Pen. Code, § 13203 · Article 5. Access to Information
Pen. Code, § 13203
Text — As published in the Legislative Counsel's database, tables dated October 18, 2026 (pubinfo_2025.zip)
(a) A criminal justice agency may release, within five years of the arrest, information concerning an arrest or detention of a peace officer, as defined in Section 830, an applicant for a position as a peace officer, a nonsworn employee of a criminal justice agency, or an applicant for a nonsworn position within a criminal justice agency that did not result in conviction, and for which the person did not complete a postarrest diversion program, to a governmental agency employer of that employee or applicant.
(b) A criminal justice agency may release information concerning an arrest of a peace officer, as defined in Section 830, an applicant for a position as a peace officer, a nonsworn employee of a criminal justice agency, or an applicant for a nonsworn position within a criminal justice agency that did not result in conviction but for which the person completed a postarrest diversion program or a deferred entry of judgment program, or information concerning a referral to and participation in any postarrest diversion program or a deferred entry of judgment program to a governmental agency employer of that employee or applicant.
(c) Notwithstanding subdivision (a) or (b), a criminal justice agency shall not release information under the following circumstances:
(1) Information concerning an arrest for which diversion or deferred entry of judgment has been ordered without attempting to determine whether diversion or a deferred entry of judgment program has been successfully completed.
(2) Information concerning an arrest or detention followed by a dismissal or release without attempting to determine whether the individual was exonerated.
(3) Information concerning an arrest without a disposition without attempting to determine whether diversion or a deferred entry of judgment program has been successfully completed or the individual was exonerated.
Notes and commentary — not statutory text
History
Amended by Stats. 2021, Ch. 158, Sec. 2. (AB 1480) Effective January 1, 2022.
Source of truth
- Edition
- As published in the Legislative Counsel's database, tables dated October 18, 2026 (pubinfo_2025.zip)
- Official file
- https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displaySection.xhtml?lawCode=PEN§ionNum=13203.
- Text hash
- sha256 794826c87c555e6a4a36955751482d5df380eb03f1b8d114e346584559752423
- Composed by
- compose_ca.py 2026-10-22: the Legislative Counsel's CAML content files read by a tokenizer (caml_readers.reader_a); an independent xml.etree reading (caml_readers.reader_b) agrees on every section
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