<p>My daughter has been going to a community college in Nc and will graduate with an associates in May. She is suppose to move onto UNCC with a teaching scholarship. She got the scholarship but now has to go thru a criminal back round check. The problem is when she was growing up she got into some trouble. Alot of it was underage but she had 3 charges of misdemeanors about 7 years ago. They should have been expunged but still show up on her record. Will this affect her chances of getting in? I pray not. She has come such a long long way. I'm afraid this would really set her back. How can they hold that against her? Don't schools want to see kids make the most of their lives and give these kids a second chance??</p>
<p>I am guessing the background check is for the teaching scholarship. This would happen in a lot of professions when she would go to work or student teach?</p>
<p>Yes Rocky its for a 2 year teaching scholarship. She was already approved for the scholarship and has to go thru a back round check for UNCC. Her record is suppose to be expunged but she never got confirmation of it. So she answered the question honestly and explained her record just in case it showed up. I keep praying it doesn’t affect her chances of getting in.</p>
<p>Do you have the money to get a lawyer to check on this? Can you go to legal aid – do they have one where you live?</p>
<p>I can ask my daughter if there is a legal aid where she lives that can check. I know she doesn’t have a lawyer. But she already put the info on her application so will that affect her chances of getting in? I mean do kids get into colleges with misdemeanors?</p>
<p>It really depends on what the misdemeanors were. You should get it expunged if possible.</p>
<p>When my nephew went through a criminal process that involved a probationary period to be followed by expunging of his record, I told him to run a criminal check on himself a few months later to be sure the rather dysfunctional court system in his locale had done what it was supposed to do. Fortunately for him, it had. But this post raises an interesting question. If your transgressions have been expunged, which means the criminal justice system is treating them as if they never happened, are you still ethically required to disclose them when asked about past criminal involvement (i.e., if asked whether you have ever been arrested, convicted, etc.)? It seems to me unlikely that anyone would be subject to a criminal check if they hadn’t also been asked to voluntarily disclose this kind of information as part of the process, so is having something expunged from one’s record is all that helpful if the facts are going to come out anyway?</p>
<p>^ “Ethically”, perhaps, but the whole point of an expungement is to remove it as if it never happened, so yoiu can honestly say “no” if asked if you were ever arrrested, etc. Thats the whole point. Othersise, why go through the process of expungement?</p>
<p>I guess you’re right–I may have some angels dancing on the head of a pin here. But I can imagine someone being thrown for a loop when asked about that sort of circumstance. “Have you ever been arrested?” “Uh…” Other than this and an annulment of a marriage, I can’t think of any circumstances in life where we get to go back and change the past!</p>
<p>An expungement “erases” the incident as if it never happened. So a person can truthfully, and ethically, say NO, if asked if they were ever arrested.</p>
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<p>Not always. For instance, the military services don’t agree as seen here:</p>
<p>[U.S</a>. Military Enlistment Standards, Part 2](<a href=“http://usmilitary.about.com/od/joiningthemilitary/a/enlstandards2_2.htm]U.S”>http://usmilitary.about.com/od/joiningthemilitary/a/enlstandards2_2.htm)</p>
<p>Moreover, some law school applications and “Character & Fitness” background check friends had to fill out for joining the NY bar specifically asks for disclosure of all arrests and convictions that go beyond things like traffic stops/tickets. This includes expunged arrests/convictions.</p>
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<p>Certain licensing boards will have access to all criminal records, even “expunged ones.” Nursing graduates applying for their licenses get into trouble with this question frequently. They will answer “no” on these questions and can have their license pulled or initial one denied because it appears that they are being dishonest. Employers do not have access to the same records as the licensing boards, however.</p>
<p>There is a difference between an arrest, and an arrest AND conviction. Anyone can be arrested for anything, but often the charges, (whether charged with a misdemeanor or felony) are dropped and no conviction occurs.</p>
<p>Forr example, (and here I go sounding like cobrat, telling stories about my frends experiences…) but a friend of mine’s son (person A), when he was in college, was walking with another friend of his (person B) down the street in a college town (my friends son was visiting this other person there). I forget the specifics, and this is second hand, but in summary they happened to walk past a bar and a bouncer said something to the friend (person B) when they walked by. The friend responded and the bouncer hit the friend (person B) and person B was injured and bleeding on the sidewalk (the specifics of this I don’t recall). Cops arrived and started to ask my friend’s son questions, and for some reason they were not immediately attending to the kid (person B) lying on the sidewalk. They wanted to question my friend’s son (person A) but he was upset and worried about his friend who was injured and bleeding and wanted first to attend to his friend. Kid A was subsequently arrested for either refusing to cooperate with the police or something. I am not sure. Bottom line, the charges were eventually dropped and he was not convicted of anything. He is now in IBanking and has had to undergo background checks in the course of his job applications. He has never reported the arrest as it was expunged and he can legally say he was never “arrested and convicted” as he wasn’t. Some states seal expunged records such that they are still available for law enforcement to see, but not anyone else doing a background check.</p>
<p>As for the military, not sure how reliable “about.com” is, and I do know that they (the military) are sticklers for not taking someone who plead guilty/are convicted of domestic violence under the Lautenberg Amendment [Lautenberg</a> Amendment (ArmyStudyGuide.com)](<a href=“http://www.armystudyguide.com/content/army_board_study_guide_topics/military_justice/lautenberg-amendment.shtml]Lautenberg”>Lautenberg Amendment - Army Education Benefits Blog) because they can’t be issued firearms. Maybe the military has specific guidelines for demanding that any arrest, even if it was dropped and expunged, be reported. No clue. But it would be a very different scenario from the OPs teaching situation, and in that scenario, especially if an applicant was falsely arrested for whatever, and the charges were dropped and expunged, they could genuinely answer “no” on the application.</p>
<p>Nrdsb4-
Do the applications say arrest, or arrest and conviction? And does it address juvenile arrests, which are often sealed or expunged?</p>
<p>This is the wrong place to be asking this question. We are all simply guessing, based on our own experiences in our own states.</p>
<p>If you google “Will an expunged crime show up on a background check?” you can find every answer imaginable. </p>
<p>In my understanding,“expunged” records never completely go away, depending on how complete the background check is. The court records disappear, but the arrest records do not. If there was ever a time when consulting with a local criminal lawyer was worth the money, this is that time.</p>
<p>That is true that some of this varies by state. It seems the bigger issue for the OP is that it wasn’t expunged, or for whatever reason it still shows up on a background check. If possible, perhaps the OP’s dau should pay to run her own background check to see exactly what comes up. If it is there, it would need to be reported, but is explainable. We don’t know the nature of the charges or if there was a plea. Agree that a consult with a criminal attorney might be advisable.</p>
<p>It is not that hard to do your own expungement. It is mainly clerical and involves getting copies of the court order and sending certified letters around.</p>
<p>I would not disclose an expunged matter unless it made it very clear on the application (military, bar etc) that you have to. And do NOT disclose arrests without convictions.</p>
<p>Each state could have different rules. A friend of mine in CA had a kid with a drug arrest, did one of the CA diversion programs which states that the person can answer “NO” to any questions about arrest etc. But, when he applied for jobs, that arrest and disposition (eventual dismissal via diversion) did show up on background checks. The program was created by the state legislature to give 1st timers a chance to start over, but it was conceived before widespread use of the internet and no one ever addressed the public records issue.</p>
<p>Plus, her son was told he would still have to disclose it for law enforcement, immigration, etc.</p>
<p>Be sure you know what, exactly, your DD was offered in terms of ‘expungement’ and then run your own background check to know what comes up. The apparent lie in not disclosing can be worse than the underlying crime.</p>
<p>This information may or may not be relevant, but it is from the UNC Charlotte (Is this the right “UNCC” ?) college of education website. It sounds like (to me) IF a conviction shows up on the background check you still get a chance to explain it. </p>
<p><a href=“http://education.uncc.edu/tealr/advising-department/criminal-background-checks[/url]”>http://education.uncc.edu/tealr/advising-department/criminal-background-checks</a></p>
<p>Criminal Background Checks
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<p>Yes, never disclose more than you have to disclose. This comes up repeatedly and there are numerous threads. There are many shades: arrests without convictions, delayed adjudication, expunged etc. If you don’t understand the smart thing is to ask an attorney. And it is essential to have any agreements checked to make sure everything happened as promised. I think it is even more important with a juvenile matter.</p>