4 ms·

Unfortunately expungement doesn’t really do much - most questions on employment forms or professional associations (state bar, FINRA, etc) ask about arrests not

by cascom 7y ago

Unfortunately expungement doesn’t really do much - most questions on employment forms or professional associations (state bar, FINRA, etc) ask about arrests not convictions. Secondly, despite being “expunged” the data still resides in numerous data bases etc. and I don’t believe you have any practical recourse against that. E.g. you go to buy a gun and the NICS system holds you up, or an employer fires you for a conviction found on a third party database what are you going to do?

duxup 7y ago
Numerous databases including mugshot sites that will gladly take your money to take down your mugshot from their site.
flensortow 7y ago
In the US, most states ban the use of an arrest that did not lead to a conviction for the purpose of excluding you for employment. Many states limit how far you can go back in considering convictions. I believe California allows background checks to look at seven years of history.
- Spooky23 7y ago
  Those bans come with loopholes that you could drive a bus through. You can determine from free public records search that somebody has an arrest without even knowing what it is, and people use that to filter folks all of the time.
  - sjg007 7y ago
    You can but the background check is after an offer of employment and given the fair credit reporting act they have to tell you why they rejected you.
  - flensortow 7y ago
    Yes, you can illegally discriminate in hiring if you choose to. Most major companies are very careful not to do this. In every case I have had a background check done on me I have asked for the company doing the check to send a copy and in every case the report sent to me certainly appeared to be following the law (the reports explicitly mention how far back they are reviewing).
closed 7y ago
> ... ask about arrests and not convictions Expungements are for clearing arrests[1] > or an employer fires you for a conviction found on a third party database what are you going to do? Ask for a copy of the report (they are required by law to provide it to you; you will know they have it because they had to get your legal consent beforehand; have to inform you decision is based on report), then dispute the report. A company can do dishonest work and pretend their decision is not based on a report, but they can't legally use expunged records to make a decision in PA (or afaik anywhere; sealed records are another story), just because they got them from an outdated consumer reporting agency. 1: http://plsephilly.org/get-help/expungement/ http://plsephilly.org/get-help/expungement/
- mjn 7y ago
  Some jurisdictions add an extra layer of protection against companies being (maybe intentionally) "sloppy" with where they pull data by mandating sequencing: You first have to make a conditional offer, and only then is it legal to pull criminal history. If you find a big red flag in the criminal history, you are still allowed to rescind the offer. But obviously at that point you had better be prepared to defend your rescission, so companies tend to make sure that they are using the real/legal criminal-history documentation there. I first ran across this when I rented an apartment in Washington, D.C., which has that rule for housing (I hadn't previously seen that sequence of "conditional housing offer" followed by criminal-history check, followed by final housing offer). But it looks like at least California (as of 2018) requires that for employment too, with pulling criminal history only allowed after sending out the conditional job offer: https://www.californiaemploymentlawreport.com/2018/01/californias-prohibition-seeking-relying-upon-criminal-histories-starting-january-1-2018/ https://www.californiaemploymentlawreport.com/2018/01/califo... Of course, this doesn't stop blatantly illegal behavior, where a company uses un-expunged third-party databases pre-offer and just doesn't tell the candidate why they were denied. But at that point you're nowhere near having plausible deniability, which most bigger companies would like.

by cascom 7y ago

duxup 7y ago

Numerous databases including mugshot sites that will gladly take your money to take down your mugshot from their site.

flensortow 7y ago

In the US, most states ban the use of an arrest that did not lead to a conviction for the purpose of excluding you for employment. Many states limit how far you can go back in considering convictions. I believe California allows background checks to look at seven years of history.

Spooky23 7y ago
Those bans come with loopholes that you could drive a bus through. You can determine from free public records search that somebody has an arrest without even knowing what it is, and people use that to filter folks all of the time.
- sjg007 7y ago
  You can but the background check is after an offer of employment and given the fair credit reporting act they have to tell you why they rejected you.
- flensortow 7y ago
  Yes, you can illegally discriminate in hiring if you choose to. Most major companies are very careful not to do this. In every case I have had a background check done on me I have asked for the company doing the check to send a copy and in every case the report sent to me certainly appeared to be following the law (the reports explicitly mention how far back they are reviewing).

closed 7y ago

> ... ask about arrests and not convictions Expungements are for clearing arrests[1] > or an employer fires you for a conviction found on a third party database what are you going to do? Ask for a copy of the report (they are required by law to provide it to you; you will know they have it because they had to get your legal consent beforehand; have to inform you decision is based on report), then dispute the report. A company can do dishonest work and pretend their decision is not based on a report, but they can't legally use expunged records to make a decision in PA (or afaik anywhere; sealed records are another story), just because they got them from an outdated consumer reporting agency. 1: http://plsephilly.org/get-help/expungement/ http://plsephilly.org/get-help/expungement/

mjn 7y ago
Some jurisdictions add an extra layer of protection against companies being (maybe intentionally) "sloppy" with where they pull data by mandating sequencing: You first have to make a conditional offer, and only then is it legal to pull criminal history. If you find a big red flag in the criminal history, you are still allowed to rescind the offer. But obviously at that point you had better be prepared to defend your rescission, so companies tend to make sure that they are using the real/legal criminal-history documentation there. I first ran across this when I rented an apartment in Washington, D.C., which has that rule for housing (I hadn't previously seen that sequence of "conditional housing offer" followed by criminal-history check, followed by final housing offer). But it looks like at least California (as of 2018) requires that for employment too, with pulling criminal history only allowed after sending out the conditional job offer: https://www.californiaemploymentlawreport.com/2018/01/californias-prohibition-seeking-relying-upon-criminal-histories-starting-january-1-2018/ https://www.californiaemploymentlawreport.com/2018/01/califo... Of course, this doesn't stop blatantly illegal behavior, where a company uses un-expunged third-party databases pre-offer and just doesn't tell the candidate why they were denied. But at that point you're nowhere near having plausible deniability, which most bigger companies would like.