Do You Need a Lawyer to Get Your Mugshot Removed in Arizona?

You typed your name into a search bar and your booking photo came up. The case is old, or it was dismissed, or it never turned into a charge, and the photo is still the first thing an employer or a landlord sees. It is a real problem with a two-part fix.

We file Arizona record relief applications every day, and AZ Record Removal is owned and powered by Future First Criminal Law. Here is what a lawyer does on a mugshot removal, what the sealing order reaches, and where it stops.

Do you need a lawyer to get your mugshot removed in Arizona?

No. Arizona lets you file the sealing application yourself and send the takedown requests yourself. Nothing in the law requires a lawyer for either step.

What a lawyer changes is the odds. A mugshot removal in Arizona is two separate jobs. The first is a court order under A.R.S. § 13-911 that seals the arrest record held by the police, the prosecutor, the court, and the Department of Public Safety. The second is a set of takedown requests to the private websites that copied the photo. The order comes first, because every later step rests on it. Our record sealing service page covers the filing.

A denied application locks you out for three years, and that is the strongest reason people hire us. One clean misdemeanor with no objection expected is a fair fight alone. More than one case, a felony, or an old arrest you are unsure about is where a lawyer earns the fee on the first filing.

Where does your Arizona booking photo live?

In government files and on private websites, and sealing reaches only the first group.

The arresting agency takes the photo at booking. A city police department or a county sheriff stores it with your name, the charge, and the date. The Department of Public Safety keeps your statewide criminal history, which lists the arrest. The court file holds the docket, which is what most background checks read, and it usually holds no photo at all. Our post on how long Arizona police keep arrest records explains the retention side.

Outside government, some Arizona sheriffs post booking photos online for a short window after arrest. Scraper sites copy them in that window and republish them with your name in the page title so search engines rank them. News outlets run the photo with the story. No court order deletes those copies directly, so the copy you are looking at decides which tool applies.

What does a sealing order do to the photo the police hold?

It takes the booking file out of public view. Under A.R.S. § 13-911, the case records that get sealed are every document tied to the arrest, the conviction, and the sentence. The booking photo sits inside that arrest file.

When the judge grants the application, the clerk notifies the Department of Public Safety and the prosecutor. The Department marks your record sealed and notifies every law enforcement agency that touched the case. The arresting agency and the prosecutor’s office flag their own files. From then on, a public records request to the police for your booking photo comes back empty, and the docket drops off the public case lookup.

Read the full text of A.R.S. § 13-911 for the limits. Police keep the file for internal use, prosecutors keep the right to use it in a future case, and a fingerprint clearance card review still sees it. Sealed means hidden from the public, not destroyed.

Does sealing a record remove your mugshot from the internet?

No. Sealing removes the public court record and the public police file. It does not remove a Google result, a news story, or a private mugshot site.

The order binds the agencies named in the law. A website in another state that scraped the sheriff’s page three years ago is not one of them. The photo stays there until the operator takes it down, and the order gives that operator no direct command.

What the order gives you is a fact you did not have before: a signed court order saying the record is sealed. That fact is the core of every takedown request you send next. Sites that want to avoid a fight remove the page once they see it. Sites that want a fight are the reason Arizona passed a mugshot website law.

What does Arizona law say about mugshot websites?

Arizona has a law aimed at sites that charge you to remove your own booking photo. As of 2026, it works this way.

A website that publishes booking photos for a commercial purpose is treated as doing business in Arizona, wherever the operator sits. That operator is barred from using booking photos, or the names and charges attached to them, to solicit business. The law names one practice in particular: requiring a fee to remove or revise the record. Charging that fee is a violation.

A person harmed by the violation has a claim in court. The law sets floor damages of $100 per day for the first thirty days, $200 per day for the next thirty, and $500 per day after that. News organizations are exempt. So is a site that never asks for money, which means the law reaches the pay-to-remove sites and leaves the free ones to the takedown process.

How do you get a mugshot taken down from a private website?

You send a written request, you attach the sealing order, and you keep a record of every contact.

Start with the site’s own removal page. Most aggregator sites have one, and many remove a photo on request once the record is sealed. State three things: the arrest date, the outcome, and the date a judge sealed the record under A.R.S. § 13-911. Attach the signed order. Do not pay a removal fee. A demand for that fee is itself a violation of Arizona law, and saying so in your request changes the tone of the reply.

For a news story, ask the outlet’s editor for an update or an unpublish review. For Google, once a page is gone, use the outdated content removal tool so the stale result drops. Keep every email. A site that ignores a sealed record and keeps asking for money is building your damages claim for you.

What does a lawyer add to a mugshot removal?

The order. Everything else follows from it, and the order is the step where a mistake costs three years.

We pull your Department of Public Safety criminal history and the court dockets so every arrest is on the table, because a photo from a second arrest you forgot about surfaces the week the first one is gone. We check each case against the waiting periods and the ineligible offense list. We draft the application around the standard the judge applies, which is whether sealing serves your best interests and the public’s safety. We file in the right court. When the prosecutor objects, we answer in writing and argue the hearing if the judge sets one.

Then the order goes out. The clerk notifies the Department of Public Safety and the prosecutor, and you get your copy. You send the takedown requests with that copy attached.

Can you seal an arrest that never turned into a charge?

Yes, and there is no waiting period. A.R.S. § 13-911 covers a completed sentence, a dismissed charge or not guilty verdict, and an arrest where no charge was ever filed. The last two carry no wait at all. You file the day you decide to.

This matters for mugshots because the arrest with no charge is the one people forget. There was no court case, so they assume there is nothing to seal. The police file exists, the Department of Public Safety history lists the arrest, and the scraper sites caught the photo the week it happened.

You file in the court where you had your initial appearance, or in the superior court of the arrest county if you never appeared. Our post on sealing an arrest that never became a charge walks through it, and our page on sealing a dismissed case in Arizona covers the dismissal path.

How long before the photo comes down?

Plan on months, not days, and expect the government copies to go first.

The sealing side has a built-in clock. Once the application is filed, the prosecutor and any victim get 60 days to object, and the judge does not rule inside that window unless both waive it. Recent grants on our case victories page ran from under a month to about 90 days from filing to signed order. After the order, the Department of Public Safety and the arresting agency update their files, which adds weeks. Our page on how long record sealing takes in Arizona breaks the stages down.

The private side has no clock. Some sites remove a photo within days of a request, and others sit on it until the damages exposure sinks in. Search engines take days to weeks to drop a removed page.

What if your case ended in a conviction?

You wait out the period for your offense class, then you file. The clock runs from the day you finish the sentence, including probation, and every fine, fee, and restitution order has to be paid before you file.

Offense class	Wait before sealing
Class 2 or 3 felony	10 years
Class 4, 5 or 6 felony	5 years
Class 1 misdemeanor	3 years
Class 2 or 3 misdemeanor	2 years
Dismissal, not guilty verdict, vacated conviction, or arrest with no charge	No wait

A second felony conviction adds five years to the wait. A short list of offenses is shut out of sealing altogether, including dangerous offenses and most crimes against children, and our post on what crimes cannot be sealed in Arizona lists them. The photo from an ineligible case stays in the police file, but the mugshot website law still applies to a site that charges for removal, and a news outlet still has its own review process.

Does a set aside remove your mugshot?

No. A set aside under A.R.S. § 13-905 sets aside the judgment of guilt and dismisses the charge. It releases you from most penalties of the conviction, and subsection O restores your firearm rights unless the offense was a serious one. It touches no file.

Read A.R.S. § 13-905 for the limits. The Department of Public Safety notes the set aside on your record and is barred from redacting or removing any part of it. Law enforcement agencies have no duty to remove anything. The docket stays public and the booking photo stays where it was. Our set aside page covers the rest.

For a booking photo, sealing is the tool, and we file both together on a conviction that qualifies for both. Marijuana is the one exception. A qualifying possession, cultivation, or paraphernalia case is expunged under A.R.S. § 36-2862, and that order reaches the arresting agency’s file. Our expungement page explains who qualifies.

Why should you choose AZ Record Removal for a mugshot removal?

Because we tell you what the record shows before you pay. We pull your Department of Public Safety history and every court docket first, and if nothing there qualifies, we say so.

Arizona record relief is the only work we do. We file the applications, we track the court, and we answer the prosecutor’s objection when one comes. One flat fee of $1,700 per case covers every type of relief the case qualifies for, with no court fees or filing fees added. The pricing page has the full numbers.

AZ Record Removal is owned and powered by Future First Criminal Law. Our founder, Zachary Divelbiss, cleared his own record with a set aside and a sealing before he cleared anyone else’s. We have 250+ five-star Google reviews. We work statewide and handle everything virtually, so you never drive to a courthouse or to us. Phones are answered around the clock at 602-900-6240, and consultations are scheduled during business hours.

What should you do next?

Find out what the record shows. Use our record search page to see what the public court file lists under your name, or take the eligibility quiz to see which filings your case qualifies for. Then call 602-900-6240. We will tell you which cases to seal, what the order will and will not reach, and what it costs. No judge is required to grant a sealing application, and putting the right filing in front of the right judge on the first try is the whole job.

Frequently Asked Questions

Does sealing a record remove your mugshot in Arizona?

Sealing under A.R.S. § 13-911 takes the booking file and the court record out of public view, so a records request to the police no longer returns the photo. It does not remove copies on private websites, news sites, or search results. Those come down through separate takedown requests, and the sealing order is the document those requests rest on.

How do you get a mugshot removed in Arizona without a lawyer?

File the sealing application yourself in the court that handled the case, or the court of your initial appearance for an arrest with no charge. Wait out the 60 day objection window. Once the judge signs, send each private site a written removal request with the order attached, refuse any removal fee, and keep every reply.

How much does a mugshot removal lawyer cost in Arizona?

Our fee is a flat $1,700 per case, and it covers every type of relief the case qualifies for when we file them together, with no court fees, filing fees, or hearing charges on top. A second case is $500 off. The private site requests cost nothing beyond your time, and a site that demands a fee is breaking Arizona law.

Can a mugshot website charge you to remove your photo in Arizona?

No. Arizona law bars a site that publishes booking photos for a commercial purpose from requiring a fee to remove or revise the record, and a site that does so faces damages starting at $100 per day. News organizations are exempt. A site that posts the photo for free and refuses to remove it falls outside that law, so the sealing order and a written request are your tools there.