Legal Articles

Obtaining a copy of a death record is a fairly simple and straightforward process.Death records must be obtained through your state or local vital records office, as there is currently no national database for retrieving these records. However, there are certain conditions that must be met before you can obtain a copy of death records.
Who can Obtain a Death Record?

Most of the local and state vital records offices have clear rules on obtaining death records. In fact, most state agencies will only release a death record for an individual who can prove to be a direct-line descendant of the person in question. A direct-line descendant is the spouse, parent or child of the deceased.

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Other persons who are eligible to receive a copy of a death record are those who have documented lawful right or claim, a documented medical need, or a court order handed down from a state court.

In order to request a copy of a death record, the person in question must provide proof of their relationship to the deceased.

The vital records office will then likely request a photo ID, such as a passport or a driver’s licenses, as well as two other letters or statements that show the applicant’s current name and address. Often times, the vital records office will accept documentation such as a utility bill or letter from a governmental agency.

Although each state will have its own set of rules regarding the release of death records, the above information is generally commonplace.

Are There any Exceptions?
For individuals interested in searching for death records for genealogy purposes, the process of obtaining a death record is not that complicated.
However, most state and local vital records offices will only release death records if the individual has been deceased for at least 50 years (this time frame may vary slightly from state to state). At this point, you can receive death certificates for genealogy purposes.

Most vital records offices will require that you request the death certificate in writing, and that you provide a good deal of information to facilitate the search. Be as accurate as possible when requesting the death certificate, and if you don’t know exact dates and locations, you can estimate.  For example, if you don’t know the exact date of the individual’s death, you can provide a span of years to the vital records office to guide them in their search.

Some of the information you may be asked to provide includes: the date of request, the full name of the deceased, the sex of the person, the date of death, the city and/or town of death, your relationship to the deceased, the purpose of your request, and your contact information.

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The vital records office will also ask you to pay a small fee to cover administrative costs.
Online Resources

There are many websites that may be able to help you in your search for death records. They can provide you with the proper information and can help facilitate the process so you can receive your death records in a reasonable amount of time.

Death records can provide us with a plethora of useful information for genealogy purposes, and may prove to be useful when dealing with estates, wills and inheritances.

There are many websites that claim to offer free death records and other vital records, but these websites are often riddled with related fees and expenses – many of which are not initially disclosed by the company.

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Look for Hidden Fees
For example, a website that offers free death records may perform a small, initial search that locates the individual in question (this simplified search is easy to complete). Then, once the deceased individual is located, the website then takes you to a new website that asks you to pay for the service of finding a death record. Often, these misleading websites charge more than other death records websites.

The bottom line is that all state and local vital records offices around the country charge a fee for a death record request. This fee generally covers the administrative costs of searching for and printing death records.  Therefore, a website cannot offer a free search for a death record when the vital records office from where they are obtaining the information is charging a fee for the service.

Beware of Inaccurate Information
If a website claims to offer free death records, it may very well provide you with misleading or inaccurate information on the person on which you are requesting the death record. For most individuals that rely on an accurate death record for genealogy or simply personal reasons, an inaccurate death record is completely useless.

How to Facilitate your Search
Of course, there are reputable resources online that can help you locate the death records you seek.  Archives.com, for example, is a powerful and comprehensive resource that can connect you with the right records.   While this is a paid service, you can utilize their free 7-day trial to evaluate the service and begin your search for death records.

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Your genealogy search has never been easier using the power of the Internet.Websites such as Archives.com are there to make the searching process easier, saving you time and effort.   The excitement of the Internet and the many conveniences that come along with it have empowered many individuals to find loved ones and ancestors – all with the click of a button.

Envisage that you encounter the next situation. You are thinking of going into a commercial deal with a new business partner or partners. It is essential that you collect all the background info on that specific party or person before settling on any lawfully binding arrangement because scamming has become such a worldwide concern.

A contract with a felonious business partner may put your commercial enterprise in danger and constitute a big threat to your laboriously earned money. Your best option is to have a ready to hand and dependable database containing the correct types of info so that you can go into the entire history of the prospective partner and look at all potential records of criminality, fraud and so forth. Once you get such data you will get an idea of the individual’s character and whether you ought to or not get into the contract with him.

Another scenario could be that you need to find the contact details of an old acquaintance from your high school or college with whom you have lost all contact. You wish to invite her for a small party or for a house warming function. It would be exceedingly irritating if you have to hunt all over for the individual’s contact details or if you must call many other acquaintances to find a friend that is still in contact with the person you’re seeking. You need to be searching public records .

You need access to a database where you can get the necessary information with just a small number of queries on your personal computer. Such a database with many thousands of public records has been put in place by Searching Public Records. While the central repository of information is filled with data that is publically available, it nevertheless has to be sourced from numerous sources that are scattered around the United States. A lot of small databases must be researched and the info combined into one database that can be conveniently searched. It should be obvious that this is not an easy matter. One must thus expect to pay a small fee for utilizing the database. The cost of using Search Records is really quite small if you consider the effort required to insert the info and keep it updated. You can find public records databases here.