A pardon is an act of executive grace. Except as otherwise provided by the Delaware Constitution, or expressly by any provision of the Delaware Code or any court rule, an unconditional pardon fully restores all civil rights to the person pardoned. Such civil rights include, but are not limited to, the right to vote, the right to serve on a jury if selected, the right to purchase or possess deadly weapons, and the right to seek and hold public office. A pardon does not remove the historical fact of the conviction from the state’s official arrest and conviction records; it simply adds to the record that a pardon has been granted. Please be advised that the Governor has the authority to place lawful conditions upon the granting of a pardon. To remove the historical fact of a conviction, you may be able to apply for an expungement after a pardon has been granted for the conviction.

PLEASE READ THIS SECTION CAREFULLY BEFORE PROCEEDING:

Before proceeding with your pardon application process, you must obtain a certified copy of your criminal history from the State Bureau of Identification and certified court dockets and sentencing orders for all adult dispositions listed as guilty, unknown, unobtainable or transferred on the criminal history. This process will take several weeks. You will not be able to fill out your application correctly without this information.

To apply for a pardon, follow the instructions given in the Board of Pardons Checklist in the order in which they are listed. FAILURE TO FOLLOW EACH STEP MAY RESULT IN A RETURNED APPLICATION. All forms listed in this checklist can be found in the Pardon Application Packet or individually on the Forms Page.

The forms on this site are portable document files (PDF). To view these forms, you will need to have an application installed on your computer that can read PDF files. Adobe Acrobat Reader 6.01 or higher will allow you to not only view these files but to fill them in online as well as save them to your computer and print them out. You can get Adobe Acrobat Reader free at get.adobe.com/reader

For assistance with these instructions or with the forms, contact the Board of Pardons by phone or by email listed on our contact page