Rhode Island fair housing law does not protect a criminal record
Rhode Island's Fair Housing Practices Act lists what a landlord may not consider, and the list is long: race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, marital status, lawful source of income, military status as a veteran with an honorable discharge or an honorable or general administrative discharge, servicemember in the armed forces, country of ancestral origin, disability, age, familial status, and whether a tenant or applicant is or has been the victim of domestic abuse.
A criminal record is not on that list. The Act does not mention criminal records at all. It also keeps, in so many words, an owner's privilege to "establish standards and preferences and set terms, conditions, limitations, or specifications" in renting, as long as those standards do not discriminate on the grounds the Act does list. A criminal-record standard is not one of those grounds, so nothing in the Act disturbs it.
So a Rhode Island landlord may run a background check, may have a policy about criminal records, and may turn you down because of one. That is the honest starting point.
What an expungement changes for a rental application
If the law will not stop a landlord from looking, the useful move is to change what there is to find. That is what expungement and sealing do, and it is why housing is one of the most common reasons people file.
A person whose record is expunged is released "from all penalties and disabilities resulting from the crime." The rule that matters most for a tenant screening is that the office that keeps the records "shall not disclose the existence of the records upon inquiry from any source." The exceptions are short: the individual themselves, a sentencing court, a bar admission or disciplinary body, the commissioner of elementary and secondary education, and a law enforcement agency in a narrow situation. A tenant screening company is not among them.
And anyone who willfully releases or allows access to records they know were expunged is civilly liable.
Can you tell a landlord you were never convicted?
The rule that lets you say you were never convicted names "any application for employment, license, or other civil right or privilege, or any appearance as a witness." It does not name housing.
Whether a rental application counts as an "other civil right or privilege" is an open question of interpretation, and this page will not pretend otherwise. What is not in doubt is the rest: the penalties and disabilities are lifted, and the record keeper is told not to disclose that the record exists. In practice, that is what decides a tenant screening.
If your case was dismissed
Many housing problems come from charges that were dismissed. Those are a different and easier process — sealing, not expungement.
If your case was dismissed under District Court Rule 48(a) on or after January 1, 2023, it was sealed automatically 10 to 20 days after the dismissal, with no motion. If a District Court Rule 48(a) dismissal came earlier, the clerk can seal it at your request. The full details are on sealing dismissed charges.
Check that it actually happened. An arrest dismissed years ago can still sit in a database somewhere, and a screening company that bought the data before the sealing may never have updated it.
Check what a landlord would see
Before you assume the worst, look. The Judiciary's public portal takes about ten minutes and shows you the same public record a screening company starts from.
The official version is the BCI report from the Attorney General — $5, in person or by mail. If you are going to file anything, file from that.
What to do next
Work out which law governs your case. The eligibility checker does it and cites the section behind every answer. It will also tell you if your record is one of the kinds that clears on its own, with nothing filed.
None of this is a guarantee about any particular landlord. It is about making sure the record they find is the record you are entitled to have.
The law behind this page
- The protected grounds under Rhode Island's Fair Housing Practices Act, which do not include a criminal record: R.I. Gen. Laws § 34-37-4.
- An owner's privilege to set standards and preferences that do not discriminate on the listed grounds: § 34-37-4(c).
- Released from all penalties and disabilities: § 12-1.3-4(a).
- May state never convicted on an application for employment, license, or other civil right or privilege, or as a witness: § 12-1.3-4(b).
- The record keeper may not disclose the records' existence, with a short list of exceptions: § 12-1.3-4(c).
- Civil liability for willful release: § 12-1.3-4(d).
- Sealing a dismissal, including automatic sealing of a District Court Rule 48(a) dismissal on or after January 1, 2023: § 12-1-12.1.
- Source: R.I. Attorney General, Bureau of Criminal Identification — $5 for a Rhode Island state background check.
