Arrest Records from Australia

[haroldzenner]

I am 69 years old and going to the USA on a tour in August. I was arrested in 1958 (aged 20) for being with a group of mates who stripped an apparently abandoned motor vehicle which turned out to be not abandoned. Several of us were arrested but my case was dismissed by a magistrate because my role was passive (just looking on really).

Should I risk answering NO to the arrest question on the entry to USA form? Does anyone know whether the Victorian (Australia) government would have retained this court record and how likely is that they would have allowed the USA access to it if it were retained?

[NORMANTHEDOG]

read the other posts about this, and as your case was dismissed,you have NO record,so stop being silly,and worrying about nothing.

[haroldzenner]

I might add that I was fingerprinted at the time. My concern is that my fingerprints still exist and are on a database accessible to USA immigration. After all incoming visitors are fingerprinted on arrival.

[Buenchico]

Although the US embassy website states that anyone who's ever been arrested is ineligible to use the Visa Waiver Program, the form you complete on the plane doesn't ask about arrests. It only asks whether you've ever been convicted for a crime of 'moral turpitude'. You can truthfully answer 'No' to that question.

While US immigration authorities would, no doubt, like to have direct access to the police & court records of other countries, they've always been denied them by every country except Canada (which shares a database with the USA). Obviously, many countries pass on specific information about people who're suspected of cross-border crime (such as terrorism or drug-smuggling) but, unless MI6 have prepared a dossier on you, you can be confident that the US authorities will not know about your 'dark history' ;-)

Chris

[dzug]

Don't know about Australia but at the time of your 'incident' UK police would have had to destroy your fingerprints once it was clear you weren't going to be prosecuted. The law on this only changed in 2001.

As for US immigration having a vast all-seeing, all-knowing database of crimes from all countries - don't succumb to paranoia. They don't.

[haroldzenner]

Thanks for your response Buenchico. However a bit more reseach by me has unearthed the form that a Visa Waiver visitor has to fill in:

http://www.thedibb.co.uk/web/imigration/xvisab ack.jpg

It does clearly ask about arrests OR convictions. It's clear that an arrest is sufficient. It's too late for me to apply for a visa (if even that would solve my problem!), so I'll have to risk answering No to the question and hope that such an old matter (a) doesn't still exist In Australian records, or (b) if it still exists somewhere here that it hasn't been transmitted to a database transmitted to USA immigration.