Legal Question in Criminal Law in Texas

Re: disposition of adjudication withheld

In some cases, defendants receive deferred dispositon or deferred adjudication where the court defers making a finding of guilt and does not make such a finding if you successfully complete probatation. Since there is no finding of guilt, there is no conviction and you could answer "no" to a query whether you had any conviction. Lots of employers have added this question to force applicants to reveal whether an an applicant received deferred and avoid the expense of a criminal records check. Since a criminal records check will reveal findings of deferred adjudication, lying won't help you.

However, if you successfuly complete deferred adjudication, you may be eligible to petition the court for an "order of nondisclosure" This will erase your arrest and deferred adjudication from most public criminal records. Exceptions are court, police, FBI, hospital and certain other records. So depending on the type of job you are applying for, you could answer "no" to that question.