Criminal Justice Information Services is the state's criminal history information repository. It provides criminal identification screening to criminal justice agencies, non-criminal justice agencies, and private citizens to identify persons with criminal warrants, arrests, and convictions that impact employment, licensing, and eligibility to purchase a firearm, as well as a variety of criminal justice functions.

The program also provides criminal statistical information for use by policy makers and that is of interest to the public, including the compilation of Uniform Crime Report (UCR) and hate crime information collected from local law enforcement agencies. The program also helps ensure the quality of the data available on the Florida Crime Information Center (FCIC) system and aids in the development of policy for national sharing of criminal justice information with the FBI and other states.

• Criminal History Information. This service is provided to criminal justice agencies, non-criminal justice agencies, and private citizens to obtain individual criminal history information. In Fiscal Year 2021-22, the program processed 3.2 million criminal history record checks, an increase from Fiscal Year 2020-21 when the program processed over 2.9 million. In Fiscal Year 2020-21, the program processed over 2.9 million criminal history checks, a decrease from Fiscal Year 2019-20 when the program processed over 3.7 million.
• FALCON. This system identifies criminal suspects and reports data. Through a web portal, users are able to perform tasks related to the management of applicant fingerprints retained by FDLE when organizations submit criminal history background check requests. Applicants retained in FALCON are compared to incoming Florida arrest fingerprints. When the fingerprints match, the organization that submitted the individual is notified of the arrest.
• Florida Statistical Analysis Center (FSAC). FDLE analyzes criminal justice data and prepares reports for a wide range of users, including policymakers, planners, academicians, media, students, and other interested in researching crime in Florida. The center also facilitates the use of Uniform Crime Report data gathered from across the state.
• Missing Endangered Persons Information Clearinghouse. FDLE provides a clearinghouse of information on missing endangered persons to assist law enforcement and the public in recovering missing children and adults. The clearinghouse incorporates AMBER Alerts for abducted children, Missing Child Alerts for missing children, and Silver Alerts for missing persons who have irreversible deterioration of intellectual faculties. Beginning in July 2022, the clearinghouse began administering the Purple Alert for missing persons who have a non-Alzheimer's- or dementia-related intellectual or developmental disability, brain injury; or another physical, mental or emotional disability not related to substance abuse. During Fiscal Year 2021-22 there were 28,892 missing persons intelligence checks conducted, an increase from Fiscal Year 2020-21 when there were 25,501.
  

Sexual Offender and Predator Tracking and Information. FDLE collects and maintains information on Florida's registered sexual offenders and predators. The registry contains public record information on offenders classified as sexual predators and sexual offenders under Florida law because of a conviction for a sex-related crime. This information is made available to interested citizens to help them educate themselves about the possible presence of such offenders in their local communities. As of May 2023, there were 30,675 sexual offenders and predators living in Florida communities. It should be noted that a sexual offender and predator’s information is not removed from the registry’s public website when they leave the state of Florida. In addition, sexual offenders and predators that are reported deceased remain on the website for one year after the date of death as provided on the death certificate.

Juvenile Criminal History Records. Section 943.053, Florida Statutes, provides that criminal history information related to juveniles compiled is confidential and exempt from public record requirements, except when the juvenile has been taken into custody for, charged with, or found guilty of, a felony offense, or the juvenile has been transferred to adult court. The exempt juvenile criminal history information must be made available in certain instances. However, these provisions were subject to repeal and to prevent the release of this information, the 2021 Legislature enacted Ch. 2021-118, Laws of Florida, which removes scheduled repeals of exemption from public record requirements for juvenile criminal history information.

In 2022, the Legislature enacted Ch. 2022-111, Laws of Florida, which requires FDLE to expunge a juvenile's nonjudicial arrest record after their completion of a diversion program for any offense that is not a forcible felony or a felony involving the manufacture, sale, purchase, transport, possession, or use of a firearm or weapon. This would allow juveniles who successfully complete a diversion program to lawfully deny or fail to deny the arrest record.

Automatic Sealing of Criminal History Records. The 2019 Legislature also enacted Ch. 2019-167, Laws of Florida, which, among other provisions, reorganized sealing and expunction statutes for clarity and created an automatic sealing process for certain criminal history records. This process requires FDLE to automatically seal a criminal history record when charges were not filed or dismissed (unless the dismissal was due to incompetency to proceed) or the defendant was acquitted, by either a verdict of not guilty or an acquittal. This process does not apply to forcible felonies such as murder and sexual battery. The sealing is not contingent on a person's prior criminal history and there is no limit to the number of sealings a person can receive. The 2023 Legislature enacted Ch. 2023-189, Laws of Florida, which limited the sealing to when a case is dismissed or acquitted as to all counts.

Uniform Criminal Justice Data Collection. The 2018 Legislature enacted Ch. 128-127, Laws of Florida, with the intent of creating a model of uniform data collection by requiring local and state criminal justice agencies to report complete, accurate, and timely data, and making such data available to the public to promote criminal justice data transparency. Specifically, the law requires the clerks of court, state attorneys, public defenders, county detention facility administrators, and the Department of Corrections to collect specified data on a biweekly basis and report it to the FDLE on a monthly basis. FDLE is required to publish the data collected on their website and make it searchable and accessible to the public by January 1, 2020.

The 2019 Legislature enacted Ch. 2019-167, Laws of Florida, which amended this law to define new data elements and revise existing ones, and require certain state agencies or local entities to collect and report these elements in an effort to help ensure accurate and comprehensive collection. The law also required the Criminal and Juvenile Justice Information Systems Council to develop specifications for a uniform arrest affidavit, uniform charge and disposition statue crosswalk table, and a uniform criminal disposition and sentencing statute crosswalk table. Through the Criminal Justice Transparency (CJDT) initiative, the department dataset seeks to provide to provide information related to arrests connected to physical bookings, prosecution actions, and court dispositions in all 67 counties in Florida.

The 2021 General Appropriations Act (Ch. 2021-36, Laws of Florida) requires the department to provide monthly status reports to the Executive Office of the Governor’s Office of Policy and Budget, the Department of Management Services, and the chairs of the Senate Appropriations Committee and the House of Representatives Appropriations Committee in order to receive funding to implement these criminal justice data collection and reporting requirements.  Each status report must include progress made to date for each project milestone, deliverable, and task order, planned and actual deliverable completion dates, planned and actual costs incurred, and any project issues and risks. Further, the department is required to competitively procure a private sector provider with experience in conducting independent verification and validation services of public sector information technology projects to provide independent verification and validation services for all department staff and vendor work needed to implement the initiative.

The 2022 General Appropriations Act allocated $8 million in General Revenue for Criminal Justice Data Technical Assistance grants to assist with ensuring that local government jail management systems can remain compatible with the FDLE Criminal Justice Data Transparency data requirements as required by statute. 

Other Reports
The Auditor General reports on department operations are available on its website

Websites of Interest
FBI National Crime Information Center
National Center for Missing and Exploited Children
Dru Sjodin National Sex Offender Public Website

Performance Information

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