Legal Question in Criminal Law in Michigan

If it is your only conviction ever, you can move to get it set aside. I have been very successful in getting these done. Contact me at kliszlaw.com to get started.

You can do it on your own, but you would be wise to hire an attorney to help make sure all hoops are jumped through and the best possible argument made on your behalf. The process involves filing out a fill-in-the-blank court form (SCAO forms MC 227 & 228: see http://courts.michigan.gov/Administration/SCAO/Forms/courtforms/generalcriminal/mc227.pdf), and filing it with the court where you were convicted to get a hearing date. The Attorney General's office and the prosecuting attorney's office that handled your case must be served with copies, and you file a proof of service with the court. You also have to send a copy of the same papers plus fingerprint cards to the Michigan State Police so they can run a criminal history check and send its info to the AG, prosecutor and court. But ... you also have to be legally eligible to petition to set aside the conviction. You seem to have met two issues because your conviction was more than 5 years ago, and the conviction was not for a Life felony or a motor vehicle code crime. The remaining eligibility issue is sometimes what blocks this whole process: the welfare fraud conviction must be your one and only criminal (felony or misdemeanor) conviction in your life ... ever ... anywhere. The only current exceptions are if you have no more than two "minor offense" convictions in addition to the welfare fraud (meaning: convictions when you were 17, 18, 19 or 20, and for crimes that were 90-day misdemeanors or less). Even a driving on a suspended license conviction would disqualify you because it is a 93-day misdemeanor. But civil infractions like speeding tickets do not count against you. So, a thorough background check is important (criminal history and driving record) to see if you are even eligible to ask to set that conviction aside. You can order a criminal history online at the MSP web site (look for the link to "iChat" and a small credit card payment will get you a list of your Michigan criminal convictions), and you can order your driving record from any secretary of state branch office. Those documents will need to be reviewed by the attorney you (hopefully) talk to.