How Clearing Criminal Records Puts People to Work [CityLab.com]

Thank you Robert for sharing your insight and expertise. Concurring with you Matt, our judicial system has many cracks. So many youth and adults I've served over the years who are ex-felons, ex-gang members, etc. have shared with me how their opportunity to have their record(s) sealed or expunged was not part of their sentencing or release process. Making a mistake (haven't we all?), paying their dues, and being punished for lifetime by not being able to get a job, drivers license, vote... Our "correctional institutions" and "rehabilitation centers" focusing on helping those individuals heal should be at the core of every policy and procedure.

Re-entry is one of the most critically imperative aspects of systems change. Self-healing communities where individuals coming home from jail or prison are embraced with opportunities of being engaged in their own healing journey, their family's healing and giving back to their communities.

Fortunately, we have some pockets in our nation doing just that. A microcosm, however, models to learn from and replicate.

Jane Stevens posted:

Bob, it seems as if another step has to be added to any records that are "sealed": give people the information to check to make sure that they are!

Jane,

It may depend on each individual state's policies and procedures for totally securing 'criminal records', or at least those of "juveniles" and those "adjudicated" [rather than "convicted"] as 'youthful offenders'. Matt Furlong also raises a valid point in his comment below.

The federal policy even on computerized records, to my knowledge seems sufficient, but the differences in how each state addresses such matters makes a difference, as do the policies and procedures of local archival repositories of printed records. However, the recall [and 'sealing'] of fingerprint cards, which are usually sent to the national FBI and state fingerprint database[s]-before being returned to the police agency who classified them, and the subsequent filing and sealing of them in accordance with each individual state's "Right-to-Know" laws, and the mug shot[s] recall policy of whatever photos were taken at the time of arrest, are not always reviewed by every criminal court having jurisdiction or appellate review of individual cases, in every single state. Some exploration of both federal and individual state policies, and the ages [and gender to which] they apply "juvenile" status offenses" and "youthful offender adjudications".

Years ago, I had met a young woman who [at 16 years of age] had been sent to one of the [adult] Women's state prisons, as a juvenile, for the "Status Offense" of "being in danger of becoming morally depraved"--she was from the same town where our National Women's Rights Monument is now located.

Bob, it seems as if another step has to be added to any records that are "sealed": give people the information to check to make sure that they are!

     As a formerly Adjudicated "Youthful Offender", I was advised I'd passed an FBI / NCIC (National Criminal Information Center) 'Background Check', while I was still in prison, awaiting parole and I was able to 'work' as a VISTA Volunteer when my parole eligibility date arrived. I assumed my [federal NCIC computerized] record showed I was "sentenced under the Youth Corrections Act-Do Not Disclose".    

    When I was later a legislative candidate, I didn't realize at the time, why a newspaper reporter asked about my "criminal record".

     About 12 years later, while working as an [Armed-certified and licensed to be] Aviation Public Safety officer, in a different state, my armed certification/licensure was questioned by the State Police in that state. I had an attorney where I did my [first of two] VISTA term[s] write back to the State Police of my current residence, explaining that state's youthful offender adjudication procedures, The attorney also checked my printed '[youthful offender] record' in our local County Clerk's office, (& the computerized record in the state capitol) and discovered that not only my printed record, but those of almost 200 other adjudicated 'Youthful Offenders' had not been properly sealed, in just that individual County Clerk's office. (This helped me understand how the reporter had raised the issue of my 'criminal' record during my legislative candidacy). The attorney took the matter before a Judge-who ordered all of those 200 [improperly sealed/unsealed] Youthful offender records to be re-examined and properly sealed, and compared to the computerized records in the state capitol. Fortunately, I was able to maintain my job as a licensed/certified aviation public safety officer [crash-fire-rescue/fire-fighter, aviation law enforcement, mass casualty planning, etc.] at that time.

Fortunately, the federal government had (I don't know if it still has) a Federal Bonding Program, for both 'dishonorably discharged veterans', and 'ex-offenders'-to pay the costs of bonding those folks in professions which may require bonding....

When we give a sentence from the courtroom, it should include the time an issue stays on a record.  When it never drops off, it is called "A Life Sentence" And if you can never live down your mistakes, it is hard to thrive again.