CROWN POINT | A Lake County judge who in January ordered records of a convicted felon destroyed backpedaled Tuesday and ordered the clerk's office to save the documents from the shredder.

In July, Dominic Pitzel, 53, a Crown Point businessman, petitioned the court to clear his record of his more than 20-year-old felony convictions.

It wasn't the first time Pitzel requested such an action in the cases. It's just the first time it succeeded.

However, Lake Criminal Court Judge Diane Ross Boswell found out she may have gone too far on Jan. 2 when she not only ordered the robbery, aggravated assault, theft, burglary, pointing a gun and carrying a handgun without a license convictions set aside -- but all records of those convictions destroyed, court records show.

In 2000 and 2001, two special prosecutors on the case -- appointed because Lake County Prosecutor Bernard Carter disclosed Pitzel's father is a "personal friend" -- asked judges to deny the post-conviction requests made by Pitzel's then-lawyer Willie Harris.

But the second special prosecutor assigned to the case, Michael D. O'Neall, of Jasper County, later reversed his position and asked the judge to comply with Pitzel's request, which had been made by attorney Marc Laterzo.

O'Neall said Wednesday he agreed only to the conviction being set aside, not the records destroyed. The stipulation filed in January makes no mention of an expungement agreement.

"I'll tell you, that's the last special prosecution case I'll take from Lake County," O'Neall said.

The court's electronic docket shows no record of Laterzo entering his appearance or of a new post-conviction relief petition being filed. However, a check of the resurrected files Wednesday turned up both as being filed in open court July 18.

Boswell's secretary, Linda Dicicco, said she was on vacation in July and didn't know why the electronic docket entries were not made.

After reading a local media account of the unusual order and the discrepancies in the record, Senior Lake Criminal Court Judge Salvador Vasquez said he spoke with Boswell about the case.

He said expungements are rare, and there are narrow guidelines for granting them.

In fact, legal experts say the only Indiana law under which arrests can be expunged is when the petitioner has been free from subsequent arrests. Records show Pitzel was arrested in 2003 for contributing to the delinquency of a minor, a charge that prosecutors dismissed in July 2005 after Pitzel paid a fine and went six months without an arrest.

"There was never a hearing on this matter," Vasquez said. "You just don't make quick decisions. But to err is human, and when you make a mistake, you've got to correct it."

Thus, Boswell's order Wednesday to save the files from destruction.

Lake County Chief Deputy Clerk Sylvia Brown said the Jan. 2 expungement order was one of only a handful she has seen in her many years in the clerk's office. That's why she called the state court administration for guidelines, she said.

Brown said she began following the expungement order by erasing computer records of Pitzel's convictions. Her next step was to destroy the hard copies, but Boswell's new order stopped that process.

Brown said she did not know if the computer files would be re-entered.