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Ask Slashdot: Can a Felon Work In IT?
First time accepted submitter Lesrahpem writes I'm a felon with several prior misdemeanor convictions from an immature time in my life. I've since cleaned up my act, and I want to go back into the IT sector. I keep running into potential employers who tell me they'd like to hire me but can't because of my past record (expunging won't work, I'm in Ohio). Does anyone have any suggestions for me? Should I just give up and change careers?"
I've hired people with misdemeanors before.
Be honest about the crime, don't have it be a surprise that I find out during the background check part of the hiring process.
I also know other managers who've done the same. Its tough to find good people. A drug offense 5 yrs ago, with proof of a completed drug treatment program for instance isn't going to stop me from hiring a good IT worker.
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On the whole, I find that I prefer Slashdot posts to twitter ones because I don't get limited to 140 chars before
While it sucks, there's a good reason why companies have asked people about their past criminal history or have done searches.
If you have past felony convictions for, say grand larceny or other similar crimes, and are hired, and then go on to commit a crime against a customer while working, it's very easy for that company to get sued for millions. It's would be incredibly easy to make the argument that the company knew or should have known that Mr. Felon (who supposedly cleaned up his act) had prior convictions and was a risk to the company and its customers. Then, BLAM, the company is out millions of dollars, all because it didn't check or didn't care.
Now, while this sucks for the felon trying to land a job, it also sucks for the company, and lets face it, the recidivism rate among past felons is generally pretty high. Why should a company want to risk it's own livelihood or existence just to give you a second chance?
This is a risk mitigation issue, and maybe it's a good thing that states are making it difficult to ask or check, but companies will do it anyway, just for the reasons I've outlined. Maybe companies in other, "more enlightened" societies haven't had their pants sued off them enough to make this an issue, bit is one here.
Or he simply doesn't know the difference. Either way, criminal background checks are required for most IT jobs I have ever applied for and have never seen anyone with a criminal history get an IT job. I have seen people get rejected for reckless driving and DUI as being able to travel and drive to remote facilities was required, let alone a rash of misdemeanors and a felony off the road.
If you want to stick to IT I would suggest trying to find (or make) friends with others in management positions over IT groups and try to get hired. Some time on the job and some strong references will help your chances, but not guarantee anything as managers' hands are often tied when HR flags a candidate with a criminal history.
I would also suggest switching your career to politics, as that career path doesn't seem to care much about criminal history.
Well, yes, in the same way that Socrates is mortal because Socrates died.
The thing is, in the good ol' US of A, where less than 10 years ago you could be a felon for owning 6 dildos, we can be pretty darn stupid. http://www.dumblaws.com/law/938. Yes, the law was overturned, but just one example of the way we are tough on crime. And here's some fun with our drug laws. http://netnebraska.org/article/news/938774/how-tough-nebraska-pot-possession-depends-county I like the quote “Let’s say you have a marijuana brownie,” Steller explained. “We would prosecute you for the possession of hash which is a class 4 felony.”
hello and welcome to my life.
it's well documented here on /. that i struggle with this same issue, and have for over a decade.
i wish i had good news for you, but i don't. it's going to be hard for you for find "regular" employment.
my advice? try to find a small company where you can get hired without a lot of fanfare. finding and owner/ceo who does the hiring, or a contracting company where they have no real interest in caring about your background because it will cost them money if they don't place you, is pretty much the only way i've been able to get back into a stable, well-paying job.
pretty much anyplace with a fulltime HR department will discover your transgressions and gleefully report to the hiring manager that they "gotcha" and are doing a really great job keeping reprobates like us away from their "sanitary" workplace.
i've started my own small consulting company and have found that it's fairly easy to work from home (im a software guy) doing the code monkey thing...it beats digging ditches that's for sure. i advertise back-end/full-stack web development/server management on craigslist and it works.
good luck...you are going to need some.
never bring a twinkie to a food fight.
I think there's a circular logic somewhere there. If you don't have a job, I guess you have a lower threshold for crime. If you have a job, and everything to loose, I guess crime is not so tepmting.
In most of Europe, criminal convictions is simply irrelevant to jobs. Some jobs require your record, but mostly not the full - only a limited record. For instance, if you work with kids, you need a record clean of child abuse and sexual assaults. But for a general job in IT? Noone would even ask about your record. I have not been asked ever - except for a visa application to the USA.
I believe the European system is better at integrating convicts back into soceity, stopping them from committing more crime.
Assembling etherkillers for fun an profit
As a hiring-manager for IT roles, I'd totally hire someone with a felony from their past. As long as they were upfront about it, and it wasn't a "background check surprise" and they showed real talent and openness. The biggest unfair downside, is that you kind of have to open up about it and share more about your life than you'd probably want to with the hiring manager if you didn't have any previous convictions. That is, you'd have to provide a context for understanding the crime that would make me feel comfortable that I wasn't putting the company at risk by brining you in. I think it's fairly easy, to be honest. Just explain the circumstances, your background, and what you want to do with your life, etc.
Don't get discouraged! It's definitely something that will stick with you, but I think IT is a great career for earnings / long term potential and while managers have to be security conscious, an *honest* employee who open shares their past dishonest mistakes is a rare treat.
The employee who applies and is honest about a past conviction is NOT going to the the person who ends up ripping you off. It'll be someone with no priors.
A felony can only delay a security clearance because the only relevance a felony has to a security clearance is whether it shows a fundamental character issue making one insufficiently trustworthy. That's fundamentally what they want to find out in a background investigation. Can we trust you? That's why a guy who's 40 with a felony charge for selling drugs but can show he's been a cleaned up citizen for 15 years can probably get a clearance but a guy with no criminal past who's had an affair on his wife or two in the recent past cannot hold one.
I'm in personnel security in a Federal agency. Given a few years of productive behavior in society, and positive evidence of rehabilitation, you will probably be able to mitigate any criminal conduct issues for basic suitability or even a security clearance.
Most agencies use suitability (5 C.F.R. Part 731). As long as you haven't done anything horrible for a few years, you are honest about what you did, and your crimes do not have a direct nexus to the position sought, you will be good to go. The OPM-FIS web site has a little more information on suitability. Beware of the "issue characterization chart" that has been floating around since the JPL lawsuit. It's not current, and it doesn't take into effect numerous additional considerations that upgrade and downgrade issue characterization.
Cleared positions will use the national security standard (E.O. 12968). Go to the PERSEREC web site and download the Adjudicator's Desk Reference. That will tell you everything you want to know about that. You might also want to find the web site of the Defense Office of Hearings and Appeals, and read some of the published cases. That will give you a realistic idea of how contractors with criminal records mitigate them.
I wouldn't bother with excepted service positions like law enforcement or the intelligence community.
That was my first thought. If you can't find someone to hire you, start your own. Corporations don't have criminal records, and unless you are working for someone who screens your employees (and that's slippery ground from a contract work perspective) you are simply doing work.
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
I don't know about other EU countries, but in The Netherlands employers can ask for a "declaration about the behaviour" of the applicant. That's a document the government issues, and the employer has to indicate what kind of possibly sensitive things the job requires, like working with children, working with large sums of money, with sensitive/secret information or with dangerous substances. If you're convicted for hild abuse you still can get such a document for working in a bank, but not for a job in childcare (and in childcare the employer is required to ask for such a declaration). If you're convicted for bank fraud the opposite, you are still alowed to work with children.
That's all most employers can ask, and most won't ask it because if they indicate the job does not require to work with anything like that the declaration will always be given and it's a waste of money and effort. Employers can ask beyond this of course, but I've never eard of it happening and I even think you are legally alowed to lie, the same like an employer isn't alowed to ask if you're pregnant but if he does and you lie a court will not alow the contract to be broken for that.
Misdemeanor is a minor crime. Misdemeanor can lead to jail time and fines and gets you a criminal record. Jail time is not uncommon, but is usually not handed out unless it is a more serious offense or this is a second conviction. It tends to be on the order of like 30-180 days. Fines and probation are the usual sentences.
Felony is a very serious crime, and in addition to a record and much more likely jail time, which starts to become years in length, you also lose many of your civil rights. In many places, you cannot vote, serve on a jury, or own a firearm as a felon and this lasts for some period after your release, up to and including the rest of your life. Your only recourse to that state is often an executive pardon.
Of course, these are classifications, not actual crimes. Murder, attempted murder, manslaughter, grand theft, etc. are all felonies. Speeding is an infraction, not a misdemeanor, but speeding excessively over the limit might be reckless driving, which is a misdemeanor. Carrying illegal substances would usually be a misdemeanor as well (in the places it isn't legal anyway).
Dealing illegal substances is more serious and can often end up as a felony, although laws vary based on how much you've been dealing.
You will frequently end up with a felony if you continue to repeat misdemeanors. And this is a frequent reason for drug based offenders to turn into felons. In addition to the utility of becoming a dealer if you are a user, if you are simply a user, addiction puts you in a position where you continue to have strong motivation to keep breaking the law which escalates charges to felony-level under repeat offender provisions in the law.
It is important to note that a crime is defined by law as a felony, there is no hard and fast requirement for a crime to meet some sort of definition to be considered a felony. For instance, two minors sleeping together used to be able to both be convicted of statutory rape, even if the act was completely consented to by both parties, because under the law a minor cannot consent to sex. In many places that is a felony. The drug laws are also one situation where felonies seem to be handed out very easily, and so consequently, is a reason the US is seen as a place where the jails are busting at the seams with non-violent offenders.
In Europe convictions are considered "spent" after some time, and you don't have to report them even if they ask. Credit reference agencies and the police are not allowed to reveal those convictions to employers, banks or anyone else.
So, the OP should move to Europe.
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SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
Use a recruiting agency, work a contract first, then convert to a perm. The recruiting agency will do the background check, after they have an offer on the table, and only if requested by the company. Once they have the offer, all that they will see is $$$ and be more likely overlook issues. Stuff that happened long ago in my case. If you are competent, it is quite easy to get converted to perm without any checks (for a mid sized company).
No, he was, by all appearances, genuinely guilty of at least one violent crime
This is rubbish. Usually it's laziness on the part of HR.
You have two candidates; one has a felony conviction, the other does not. Do you really think that the HR person is going to invest hist/her time to find out whether person with the felony was only arrested for eating a hash brownie or robbing a liquor store?
The mountains of madness have many little plateaus of sanity - Terry Pratchett.
You cannot be charged with trespassing or any extent of it if someone who has charge of the property invites you on to it. You will have to show the person entered the premises by force, stealth, or deception which negates going to a friends house and getting busted by their parents for raiding the liquor cabinet.
Also, you will not be able to show any cases in which that has actually happened and a kid or anyone has been charged with a felony, convicted and now suffers from it when he was invited onto the property. If you broke into someone's house, then I would definitely say felony applies.
I never said violence has to be present. I said violence for lesser crimes than a first and second degree felony. Theft over a certain amount is a felony of the second degree and over a larger amount is a first degree felony offense. Stealing a gun from a federally licensed firearms dealer. it is a first degree felony. As you pointed out, burglary which doesn't have to involve violence is a second degree felony. So there are things that are not violent that can make a person non eligible to have a record expunged that do not involve the convolution of laws and situations in order to make them fit.