When you have a specific name to check in Adams County, court filings land in two places: the statewide MyCase portal for docket-level case data, and the Adams County Clerk of Court for certified copies and county-filed documents. The Clerk’s Office at the Adams County Courthouse is open Monday through Friday, 8 a.m. to 4 p.m., and appointments are required — call (260) 724-5309 to schedule. Booking records held by the Adams County Sheriff’s Office are a separate system entirely, reachable at (260) 724-5345.
If someone you know was just booked tonight, our Adams County inmate-search page has phone-first contact info.
If your person has a history in other states
Adams County’s MyCase portal and the Clerk’s records cover Indiana filings only — cases from other states, federal charges, and arrests that pre-date the portal’s online window won’t appear there. A nationwide criminal database search may surface records from those gaps across multiple jurisdictions. The preliminary scan is free; a full report requires creating an account.
Sponsored: Nationwide Criminal Background Check (we may earn a commission at no extra cost to you).
This tool is not a consumer reporting agency under the FCRA and may not be used to screen anyone for employment, housing, credit, or any other purpose covered by that law.
How to look up arrest records in Adams County
Pull up the statewide MyCase portal first — it covers every Indiana county’s court docket, including Adams, and it’s free to search by name without an account.
Go to MyCase and enter the person’s name. The portal returns case numbers, charge descriptions, hearing dates, and disposition information for Adams County Circuit Court and Adams County Superior Court filings. MyCase is statewide in scope, meaning it searches across all 92 Indiana counties simultaneously — useful if you’re not certain which county a case was filed in. What it does not show is the booking record itself: the Sheriff’s arrest log, the booking photo, or the jail intake date. Those live on the Sheriff’s side of the system.
For the Clerk’s county-only filings — certified copies, case jackets, or documents not yet digitized — contact the Adams County Clerk of Court directly. The Clerk’s Office is inside the Adams County Courthouse and handles both Circuit Court and Superior Court records. Appointments are required before you visit; call (260) 724-5309 to schedule. Hours are Monday through Friday, 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. The office accepts cash, money order, credit card, and debit card for records fees — confirm the current per-page fee when you call, as it is subject to change. A kiosk in the lobby of the Human Service Building also accepts cash, debit, and credit card for payments. The Clerk’s records are county-specific only; MyCase is the tool for cross-county searches.
For booking records — the arrest log, intake date, and booking photo — contact the Adams County Sheriff’s Office at (260) 724-5345. Booking records are public under Indiana’s Access to Public Records Act. The Sheriff’s Office handles records requests separately from the Clerk; a written request may be required for older records. Note that phone calls to the Adams County Sheriff’s Office and Detention Center can result in brief responses from staff — if you need detailed records information, a written request or in-person visit is more reliable than a phone inquiry.
For cases where someone was sentenced to state prison rather than the county jail, the Indiana Department of Correction offender search covers IDOC-supervised individuals. This is a separate database from both MyCase and the Sheriff’s booking log, and it only reflects sentences served in state custody.
The Indiana Judicial Branch Adams County page links directly to local court contacts and the Clerk’s filing information, and is a useful reference if you need mailing addresses or updated court contact details before visiting.
Are Adams County arrest records public?
A juvenile record in Adams County — a minor’s arrest, delinquency proceeding, or related court filing — is not open to the public the way an adult record is. That distinction matters before you search.
For adult records, Indiana’s default rule is openness. Booking records, court dockets, and case filings are public records under Ind. Code § 5-14-3, Indiana’s Access to Public Records Act. Any person can request them from the Adams County Sheriff’s Office or the Adams County Clerk of Court without stating a reason. The law applies to both the booking record (Sheriff-side) and the court case file (Clerk-side).
Juvenile records are the primary exception. Indiana law treats delinquency proceedings as confidential, and those records are not accessible through MyCase or a standard public records request. A parent or guardian of the juvenile, the juvenile’s attorney, and certain government agencies may access them under specific circumstances — but a general public search will not surface them.
Expunged records are the other significant exception. Once a court grants an expungement petition under Indiana’s Second Chance Law, the record is removed from public view. MyCase will no longer display it, and the Clerk’s public index will not reflect it. Law enforcement agencies retain access to expunged records, but members of the public — including background-check requesters — do not.
Victim-protection redactions apply in certain cases. Identifying information for crime victims, particularly in sexual assault and domestic violence cases, may be withheld from the public copy of a record even when the case itself remains publicly accessible. The redacted version is what you’ll receive on a standard records request.
Pending cases are public from the moment charges are filed. An arrest that has not yet resulted in a court filing may appear only in the Sheriff’s booking log, not yet in MyCase — so checking both systems gives you the most complete picture of an Adams County record.
What’s in an Adams County arrest record?
Pull up a case in MyCase and you’ll see the court-side record — the docket entries generated after charges were filed at the Adams County Courthouse.
The docket typically shows the case number, the full charge description (statute cited, level of offense), the filing date, and the attorney of record for both prosecution and defense. Hearing dates appear as docket entries with the type of hearing noted — initial hearing, pretrial conference, jury trial, sentencing hearing. Sentencing dates are recorded when a judgment is entered, and the sentence itself — including any probation terms, fines, or suspended sentence — appears in the judgment entry. If probation was ordered, the docket will reflect the term length and any subsequent probation-violation hearings.
Disposition is recorded when the case closes. A guilty plea, a jury verdict, a dismissal, or an acquittal each generates a separate docket entry. Cases dismissed before trial show the dismissal date and the reason if stated. Acquittals show the verdict date. These disposition entries matter for expungement eligibility, so note them carefully.
The booking record — held by the Adams County Sheriff’s Office, not the Clerk — contains different fields. It shows the arrest date, the arresting agency, the charges at the time of booking (which may differ from what was ultimately filed in court), the booking number, and the date of release or transfer. Booking photos are part of the Sheriff’s record. Indiana’s Access to Public Records Act makes booking photos generally available to the public, but the Adams County Sheriff’s Office controls the release process — call (260) 724-5345 to request a specific booking photo or confirm the current request procedure.
One practical distinction: MyCase reflects what the court has entered into its system, and there can be a lag between a hearing and when the docket entry appears online. If you need same-day confirmation of a hearing outcome, the Clerk’s Office at the Adams County Courthouse is the more reliable source — their staff can confirm entries that haven’t yet propagated to the public portal.
Federal charges filed in the Northern District of Indiana do not appear in MyCase or the Adams County Clerk’s records at all. Those cases are filed in federal district court and require a separate search through the federal PACER system.
How to expunge an arrest record in Adams County
If the arrest you’re looking at resulted in no charges, a dismissal, or an acquittal, the path to clearing it from the public record is more straightforward than most people expect.
Indiana handles all criminal-record relief through a single statute: Ind. Code § 35-38-9 (Indiana “Second Chance Law”). The Clerk of Court at the Adams County Courthouse is the filing authority for expungement petitions — you submit your petition there, and the court assigned to your case processes it. The Clerk’s Office is open Monday through Friday, 8 a.m. to 4 p.m., and appointments are required; call (260) 724-5309 before you go.
For an arrest that never resulted in a conviction — no charges filed, charges dismissed, or a not-guilty verdict — you can petition to expunge the arrest record one year after the arrest date. Dismissals and acquittals are actually eligible for automatic expungement under Indiana law, with the order taking effect no sooner than 60 days after entry. Even so, many people file a petition to confirm the record is cleared and to get a court order they can point to.
For a misdemeanor conviction, the waiting period is five years from the date of conviction, and the court must grant the petition if you meet the eligibility requirements. For a Class D or Level 6 felony conviction, the waiting period is eight years from conviction — also a mandatory grant if requirements are met. More serious felony convictions carry a waiting period of the later of eight years from conviction or three years from completing the sentence, and the court has discretion whether to grant the petition. The most serious felonies require both the passage of the later of ten years from conviction or five years from completing the sentence, and the written consent of the prosecutor.
Indiana’s Second Chance Law gives each person effectively one expungement petition per lifetime. All cases in Adams County must be petitioned together in a single filing — you cannot petition for one case now and return for another later. Getting the timing right before you file is essential. Confirm the current waiting period and your eligibility against the current statute text before submitting anything.
Sex offenses, violent offenses, and official-misconduct offenses are excluded from expungement eligibility under Indiana law. If the record you’re looking at involves one of those categories, the Second Chance Law does not provide a path to sealing it.
The filing fee for an expungement petition is set by the court; call the Adams County Clerk at (260) 724-5309 to confirm the current amount. An indigency waiver is available if you cannot afford the fee — ask the Clerk’s Office about the process when you call. You can file the petition yourself without an attorney, but given the one-petition lifetime limit, many people choose to have an Indiana-licensed attorney review the petition before filing. The Indiana Roll of Attorneys search at Indiana Roll of Attorneys can help you find a licensed attorney, and the Indiana Public Defender Council can point you toward public defender resources if cost is a concern.
After expungement, the record is removed from public view in MyCase and the Clerk’s public index. Law enforcement agencies retain access. The practical effect is that a standard background check will not surface the expunged record — but the court order itself is the authoritative document, and keeping a copy is advisable.
| Resource | What it confirms | What it cannot confirm | Next step |
|---|---|---|---|
| MyCase statewide court portal | Case numbers, charges filed, hearing dates, dispositions, attorney of record — all Indiana counties | Booking records, booking photos, Sheriff-side arrest logs, federal cases | Search by name; no account required |
| Indiana Judicial Branch Adams County | Local court contacts, Clerk filing information, court addresses | Individual case records — use MyCase for those | Use for Clerk contact details before calling or visiting |
| Adams County Clerk of Court — (260) 724-5309 | Certified copies, case jackets, documents not yet in MyCase, expungement petition filing | Sheriff booking records, IDOC custody status | Call to schedule appointment; Mon–Fri 8 a.m.–4 p.m. |
| Adams County Sheriff’s Office 📞 (260) 724-5345 |
Booking records, arrest logs, booking photos, jail intake dates | Court docket entries, case dispositions, IDOC records | Call or submit a written records request under Ind. Code § 5-14-3 |
| Indiana Department of Correction offender search | State prison sentences, IDOC-supervised individuals, release dates | County jail bookings, court dockets, charges not resulting in state prison | Search by name on the IDOC offender lookup |
| Nationwide criminal database search | May surface records from other states, federal cases, or arrests pre-dating MyCase’s online window | Cannot guarantee completeness; not an official government source | Use as a supplemental check after exhausting official sources |
Sources verified 2026-07-20:
- Indiana MyCase docket search — public case search for all 92 Indiana counties, including Adams County Circuit and Superior Court dockets
- Indiana Judicial Branch: Adams County — local court directory, Clerk contact information, and filing resources for Adams County
- Indiana Department of Correction offender search — IDOC-supervised individuals, state prison sentences, and release status
- Indiana State Police — statewide law enforcement agency; supplemental records resource for state-level investigations
- Indiana Roll of Attorneys — licensed attorney search for expungement and records-sealing assistance
- Indiana Public Defender Council — public defender locator for Adams County residents seeking legal assistance
Found an error or outdated detail? Submit a correction — we review and update within 48 hours.
Frequently asked questions about Adams County arrest records
Where can I find my own Adams County arrest record, and what will it show?
Your Adams County court record is searchable by name on MyCase, Indiana’s statewide court portal. It will show case numbers, charges, hearing dates, and the disposition of each case — including whether it was dismissed, resulted in a conviction, or is still pending. The booking record (arrest date, booking photo, jail intake) is held separately by the (260) 724-5345 Adams County Sheriff’s Office; call to request that record. For certified copies of court documents, contact the Adams County Clerk of Court at (260) 724-5309 — appointments are required, and the office is open Monday through Friday, 8 a.m. to 4 p.m.
How do I get an Adams County arrest record expunged under Indiana law?
Indiana’s expungement process runs through Ind. Code § 35-38-9, the Second Chance Law. File a verified petition at the Adams County Clerk of Court — the courthouse where the case was originally filed. If the arrest never resulted in a conviction, you can petition one year after the arrest date. A misdemeanor conviction becomes eligible five years after conviction; a Class D or Level 6 felony after eight years. Indiana allows effectively one lifetime petition, so all Adams County cases must be filed together. Call the Clerk at (260) 724-5309 to confirm the current filing fee and schedule your appointment before submitting anything.
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