Ohio has significantly expanded who qualifies for record sealing over the past few years, and that news has given a lot of people reasonable hope that an old OVI might finally be off the table. It isn’t. OVI convictions are permanently excluded from sealing and expungement under Ohio law, and the recent expansions didn’t change that. What matters now is understanding exactly what that means and what options still exist depending on where your case stands.
At Funkhouser Law, we handle both OVI defense and expungement work. Our founding attorney Douglas Funkhouser spent years as a U.S. Army prosecutor before building a criminal defense practice, and that background shapes how we approach OVI cases from the start. We know how the government constructs its case and where the evidence is most likely to break down. When a client asks about clearing an OVI from their record, the honest answer involves two separate conversations: what the statute says, and what might still be done.
Ohio Law Permanently Bars OVI Conviction Expungement
Ohio Revised Code 2953.36 lists the offenses that can never be sealed or expunged, and OVI is on that list without qualification. There’s no waiting period that eventually opens the door, no rehabilitation exception a judge can apply, and no judicial discretion to override the statutory bar. A first-offense misdemeanor OVI, an OVUAC (operating a vehicle after underage consumption), a physical control conviction, and a felony OVI all fall under the same exclusion.
Ohio’s 2023 expungement reforms under Senate Bill 288 expanded eligibility for many offense categories, but the General Assembly specifically kept OVI on the ineligible list. The reason is practical: OVI convictions count toward 10-year and 20-year look-back periods used to escalate a future OVI from a misdemeanor to a felony. Allowing those convictions to be sealed would undercut that escalation framework entirely, so they stayed excluded.
What Can Be Sealed: Dismissals, Acquittals, & Co-Charges
The bar against sealing applies to convictions. It doesn’t apply to every record that comes out of an OVI arrest, and that distinction opens a few concrete paths worth knowing.
Dismissed Charges & Acquittals
ORC 2953.52 governs the sealing of dismissed charges and not-guilty verdicts. If the OVI charge was dismissed at any point, whether after a successful motion to suppress or through a plea negotiation that resolved on a different charge, the dismissed OVI count is eligible for sealing with no statutory waiting period. The same applies if the case went to trial and the defendant was acquitted.
Co-Charges from the Same Arrest
OVI arrests rarely produce a single charge. Charges like reckless operation, open container, driving under suspension, or minor drug possession filed alongside the OVI and later dismissed or reduced are typically sealable under ORC 2953.32, even when the OVI conviction itself remains on the record. This is one of the most actionable and most overlooked forms of relief for someone already convicted.
Reductions to Non-OVI Offenses
A negotiated reduction from OVI to reckless operation or physical control produces a non-OVI conviction. Because that resulting conviction isn’t an OVI, it isn’t excluded under ORC 2953.36. After the standard waiting period, it may become eligible for sealing. The outcome negotiated at the front end of the case has a direct and lasting effect on what record relief looks like years later.
The One-OVI Exception: Expunging Other Convictions on Your Record
Before a recent statutory change, any OVI conviction on a person’s record created a blanket bar that blocked expungement of all other convictions, even completely unrelated ones. That rule no longer applies across the board. Under current Ohio law, a person with exactly one OVI conviction remains eligible to apply to expunge one other eligible, unrelated felony or misdemeanor conviction.
This exception doesn’t seal the OVI. The OVI stays visible. But for someone managing the collateral consequences of a separate prior conviction, it means an old drug charge, a misdemeanor theft, or another eligible offense doesn’t have to follow them indefinitely just because they also have an OVI on record. The eligibility rules for the other offense still apply in full, so whether a specific conviction qualifies depends on the offense category, timing, and whether it falls within a broader statutory exclusion.
How Columbus OVI Cases Are Processed & Where Records Live
Misdemeanor OVI cases in Franklin County are processed through Franklin County Municipal Court. Felony OVI cases, which under Ohio Revised Code 4511.19 typically arise when a driver accumulates a fourth offense within ten years or a sixth offense within twenty years, are heard at Franklin County Court of Common Pleas. Any sealing application for an eligible component of the record would be filed in the court where the case was resolved.
One detail that surprises many people: a successful criminal record sealing order doesn’t affect the Ohio Bureau of Motor Vehicles driving record. The BMV maintains its own record independently, and a sealed criminal case doesn’t reach it. An OVI remains visible on the BMV record regardless of what happens in the criminal court proceeding, which matters for employment screenings that pull driving history separately from criminal background checks.
If you have an eligible conviction to seal through Franklin County Municipal Court, the filing fee for a sealing or expungement application involving a conviction is $50 and is non-refundable. Sealing a dismissed charge or a not-guilty record carries no filing fee.
Why How the Charge Resolves Is the Only Real Record Strategy
Because no post-conviction remedy removes an OVI from the criminal record, the only reliable path to a clean record runs through the case itself. A dismissed charge after a successful motion to suppress, an acquittal at trial, or a reduction to reckless operation each produce a fundamentally different record outcome than a straight OVI conviction. That means the defense strategy pursued during an active case is also, in effect, the long-term record strategy.
Common defense grounds in Franklin County OVI cases include challenges to the legality of the traffic stop, the administration of standardized field sobriety tests, and the accuracy or chain of custody of breath or blood test results. Each of those challenges can result in suppression of key evidence or dismissal of the charge entirely, which is the only route to a record that doesn’t carry a permanent OVI conviction. Douglas Funkhouser’s background as a former U.S. Army prosecutor directly informs how we evaluate that evidence. Having built cases from the government’s side, he knows the procedural requirements that must be met at every step and where the state’s evidence tends to be most vulnerable when those requirements aren’t followed.
If you have questions about what can be sealed from your record, or want to understand your defense options in an active case, Funkhouser Law can review the full picture with you. Reach us at (614) 756-2154.