Arrest Records for Dallas County, Alabama

Dallas County arrest records live in two distinct systems: the Dallas County Fourth Circuit Court maintains docket-side case filings accessible through the county’s own Alacourt portal, while booking records are held by the Dallas County Sheriff’s Office under Alabama’s open jail-register law. The courthouse sits at 105 Lauderdale Street, Selma, mailing address P.O. Box 1148, and opens at 9:00 AM on weekdays. Reaching the courthouse by phone can take patience — callers report congestion on the main line — so plan to call early in the day or visit in person.

If someone you know was just booked tonight, our Dallas County inmate-search page has phone-first contact info.

If your person has a history in other states

Dallas County’s court portal covers cases filed in the Fourth Circuit — it won’t surface charges from neighboring Wilcox or Perry counties, federal cases, or records from other states where the person may have lived. A nationwide database search may help fill gaps that local portals often leave, including name variants, prior names, and records predating the portal’s online window. The preliminary scan is free; a full report requires creating an account.

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This tool is not a consumer reporting agency under the FCRA and may not be used to screen anyone for employment, housing, credit, or any other purpose covered by that law.

How to look up arrest records in Dallas County

Dallas County Courthouse opens at 9:00 AM on weekdays — that’s the window for in-person records access at 105 Lauderdale Street, Selma (mailing: P.O. Box 1148). The courthouse main number is (334) 358-6801; confirm hours before driving, as the phone lines can be congested and calls sometimes go unanswered.

Court-side records for Dallas County sit on the county’s own Alacourt subdomain. The Dallas County Fourth Circuit Court magistrates and warrants portal is the county-first resource for active warrant and case information. For traffic-related matters, the Dallas County traffic court portal handles those separately, and the statewide Alabama traffic court records system can supplement it.

Alabama does maintain a statewide trial-court index — Alacourt — that covers all sixty-seven counties including Dallas. That index is a paid service: it charges a fee per name search. The free portal at alacourt.gov covers appellate courts only and will not show a Dallas County Circuit or District Court criminal case. Never assume the free portal is a substitute for the paid county-level search.

For a recent booking — someone arrested in the past day or two — go to the Dallas County Sheriff’s Office. Alabama law requires the sheriff’s jail register to be open to public inspection, so a booking inquiry is a legitimate public-records request. The Sheriff’s Office is the right contact for recent arrests; the court portal picks up once a case is filed with the Clerk.

For someone serving a state prison sentence rather than sitting in the county jail, use the Alabama Department of Corrections inmate search. ADOC covers people in state custody; the Dallas County Sheriff covers people held locally pre-trial or on shorter sentences.

Municipal charges — citations issued by Selma city courts, for example — may sit outside the main Alacourt index. If you’re looking for a city-level charge and it doesn’t appear in the county portal, contact that city’s court directly to confirm whether the record is indexed there.

One practical note on courthouse mail: callers and correspondents have reported that documents sent to P.O. Box 1148 sometimes show as delivered but take time to be processed. If you’re submitting a records request by mail, follow up by phone after a reasonable interval rather than assuming the request has been acted on.

Are Dallas County arrest records public?

Juvenile records in Dallas County are excluded from public access under Alabama’s juvenile-confidentiality provisions — that exclusion is the sharpest boundary in the state’s otherwise open-records framework. Adult arrest records, booking entries, and court filings are presumptively public.

The governing statute is Ala. Code §§ 36-12-40 to 36-12-46, Alabama’s Open Records Act. Under that framework, booking records and the jail register held by the Dallas County Sheriff’s Office are open to public inspection by default. Court filings at the Dallas County Fourth Circuit Court carry the same default-public status once a case is filed.

Sealed and expunged records are the primary adult exception. When a Dallas County Circuit Court grants a petition to seal under Alabama’s expungement statute, the record is removed from public view — it no longer appears in Alacourt searches or in response to public-records requests. Law enforcement retains access to sealed records; the public does not. The practical effect is that a sealed record won’t show up when you search the county portal.

Victim-protection redactions apply in certain cases. Identifying information for victims in domestic-violence, sexual-assault, and related cases may be withheld from the public copy of a record even when the underlying case is otherwise public. What you receive in response to a records request may have those fields blacked out.

Booking photos are part of the official record in Alabama — there is no statute restricting their publication. Whether the Dallas County Sheriff’s Office releases a booking photo in response to a specific request is a matter to confirm with the office directly, as release practices can vary.

What’s in a Dallas County arrest record?

How far back does a Dallas County arrest record reach — and can you still pull an old one? Records in the Alacourt system go back to the period when the county’s cases were digitized; older paper-era records may require an in-person visit to the Dallas County Courthouse at 105 Lauderdale Street to access through the Clerk’s physical files.

The booking entry and the court docket are different documents that live in different systems. The booking entry is created by the Dallas County Sheriff’s Office at the time of arrest. It typically contains: the arrestee’s name and date of birth, the booking date and time, the charges as written at arrest, the arresting agency, and — if the record includes it — a booking photograph. Bond information may also appear here, though Alabama uses money bail with judicial discretion and amounts are not fixed by offense.

The court docket is created by the Dallas County Circuit or District Court Clerk once a case is formally filed. Docket entries show the case number, the charges as formally filed (which may differ from the arrest charges), hearing dates, attorney of record, and disposition if the case has concluded. Dispositions include outcomes like conviction, acquittal, nolle prosequi (charges dropped), or dismissal. A case that was dismissed will show that disposition on the docket — it does not disappear from the record unless it has been sealed.

One important gap: an arrest that did not result in a filed case may appear in the Sheriff’s booking register but have no corresponding court docket entry. If you search Alacourt and find nothing, that doesn’t mean no arrest occurred — it may mean charges were never filed. The Sheriff’s register is the authoritative source for the booking itself.

Traffic cases in Dallas County have their own docket track, accessible through the Dallas County traffic court portal. Traffic violations handled at the municipal level in Selma may not appear in the county portal at all — confirm with the city court if a traffic matter is missing from the county search.

How to expunge an arrest record in Dallas County

Once a Dallas County arrest record is sealed, law enforcement agencies can still see it — but it disappears from public court searches, background-check databases that draw from public records, and responses to Open Records Act requests. That distinction matters: sealing changes what the public sees, not what a police officer or prosecutor can access.

Petitioning to seal an arrest record in Dallas County is a routine legal procedure governed by Ala. Code § 15-27-1. Since 2021, Alabama’s expungement law reaches convictions as well as non-conviction outcomes — a significant expansion that much older guidance misses. If you’ve read elsewhere that Alabama only seals dismissed or acquitted cases, that information is out of date.

Non-conviction outcomes — charges that were dismissed, nolle prossed, or resulted in acquittal — often have a more direct path to sealing. The statute does not require the same waiting period that applies to conviction-based petitions. If your Dallas County case ended without a conviction, that streamlined path is worth exploring first.

For conviction-based petitions, a waiting period applies after the sentence is completed and the record remains clean. The exact duration is set by the controlling statute; AL law sets the timing requirements in Ala. Code § 15-27-1 — check the current statute text or ask the Clerk of Court for the specific window that applies to your charge type, since misdemeanors and felonies are treated differently.

The petition is filed in the Dallas County Circuit Court — the circuit court for the county where the charge was brought. The Dallas County District Attorney and the arresting agency are both entitled to object to the petition. The court schedules a hearing if an objection is filed; if no objection comes, the court may grant the petition without a hearing.

Filing fees apply. An indigency waiver path exists for petitioners who cannot afford the fee — ask the Clerk at the Dallas County Courthouse, (334) 358-6801 (verify before calling), about the fee waiver process. You can file the petition yourself without an attorney, though attorney-assisted petitions tend to be more complete and less likely to be returned for technical defects. The Alabama State Bar Lawyer Referral Service can connect you with an attorney who handles expungements. If you cannot afford private counsel, the Alabama indigent defense locator may identify available assistance.

After sealing, the Dallas County Circuit Court record is removed from public Alacourt searches. The Sheriff’s booking entry is also sealed. You may lawfully answer “no” on most private applications asking about arrests or convictions when the record has been sealed — but confirm the specific question’s wording and any exceptions that apply to your situation.

Quick-contacts reference

Frequently asked questions about Dallas County arrest records

How do I visit or contact the Dallas County Courthouse to get an arrest record?

The Dallas County Courthouse is at 105 Lauderdale Street, Selma, Alabama (mailing: P.O. Box 1148). The building opens at 9:00 AM on weekdays. You can reach the courthouse at (334) 358-6801 — confirm hours before visiting, as callers report the line can be congested and calls sometimes go unanswered. For a court-side record, ask for the Circuit Clerk’s office. For a booking record, contact the Dallas County Sheriff’s Office directly, since booking entries are held by the Sheriff rather than the Clerk. You can also search filed cases online through the Dallas County Fourth Circuit Court portal before making the trip.

How do I get a Dallas County arrest record sealed or expunged?

File a petition in the Dallas County Circuit Court under Ala. Code § 15-27-1. Since 2021, Alabama’s expungement law covers convictions as well as dismissed or acquitted cases — older guidance that says only non-convictions qualify is out of date. Non-conviction outcomes (dismissals, acquittals, nolle prosequi) typically have a more direct path with no waiting period. Conviction-based petitions require a waiting period after sentence completion; the exact duration depends on the charge type and is set by the statute. The Dallas County District Attorney and the arresting agency may object. Filing fees apply; ask the Clerk about the indigency waiver if cost is a barrier. After sealing, the record is removed from public Alacourt searches and Open Records Act responses — law enforcement retains access, but the public does not.