By State Public Records Search

By Claire Dowell


Pursuant to California's Public Records Act, any Californian has the right to access public information maintained by local and state government agencies, including the Department of Justice. In California, vital records are housed in the Office of the Vital Statistics which operates under the Department of Health. California public records include documents of births, adoptions, marriages, divorces, deaths, and even criminal and arrest records.

Conversely, there are certain records in California that cannot just be obtained by anyone who wishes to. Criminal records and arrest, for instance, can only be accessed by legitimate law enforcement agencies, authorized applicant agencies, and those individuals who personally own the criminal history information. In case of background checks, certified copies of criminal or arrest records may not be available as request from third parties for such records will not be processed. Thus, for genealogical purposes and background checks, one may have to settle for an informational copy instead.

When appealing for a particular record, you have to secure an application form and fill it out in its entirety with all the significant details required. Informational pamphlets and all of the application forms for public records can be downloaded online.

For birth record requests, you must provide the full name of the person, date of birth, place of birth, and the name of the parents. For death certificate requests, you have to input in the request form the complete legal name of the decedent, sex, date of birth, date and county where the death transpired, name of spouse and that of the parents. For marriage certificate requests, you have to provide all the personal details about the couple, date and county where they tied the knot, and the county where the marriage license was issued. For divorce decree requests, you must input the significant details of the husband and the wife, the date of the separation, and the county where the divorce was filed and approved. For criminal history information requests, you have to secure a live scan form from the Department of Justice, fill it out with your personal details, and submit it together with an image of your live scan fingerprints.

The processing fee for birth record requests is $20. For death record requests, the fee is $16. The processing fee for criminal records is $25. For marriage certificate requests, the fee is $14 while divorce record requests require a fee of only $13. Birth and death records that date back to 1905 take 7 weeks to be processed. Those recorded from 1969 to present only take 4 weeks processing time. However, marriage and divorce records can exceed 6 months to be processed. These estimated turnaround times will still vary and may increase depending on the volume of requests received by such agencies. Unfortunately, these offices do not cater rush requests.

If you wish to acquire government records fast, then pull a quick record review online. There are various online record providers proffering the same services yet for only a minimal fee to no fee at all. Unlike the typical way of getting government records, you can retrieve the records you need in the comfort of your own home with a computer and an Internet connection handy. Procuring records over the web will only take minutes to hours instead of the usual processing time that takes weeks to several months. Just see to it that you perform a quick background check on the record provider you are eyeing on to ensure less to no errors with the results of your record search.




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