Having a criminal record, even one that doesn't result in a conviction can affect your ability to get a job alone or even housing for years after the incident.

The New Jersey Office of the Public Defender recently hosted a free expungement clinic to help offenders with the paperwork and legal resources they need to get a clean slate.

Ted Goldberg reports.

More than 200 people showed up to a recent expungement clinic in Somerset, hoping to get old criminal charges taken off their record.

It opened up doors because a lot of businesses, even when I was working with someone cleaning, you had to have at least five year clearance, seven years and you were okay.

But some people, they just play hardball, just like I just got rejected for something that happened in 1975.

Hardy Kee drove up from Lakewood, where he runs a cleaning business for medical offices and banks.

He says a nonviolent charge from 45 years ago has kept him from expanding his business.

I was 18 and I was running the crowd and it was a shoplifting charge.

And I had an expungement done and I had other things on my record, and other three things was taking off.

And the one in 1975 wasn't taking off.

So when I went for my nursery license, my whole Murphy license, I was rejected because of the 1975 charge.

They've already turn their lives around.

They've already demonstrated a commitment to living a law abiding life.

These clinics work with people who are five or ten years removed from certain offenses and help complete what's called a petition package that goes to the Superior Court of New Jersey.

If approved, a court order goes to the state police and the criminal charges are removed from the record.

God has given all of us a second or third chances.

If there are barriers to people getting barber licenses or doing other things to be more productive citizens, we want to help those barriers be removed.

One mistake should not dictate your future.

In most cases.

As hinted at by Assemblyman Joe Danielson, you can't expunge robberies, certain violent crimes or certain sexual crimes.

But for other offenses, expungement can mean a world of help.

I hear about it all the time for one reason or another.

People getting jobs, people getting financing, people getting promotions, people going for gun permits.

Despite having to turn their lives around and living law abiding lives.

For many years now, an old criminal conviction really can serve as a millstone around their neck, and it prevents them from kind of forging that path forward and finding meaningful work.

Fletcher Duddy works in the state's Office of the Public Defender and says studies show tangible proof that people's lives get better when their records are cleaned up without harming the communities where they live.

Within two years of getting one's criminal record expunged, they're in their salary goes up upwards of 25%.

And in fact, for those who have an expungement, who've gotten their criminal records expunged, their recidivism rate likelihood to commit another offense is actually lower than that of the general public.

Key is hoping for an expungement of his own, while encouraging others to reach out if they're curious.

Keep it up.

Keep trying to clear your name because you never know where it will take you.

You know, that's what I'm doing.

And trying to move past an old conviction slowing down his business.

Almost 50 years later in Somerset.

I'm Ted Goldberg.

NJ Spotlight News.