Finding a job is often an arduous task, and things get even more complicated when one has a criminal record under their belt. According to a 2017 report on Fast Company, as much as 70 million Americans have been convicted of a crime, and they are finding it immensely difficult to land employment. There is a stigma attached to anyone who has been to jail even for minor transgressions, and this negativity makes their assimilation to mainstream society harder. Apart from supporting yourself, you may have dependents that desperately need to improve their quality of life, but this journey must start with finding work. San Diego Criminal Attorney understands these hurdles all too well, and we have prepared this blog to help you navigate the cutthroat labor market.

Job Posting Sites For People with a Criminal Record

The first step in seeking employment upon release from jail is learning the most updated industry information, including new initiatives geared to helping ex-convicts. No matter how long you have been away from the job market or perhaps you have never been employed, there is something out there for you.

Job seekers usually use LinkedIn and other professional sites to showcase their skills and qualifications to prospective employers, but people who have spent considerable time in jail do not have this luxury. It is worth noting that some people find themselves in legal entanglements for minor crimes like possessing marijuana or petty theft, but without proper representation, they get jail time. Others find themselves in jail for arrests without convictions – such as being denied bail and spending too long awaiting arraignment – or they were sentenced to months or years in prison. Whatever the case may be, this population typically has gaps in employment history with some people never held a real position before.

70MillionJobs is a job-seeking site that caters to people who have served time in jail and need a fresh start in the labor market. The founder, Richard Bronson, notes there are six million positions that are unfilled at any given time, and companies with such jobs are losing money if they cannot find suitable workers. These varieties of open positions could go to convicts, but they need help accessing them coupled with the necessary preparation, so they are appealing to hiring managers. While there are nonprofits that aid with job placement, the majority of them still employ archaic methods that fail to harness the full potential of technology, and this is where 70MillionJobs goes further.

Bronson notes his startup is tailor-made to work with the hiring procedures applied by large companies such as having portals where employers log in to see prospective candidates rather than scanning public profiles. Job seekers with scanty or non-existent resumes can record video resumes explaining their background, skills, interests, etc. thus establishing a personal connection with employers. With such approaches, candidates can leverage the power of technology to make themselves known to hiring managers, and personal touch helps others see them more than their criminal history.

What is the Fair Chance Business Pledge?

America has gained a longstanding reputation of being the second most punitive nation accounting for roughly 25% of the world's incarcerated population. This mass incarceration is mainly attributed to the "War on Drugs" and its misguided policies that have consistently failed to create safer communities and help ex-offenders restore their lives.

As a result, more than 600,000 convicts are freed from federal and state prisons every year, and another 11.4 million inmates pass through local jails. These figures point to a high rate of imprisonment, which has ripple effects on how these people assimilate back in mainstream society and start contributing positively. Any criminal record usually disqualifies people from entering the job market, and this trend breeds more issues for ex-convicts of working age. For instance, they may engage in criminal activity to earn a livelihood or at least feel a sense of belonging in a society that looks down on such people.

As part of strategies to reform America's criminal justice system, the former Obama Administration established the Fair Chance Business Pledge to help ex-convicts who have already paid their debt to society find work more quickly. Obama became the inaugural president to set foot inside a federal prison where he held court with prisoners who were set to be released. In a 2015 speech delivered at Rutgers University, the former president said that barriers to finding and keeping work are "bad for not only those individuals, but it's also bad for our economy. It's bad for the communities that desperately need more role models who are gainfully employed."

In 2016, over nineteen homegrown conglomerates including Google, The Hershey Company, Uber, Starbucks, and Unilever signed this pledge to help released prisoners to find work without presenting barriers. By signing this oath, some of the nation's biggest employers promised to:

  1. Voice strong support for economic opportunity for everyone, including roughly 70 million people who have a criminal record of one form or another.
  1. Show an unwavering commitment to curb barriers to ex-convicts getting a fair shot at a second chance, including practices like “banning the box” by delaying criminal history questions until later in the hiring process. This ban means venturing into an applicant's criminal history happens in an appropriate context as opposed to promoting hiring practices place jobs out of reach for people who have served time.
  1. Demonstrate to their peers that giving people with a criminal record a fair chance at landing employment is the right thing to do. Since this official signing with nineteen companies, more conglomerates have come on board to further the aims of the Fair Chance Business Pledge.

Getting Ready for Employment with 70Million Jobs Initiative

One of the founders of the Fair Chance Business Pledge, Justin Vail, reckons the 70 Million startup endeavors to educate employers about this vast talent pool of ex-convicts. It also seeks to provide the necessary tools for prospective employers to tap into this growing labor source.

The City of Los Angeles has joined these efforts to helping ex-convicts find jobs by investing in re-entry programs that go beyond merely posting a video resume. Understandably, the ubiquitous nature of technology hardly applies to people who have served extended prison terms, and neither do they have tech gadgets. The mayor's office is working closely with this startup to provide the necessary technology and training so people coming out of prison and those who were released earlier can develop and post resumes.

The manager of the Mayor's Office of Reentry draws a connection between low employment rates to the high recidivism rates that now stand at 53%. When ex-convicts manage to find work and remain employed, the incidence of returning to prison drops to 7%, and if they find work soon after release, the rate further drops to 3%. There is a definite social benefit of assisting this population to land meaningful employment without facing prejudice, and you too can take advantage of this provision in your jurisdiction.

Being connected to 70Million Jobs paves the way for more than just posting a resume; you can get access to other programs that help with mental health, treatment for substance abuse disorders, and finding housing. With such a holistic approach, finding work becomes less of a far-fetched dream and more like an attainable reality. Apart from this groundbreaking startup, there are other measures people can take to bolster their chances of landing a job after a criminal conviction.

Understand Your Rights under the Fair Chance Ordinance (FCO)

To reiterate, securing meaningful employment after release from prison calls for concerted efforts on the federal, state, and local governments coupled with nonprofits catering to this burgeoning labor pool. You are also called upon to become acquainted with the laws protecting you from discrimination by prospective employers, and the Fair Chance Ordinance (FCO) is one such regulation. This directive prevents covered employers from asking applicants about their arrest or conviction records until after they give a conditional offer of employment.

The FCO also prevents such employers from considering the following scenarios:

  • Convictions in the juvenile justice system
  • Arrests that did not lead to conviction except unresolved arrests
  • Offenses like infractions that are not considered felonies or misdemeanors
  • Sentences that are more than seven years old unless the potential job entails supervising minors or dependent adults
  • A conviction for decriminalized conduct such as recreational use and growing marijuana
  • Involvement in a diversion or deferral of judgment program
  • Convictions that were dismissed, expunged, otherwise nullified

This regulation covers employers who have a cumulative of five or more employees worldwide, contractors on city projects, subcontractors, and leaseholders. It also covers jobs in which the employee will work at a minimum of eight hours per week, and this includes temporary, part-time, contractual, seasonal, commission-based, and contingent employment. Jobs that are executed through a temporary agency and any vocational or educational training (paid or not) are also subject to FCO guidelines. Arming yourself with these facts is vital so you can know what are within your grasp without discrimination for having a criminal past.

Unfortunately, doing time for any crime remains shrouded in stigma, and employers will use this revelation to screen out well-deserving applicants, even after landing a job. If you have been out of prison for a while and can't seem to lock down a job longer than a few months, you could be a victim of wrongful termination. Unscrupulous employers will knowingly contravene FCO guidelines and other California labor laws to get rid of staff under the pretense of wrongdoing. For instance, you could be fired for simple misconduct, but your criminal past coming to light is the underlying reason. San Diego Criminal Attorney empathizes with people in such predicaments, and we work tirelessly to ensure that your rights are upheld.

Join a Restoration Assistance Program in Your Locale

As noted earlier, people who have been released from prison need more than a job to survive in mainstream society. Depending on the circumstances of their criminal activity and subsequent arrest, these people could be in dire need of substance abuse treatment and mental health intervention programs. The Offender Aid and Restoration (OAR) is an institution that works with ex-prisoners in their efforts to rebuild their lives since its inception in 1968.

The principal aim of OAR is to promote a criminal justice system where restorative justice of past offenders is the driving force to rehabilitating them after they paid their dues to society. To this end, trained volunteers empower released convicts with information and encourage them to convert their experiences toward accountable and productive lives. Apart from sanctioned imprisonment, this movement also focuses on other measures of handling offenders such as community service and those already in correctional centers can benefit from instructional programs. In the end, OAR seeks to break the vicious cycle of recidivism that continues to plague communities, especially minorities who are overrepresented in prisons and jails.

To illustrate this point, the Pew Research Center breaks down this disproportionate number of minority convicts as per a racial composition of whites (64%), Hispanic (16%), and blacks (12%). Nonetheless, there is an apparent disparity when it comes to imprisonment with the racial breakdown as follows: whites (30%); blacks (33%); and Hispanics (23%). Furthermore, data by the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) surmises that black men are imprisoned at more than five times than whites, and black women are imprisoned at twice the rate of white women. It appears then, black people and minorities, in general, are treated more harshly upon contravening laws, and without proper legal counsel, imprisonment befalls them.

After seeing the disparities mentioned above, it is vital that released offenders find solace in rehabilitative programs that are merciful in how they perceive such populations. Here you will get employment counseling and other forms of transitional assistance like getting enrolled in a trade school so you can launch a career path of your interest.

Consider Having Criminal Records Sealed or Expunged

Despite radical criminal justice reforms, millions of released offenders continue to find it hard to find suitable jobs and hold on to them without the gnawing fear of being let go lawfully or otherwise. The situation is worsened by the widespread use of technology and invasive background checks by hiring managers, which means a criminal record continues stalking you long after imprisonment. Many studies have proven this unfortunate reality as accurate, and once again, it is badly skewed against minority groups and black men in particular.

Harry Holzer and his colleagues published a study "Declining Employment Among Young Black Less-Educated Men: The Role of Incarceration and Child Support" exploring the adverse effects of imprisonment in the 1990s, and these findings remain relevant today. The researchers surmised that black men are perpetually stricken with less work experience and weak employment networks and the spell of incarceration exacerbates things. Once this population sets foot in prison, they are marked for life, thus preventing them from pursuing economic opportunities, and this unfair dynamic has a ripple effect on their families. To save your family from this downward spiral that generally befalls ex-offenders of any race, take things a notch higher by enlisting a criminal defense attorney to have your record expunged.

Expungement is the procedure of sealing or destroying court documents such that these records are no longer available to be accessed and the individual is not mandated to reveal the details to which these records pertain. It is imperative you note that while the legal terms "expungement" and "sealed" are often used interchangeably, they have different meanings. Some jurisdictions allow expungement of records to deny access in any shape or form, but they decline to permit their physical destruction, so they remain sealed.

The latter scenario means a criminal record could be unsealed opened under particular circumstances, such as when law officers are looking into a case. A judge can also order unsealing of such documents when the individual is apprehended or facing conviction of gross offenses down the line. Any expungement or sealing of criminal records must fulfill certain conditions, and these requirements vary from state to state. Firstly, the said record must fall under the purview of the state's expungement laws and then pursue these measures:

  1. Certificate of Actual Innocence

This document means that your case was dismissed and therefore, these records cannot be unsealed later to hurt you in any way.

  1. Proof of rehabilitation

This approach is yet another way of handling documentation of a less than stellar past. It gives evidentiary evidence that you are taking the necessary actions to uphold exemplary conduct and are proactively taking steps to the right past wrongdoing.

  1. Official pardon

This expungement entails getting a reprieve from state law enforcement officials, but it doesn't erase your crimes but instead shows that you have been officially forgiven. This approach requires you to disclose information about past criminal activity whenever necessary, but an official pardon somehow counteracts the impact of said record.

Find a San Diego Criminal Defense Lawyer

Having a criminal record can have dire consequences now and in the future, and these ramifications can extend to your loved ones when finding meaningful work is thwarted by one hurdle after the next. There are legal protections in your favor and measures you can take to improve your chances of getting hired so you can secure the economic and financial future of your family. After paying your debt to society, you deserve to find a legitimate job with regular hours and a steady paycheck, so you don't have to hustle with part-time informal work. Whether you are seeking to have your record expunged or overcome hiring discrimination, call San Diego Criminal Attorney at 619-880-5474, we specialize in protecting ex-offenders futures by offering various options for their criminal history. We will be more than happy to support your quest to becoming a responsible citizen.