I applied for basic disclosure recently as part of a job…

Ok, thank you.

I can answer the question more fully, as follows :

On a basic disclosure (issued by disclosure Scotland) a caution (youth and adult) is spent immediately and will not show up. A conditional caution (youth and adult) will be spent once the conditions end or after 3 months, whichever is sooner. A caution however will show up for longer periods of time on Standard and Enhanced DBS certificates and in some cases may be disclosed forever.

On a Standard DBS certificate a police caution will show up for at least 6 years, a youth caution will show up for only 2 years. If however your caution was for a proscribed offence it will show up indefinitely on a standard (and enhanced) Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) certificate (NB 2017: this rule is subject to a government review). Most offences that appear on the proscribed list you would be unlikely to receive a caution for, offences include murder, terrorism and rape. However there are a certain number of offences that are on the proscribed list that can easily apply to facts that are relatively minor, offences such as Actual Bodily Harm (ABH), child cruelty or burglary. Whilst these offences can at times relate to more serious factual incidents, sometimes cautions can be issues for these offences where the facts are relatively minor. Examples might be causing a minor cut or bruise to someone during a domestic fight, leaving your child unattended for a short period of time or a burglary allegation when a youth and of a low value and type, for example entering an abandoned home and taking something of low value.

On an enhanced DBS certificate, a police caution will definitely show up for 6 years (2 years for youth cautions) after which it will be protected and will most likely be filtered off of a DBS certificate. If however your caution is for an offence on the proscribed list of offences that never become filtered, then your caution will never become protected and it will always appear on your DBS certificate.

Even if your caution is not for a proscribed list offence and so will be eligible for filtering, the police retain a broad discretion in terms of the information they can disclose on an enhanced DBS certificate. So even of your caution was for a minor common assault, or a minor theft, the police, if they feel the caution reveals facts that are relevant to your job application, then they may disclose relevant facts on your certificate. If information related to your caution is disclosed after the 6 year period, as long as it is not for a proscribed list caution, you may appeal the disclosure of this information.

The way in which a conviction can become 'spent' under the ROA will depend upon the sentence received for the offense, and the rehabilitation period that applies to that offence sentence.

According to the rules, Cautions (which are admonishment), Warnings and Reprimands are all "spent" as soon as they are issued - this is the relevant rehabilitation period. Conditional cautions are spent as soon as the conditions end. See table attached.

I would suggest therefore that your admonishment would be on there for 6 years after which it should not then show up.

I hope the above goes some way to answering the question. If so, can I ask you give me a 5 star rating so that I get credit for the work.

Many thanks,

Jim

Hi again,

I have checked the law and actually, a caution differs slightly to admonishments as the latter is not provided for in the ROA 1974 Act.

It is actually a period of 5 years before the admonishment is wiped - this is because "Admonition" is a sentence in its own right in Scotland, governed by section 246 of the Criminal Procedure (Scotland) Act 1995. Admonition is not referred to in the Act and as such there is no provision that deals with "when" an admonition becomes spent.

However, admonition will fall under the ‘any other sentence’ provision in the ROA, which states that such offences will become spent 5 years after the date it was issued (or 2.5 years if the person was under 18 at the time).

Sorry for the confusion - its 5 years unless you were under 18 years old at the time of the offence in which case it would be two and half years.

If you want the admonishment wiped off the record sooner, there are firms of solicitors who can do this for you.

Have a good day.

Jim

Not a bother - any time, have a good day

Jim

Thank you for your positive rating.

Should you require and further assistance in the future please don't hesitate to contact me.

Best wishes,

Jim