Why the disposition and the full charging history matter

Two Collin County cases that sound identical in conversation can come out differently on paper. Eligibility turns on the final disposition as the court recorded it, the exact statute of the charge, the relevant dates, and everything else on your record — not on how the case felt at the time. A "dismissal" that was actually a plea to a lesser charge, or a "probation" that was deferred adjudication rather than a conviction, points to a completely different remedy.

Companion charges are the most common surprise. Texas treats offenses arising from the same criminal episode together: an acquittal on one charge cannot be expunged if you were convicted of, or still face prosecution for, another offense from the same episode, and a related pending or convicted charge can change the analysis for dismissals as well. That is why the screener asks about other charges from the same incident and why we pull the full charging history rather than the one case you remember.

How the online process works for a Collin County case

1. Take the free check. A few questions about how the case ended. Your answers stay in your browser until you choose to send them.
2. See your preliminary result. The tool explains whether your answers point toward expunction, nondisclosure, sealing, a waiting period, or a closer look — before you share any contact information.
3. Send it for verification. A paralegal pulls and reads the Collin County court record — the charging instrument, the judgment or dismissal, the dates, and any related cases — and compares it with your answers.
4. Attorney approval. Joshua Andor reviews the eligibility determination before we email you confirmed next steps or prepare a petition.
5. Filing and follow-through. If you engage us, we prepare the petition and proposed order, file in the proper court, and handle the ordinary case management through the order.

The whole workflow runs online and by email. There is no phone tag and no office visit required to find out where you stand — the how it works page walks through it in more detail.

What it costs

The $1,250 flat attorney fee covers one standard expunction, nondisclosure, or juvenile-record-sealing matter in Collin or Denton County: the court-record eligibility review, attorney approval, the standard petition and related documents, filing and ordinary case management, a standard hearing if one is required, and the standard proposed order. It is paid $625 at engagement and $625 before filing. Court filing fees are separate and due before filing — we tell you the amount for your matter before anything is filed. If your situation is not a standard single matter, we say so before you engage us.

Collin County practical context

McKinney is the county seat, and the county's district courts and county courts at law — the courts that handled most misdemeanor and felony cases — sit there. In Collin County, felony criminal records are handled through the district courts and District Clerk; Class A and B misdemeanor records through the county courts at law and County Clerk; and Class C matters through municipal or justice courts, depending on the case. The case record tells us which clerk holds what we need to verify.

North Texas city limits do not follow county lines. Parts of Frisco sit in Denton County, and other cities along the county's edges straddle boundaries too, so a city name alone doesn't settle which county's courts and agencies are involved. The screener asks which Texas county or city the case was in; if you're unsure, use what your court paperwork says, and we confirm it against the record during verification either way. A Frisco matter can involve Collin County or Denton County depending on the underlying record; we handle both and confirm the county during verification.

Because our office is in Allen, inside the county, Collin County records and courts are the ones we work with most. That familiarity is useful — but it does not change the legal analysis, which is the same set of Texas statutes everywhere.

What we don't claim

We don't publish filing-time estimates, judge-specific practices, or approval rates — those vary case by case, and any specific expectations for your matter belong in the confirmed next-steps email after the record has actually been reviewed. Nothing on this page is a determination about your case; the preliminary result is a screening, and the confirmed answer comes only after record review and attorney approval.

Common questions

My arrest was in Plano but the case was in McKinney. Which county is that?

Plano and McKinney are both in Collin County, so that is ordinarily a Collin County case. We confirm the county, court, and remedy from the case record during verification.

Do I have to come to McKinney or to your office in Allen?

No. The eligibility check, the records verification, and our communication are all online and by email. If your matter requires a hearing at which your presence is needed, we tell you before anything is filed.

Can you help with a case from Dallas, Tarrant, or another county?

Our office currently handles the lawyer work for qualifying Collin and Denton County matters. Anyone in Texas is welcome to take the free check — you will still see your preliminary result — and where we can't help directly, we try to point you toward someone who can.

What if I have more than one Collin County case?

Take the check for the case you are most concerned about, and mention the others in the notes. Related charges from the same incident are part of the eligibility analysis; separate cases may each need their own petition. We tell you what applies — and what it would cost — before you engage us.

How long does a Collin County expunction or nondisclosure take?

It varies by court and case type, so we don't promise a schedule. In general, records verification takes days to a couple of weeks, and the court process after filing is typically measured in months, not days. We handle the follow-up so you don't have to chase anything.

Will an employer still see the record afterward?

It depends on the remedy and who is looking. After an expunction, entities subject to the order must remove the records it covers, and you may generally deny the arrest. After an order of nondisclosure, ordinary public access is restricted, but law enforcement and certain statutorily authorized agencies and licensing entities can still see it. Private background-check databases update on their own schedules; addressing them is a separate follow-up step.