Arrest Records for Concordia Parish, Louisiana

Arrest records in Concordia Parish sit across two separate systems: criminal case filings at the Concordia Parish Clerk of Court, located at 4001 Carter St., Room 9, Vidalia, LA 71373, and booking records held by the Concordia Parish Sheriff’s Office. The Clerk’s office keeps weekday hours of 8:30 AM to 4:30 PM. Concordia Parish is also part of the Louisiana Clerks Remote Access Authority, which means some court records may be reachable without a trip to Vidalia. The Sheriff’s Office maintains a live pretrial inmate roster at concordiasheriff.org for custody checks.

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

If you need records outside Concordia Parish

A nationwide search may surface records from neighboring parishes, federal cases that Concordia’s local portals never index, or entries under name variants and prior names. The preliminary scan is free; a full report requires creating an account.

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How to look up arrest records in Concordia Parish

“Public records shall be open to inspection” — that is the operative language of Louisiana’s open-records framework, and it means Concordia Parish arrest records are accessible through the channels below without a court order or attorney.

Clerk of Court — court-side records. The Concordia Parish Clerk of Court at 4001 Carter St., Room 9, Vidalia, LA 71373 holds the official docket for every criminal case filed in the 7th Judicial District Court. Office hours are 8:30 AM to 4:30 PM on weekdays. The Clerk’s office is part of the Louisiana Clerks Remote Access Authority, so some case records may be searchable remotely — ask the Clerk directly about current online access options. Call the Concordia Parish Courthouse at (225) 342-9500 to confirm the records-request fee and any required forms before you visit. Bring the full name and approximate date of the arrest; a case number speeds the search considerably.

Sheriff’s Office — booking records. The Concordia Parish Sheriff’s Office maintains booking records and the parish jail roster. The Sheriff operates facilities at three locations: 5223 Highway 84 W in Vidalia, 4001 Carter St. in Ferriday, and 15045 Highway 84 in Jonesville. For records requests, (318) 336-5231 is the main line. The Sheriff’s website at concordiasheriff.org publishes a live Pretrial Inmates roster — useful for confirming whether someone is currently in custody and under what charges. Booking photos and charge details visible on that roster are public under Louisiana Public Records Law.

Louisiana DOC — state prison records. If the person you’re researching was sentenced to state custody rather than held at the parish jail, the Louisiana Department of Public Safety and Corrections tracks that record. The Louisiana DOC inmate lookup searches by name or DOC number and shows current facility, sentence, and projected release date. Parish jail pretrial detainees do not appear there — they appear on the Sheriff’s roster above.

Louisiana State Police — background check records. The Louisiana State Police administers the state’s criminal history repository. A name-based criminal history check through LSP covers convictions statewide, not just Concordia Parish. This is the path if you need a certified record for a legal proceeding rather than a case-specific docket lookup.

Confirm numbers and hours before visiting or calling, as schedules can change without notice on agency websites.

Are Concordia Parish arrest records public?

“Every person of the age of majority is entitled to examine any public record” — that is the core guarantee of La. R.S. 44:1, Louisiana’s Public Records Law, and it applies directly to Concordia Parish arrest records. Court filings, booking entries, and charging documents are public by default. Sealed or expunged records, juvenile records, and certain victim-protection redactions are the narrow exceptions.

An arrest record that has been expunged under Louisiana law is removed from public view entirely. After a successful expungement, the Concordia Parish Clerk of Court and the Sheriff’s Office are both required to treat the record as if it does not exist for public-records purposes. Law enforcement agencies retain access to sealed records for their own investigative use, but a member of the public requesting the same record will receive a response indicating no record exists. That distinction — public access cut off, law-enforcement access preserved — is the practical effect of expungement in this parish.

Juvenile records carry a separate protection. Arrests and adjudications of persons under 17 at the time of the offense are not open to the public under the same framework that governs adult records. Requesting a juvenile record requires a court order.

Victim-identifying information — addresses, contact details, and certain case details in domestic violence and sexual assault matters — may be redacted from otherwise public documents. The Clerk will produce the redacted version on request; the full unredacted record requires a showing of need to the court.

Mugshot release in Concordia Parish follows the Sheriff’s discretion under the same public-records framework. Call the (318) 336-5231 Sheriff’s Office line to ask about the current policy for a specific booking — the answer may vary depending on whether the case is still active. The expungement process covered in the next section is the mechanism for removing a record from public view permanently.

What’s in a Concordia Parish arrest record?

Pull the booking entry and the court docket for the same arrest, and you will find they contain different fields — because they live in different systems maintained by different offices at the Concordia Parish Courthouse and the Sheriff’s facility on Highway 84.

The booking record, held by the Concordia Parish Sheriff’s Office, captures what happened at the jail: the booking date and time, the arresting agency (Sheriff’s deputies, Ferriday PD, Vidalia PD, or Louisiana State Police), the charges as written at arrest, physical descriptors, and the booking photo. The pretrial roster at concordiasheriff.org shows a subset of this — name, charges, and bond amount for current detainees. Older booking entries are not published online; you request those directly from the Sheriff.

The court docket, held by the Concordia Parish Clerk of Court at 4001 Carter St., Room 9, Vidalia, shows what happened after the arrest reached the 7th Judicial District Court. That record includes the case number, the bill of information or grand jury indictment, every scheduled hearing date, the attorney of record (public defender or retained counsel), and — critically — the disposition. A disposition entry is what tells you whether the case ended in conviction, dismissal, acquittal, nolle prosequi, or diversion. The booking record at the Sheriff’s Office will never show a disposition; that field only exists on the court side.

One arrest can produce multiple records across both systems. A person arrested by Ferriday PD, booked at the Concordia Parish jail, and later charged by the 7th District Attorney will have a Ferriday PD incident report, a Sheriff’s booking entry, and a Clerk of Court case file — three separate documents, each with different fields, held by different offices. If you need the complete picture, request from all three.

The Louisiana State Police criminal history repository adds a fourth layer: a statewide summary that aggregates conviction data from all parishes. That record may show Concordia Parish convictions alongside convictions from other parishes where the person has lived. It will not show arrests that did not result in conviction, and it will not show cases that were expunged.

How to expunge an arrest record in Concordia Parish

Louisiana sets specific waiting periods before a petition to seal is eligible — five years after completing a misdemeanor sentence (including probation), ten years after completing a felony sentence — and those timers run from the end of supervision, not from the conviction date itself.

The controlling statute is La. Code Crim. Proc. art. 971, which governs expungement of criminal records statewide. Petitioning to seal an arrest record in Concordia Parish is a routine civil filing at the 7th Judicial District Court, handled through the Clerk of Court at 4001 Carter St., Room 9, Vidalia, LA 71373. The Clerk’s office is open 8:30 AM to 4:30 PM on weekdays.

Non-conviction cases move faster. An arrest that ended in dismissal, acquittal, or a refusal to prosecute carries no elapsed-time wait at all under the statute. You can petition immediately after the case closes. An arrest that was never prosecuted must wait for the prescriptive period to run before the petition is eligible. A DWI resolved through pretrial diversion is the one non-conviction that carries a hard wait — five years from the date of arrest — before the petition can be filed.

Marijuana possession — first offense. A first conviction for simple marijuana possession qualifies after ninety days from the completion of sentence. That is a significantly shorter window than the standard misdemeanor path.

Filing the petition. The petition must be filed at the District Court through the Clerk of Court for Concordia Parish. Call the Clerk at (225) 342-9500 to confirm the current filing fee. An indigency waiver is available if you cannot afford the fee — ask the Clerk for the in forma pauperis form at the same time. The petition requires a certified copy of your criminal history from the Louisiana State Police, a copy of the judgment of conviction or dismissal, and service on the district attorney’s office and the arresting agency.

Self-petition vs. attorney-assisted. Louisiana does not require an attorney to file an expungement petition. Many people handle straightforward non-conviction expungements without counsel. Felony petitions, cases with multiple charges, or situations where the district attorney is likely to object benefit from attorney review. The Louisiana State Bar Association attorney finder and the Louisiana Public Defender office are both resources if you want legal guidance.

What changes after expungement. Once the court grants the petition, the Concordia Parish Clerk of Court and the Sheriff’s Office seal the record from public view. A background check by a member of the public returns no record. Law enforcement agencies — including the Sheriff, the district attorney, and the Louisiana State Police — retain access to the sealed record for investigative purposes. The record does not disappear from law enforcement systems; it disappears from public ones.

Quick-contacts table

Frequently asked questions about Concordia Parish arrest records

What is the fastest way to visit the Concordia Parish Clerk of Court and get a copy of an arrest record?

Go to the Clerk of Court at 4001 Carter St., Room 9, Vidalia, LA 71373 during weekday hours of 8:30 AM to 4:30 PM. Bring the full name of the person and the approximate arrest date. The Clerk will search the 7th Judicial District Court docket and produce the case file, which includes charges, hearing dates, attorney of record, and disposition. Call (225) 342-9500 ahead of your visit to confirm the current records-request fee and any required forms — fees must be paid by cash, money order, or certified cashier’s check. If you cannot travel to Vidalia, ask the Clerk about remote access options through the Louisiana Clerks Remote Access Authority, of which Concordia Parish is a member.

How do I get a Concordia Parish arrest record expunged?

File a petition under La. Code Crim. Proc. art. 971 at the 7th Judicial District Court through the Concordia Parish Clerk of Court. The waiting period depends on the outcome: arrests ending in dismissal or acquittal have no wait; misdemeanor convictions require five years after completing the sentence; felony convictions require ten years. A first marijuana-possession conviction qualifies after ninety days. Call the Clerk at (225) 342-9500 to confirm the current filing fee. If cost is a barrier, ask for the in forma pauperis waiver form. Once granted, the record is sealed from public view — the Clerk and the Sheriff’s Office both treat it as nonexistent for public-records purposes, though law enforcement retains access.