Criminal background checks.
Criminal records sit in separate systems: county courts, statewide repositories, federal district courts, and sex-offender registries. This category covers each one — what it searches, and when a database hit must be confirmed at the source.
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- National criminal search
- County criminal search
- Statewide criminal search
- Federal criminal search
- Sex-offender registry search
+ 2 more below
The short version
Each search asks a different record-holder. A national database returns leads; a county clerk returns case files; federal court returns offenses the county never sees. The right package depends on which systems the role actually requires.
If you only remember one thing
National databases are locators and supplements. County court is the primary source for ordinary felonies and misdemeanors. Federal court is a separate building. Sex-offender registries are not court records. Hits in a database should be confirmed at the source before anyone treats them as a decision.
When you need these.
Almost every employment or volunteer package
Start with SSN trace to pick jurisdictions, a national database to catch out-of-state leads, a sex-offender registry for youth-adjacent roles, and county confirmation on hits — Plus builds the county step in.
When the person has moved, or the name is common
Address history expands the county list. Aliases from the SSN trace have to be searched too. Identity verification is what stops you from searching the wrong John Smith in the right county.
When the role has federal or fiduciary exposure
Tax evasion, bank fraud, interstate offenses, and crimes on federal property do not live at the county courthouse. That is a federal district search, usually missed by buyers who assume “criminal” covered it.
What this category includes.
- 01
National criminal search
Multi-jurisdiction database search
The United States has no single criminal court, so the compiled file is how a researcher sees past the current ZIP code. Every partner version — JDP’s national file, DataFacts’ 4,000-plus-source national-with-alias, NCSI’s dual multi-jurisdictional pass, 3rd Degree’s national database — agrees that hits should be confirmed at the court of origin, and Synapse can dispatch that county confirmation through TazWorks automatically.
What it covers - 02
County criminal search
Primary-source court record search
This product covers two jobs: searching the address-history counties from the SSN trace (current county, or seven years of residences), and confirming national-database hits at the court of origin. Partner CRAs — JDP’s researcher network plus electronic access, 3rd Degree’s 3,400-plus jurisdictions, NCSI’s local-county-on-every-check, DataFacts’ county reports — already work in those courts, and Synapse dispatches confirmations through TazWorks.
What it covers - 03
Statewide criminal search
State repository search
State repositories receive data from local agencies that may or may not send it, and lower-level infractions are often missing — JDP’s own product notes say so. That is why 3rd Degree and DataFacts sell state searches as a complement to county, not a replacement, and why availability varies by state.
What it covers - 04
Federal criminal search
U.S. District Court search
This is the most commonly skipped serious search in employment screening: JDP’s notes say it plainly — low hit rate, district-by-district, an extra layer on top of state and county. For finance, executive, and healthcare-billing roles the cases it catches are the ones that are catastrophic to miss, and federal records’ thin identifiers are where a bound vID identity and Synapse’s corroboration rules matter most.
What it covers - 05
Sex-offender registry search
State, territorial, and tribal registries
The SafeSport Act, insurers, and state child-protection rules all point at registry coverage; NCSI runs two registry passes on every check, JDP searches DOJ-sourced registries including tribal, and DataFacts bundles a 50-state registry into national. It belongs in Standard because a registrant from a state they no longer live in is exactly who a current-county search misses.
What it covers - 06
Incarceration & bookings
Jail and prison custody search
3rd Degree’s Smart Screen is the clearest version: an incarceration network covering 1,900-plus county jails and 30-plus state prison systems, used as an instant first pass before court research. A bookings hit still needs identity corroboration and usually a court follow-up before anyone makes a decision.
What it covers - 07
Custom criminal integrations
Custom scopes beyond default packages
The partner network is a court-access business: JDP does custom county, state, and federal scoping, 3rd Degree expands jurisdictions, NCSI runs multi-county searches off address history, and TazWorks reaches clerks without portals. We turn a written requirement into a package the network can run on an identity-verified candidate.
What it covers
How these get fulfilled.
Synapse routes SSN-trace and national-criminal searches across Cerebrum’s CRA network, then sends county-confirmation requests through TazWorks when a hit needs a primary source. Statewide, federal, incarceration, and custom scopes are fulfilled by the same network — the CRAs already running those searches for healthcare, staffing, youth sports, and enterprise clients.
Frequently asked questions.
Pick the courts. We’ll run the searches.
Start with identity-verified Standard or Plus, then add statewide, federal, or a custom county scope when the role calls for it.
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