CONVICTION OF A FELONY

Ethel

Can conviction of a felony be shown in a handbook as a reason for termination, or does it have to be qualified in some way?

Don D

Don't include it in a handbook. No need to. Just have on your application a question as to have you ever been convicted of a criminal offence and if so, explain. You may want to state that the applicant should exclude traffic violations. Then if your background investigation reveals that the applicant lied on the application, reject him. Period.

But, to your question, you may want to hire a person who has been convicted of a felony; who knows? Depends on the crime and the position you have open. What if he slapped a cop after a college football game when he was 22 and 15 years later you are looking at him for a customer service position?

LarryC

Ethel,

We have that question on our application. I explain to the applicants who answer "yes" to that question that I consider three things about the felony:
1. How long ago was it?
2. What was the nature of the felony? (Here they have to give me the sordid details)
3. Will they possibly present a danger to our customers, vendors, and coworkers?

I carefully consider each case on its own until I am comfortable with possibly explaining my decision to a hostile attorney someday, even though, unlike in Wisconsin, convicted felons are not a protected class in Minnesota. This simply means that you cannot make your hiring decision strictly on the basis of the felony. You might check what the Texas law says here.

We have a couple of excellent employees here who have served their time and have rehabilitated themselves, to borrow an Arlo Guthrie phrase.

deniseE

We look at felonies in a similar way...how does the crime relate to the job description? How long ago was it? Do we have a string of convictions or a one-time thing?

Our application also states that a conviction does not necessarily preclude employment. We hope this will encourage people to be honest with us. We do terminate if we discover that someone was dishonest.

Other things to look out for, some states offer alternative "punnishments" so that although someone may have been convicted, they are in some type of rehab arrangement and are not required to list this type of conviction, unless they fail to complete the program

we had a huge issue a while back because we should not see these types of convictions on our background check, but they were showing up...and we were questioning people about events we should have no knowledge of.

Hunter1

[font size="1" color="#FF0000"]LAST EDITED ON 01-21-05 AT 11:43AM (CST)[/font][br][br]Larry - How right you are. But, then, we felons have to work somewhere. The pivotal case in WI is one in which a person threw hot grease at his live-in, missed her and burned her young child. This was held not to be closely related enough to keep him from being a boiler operator at an elementary school with access to chemicals and contact with many children. Ah, the court system!

sonny

I think Ethel maybe asking about a current employee who is convicted of a felony while employed?

We don't spell this out. The old phrase "Conduct unbecoming" covers a multitude of sins.

Ethel

What prompted the question is that it was in the old handbook that I am updating. When I saw it, I did not think it should be, but couldn't verbalize exactly why (I will be challenged on each change.) We do have the verbiage on our application (I won that battle.) So, I am leaving it out of the updated version.

Thanks folks -- being a member of this forum is like having an unlimited HR staff. Makes me feel empowered!!!

pork1

Ethel: Congradulations! You should be able to win the next battle also. Don's response is right on, you do not want to tie the company down by discrimination.

We had an x-employee who was a CPA, with a conviction for wrong doing in the financial world. He made a very good breeder of Sows in "heat" at $6.50 per hour plus O/T, until he slipped and fell braking his tail bone and while out of work on W/C, he began to sell a little "CRACK" on the side. He is now back in jail and when he gets out his value as a "crack dealer" will keep him off of our payrolls.

Past criminals sometimes make good workers!!! They may have a different reason and purpose for working and staying busy doing the right things which will benefit the company!

PORK

stilldazed

We are pretty heavily regulated on criminal background histories in our organization because of the ages of some of our clients (children in daycare and seniors in long-term care). Even with the heavy regulation, there are forgiveness opportunities available at the state level for folks are so inclined to pursue exemption and successfully pass the criteria. We occasionally find folks who obtain exemption, and when they do, the exemption prevails over the felony conviction.

I would agree to stick with the questions on the application and focus on misrepresentation. It's a strong tool.