PI Newswire

Lt. J.K. Williams, who works in the Oklahoma City police white collar crimes division, said compromised credit cards often are not reported to police. Banks and credit card companies take the losses and often choose not to file police reports.

Experts on identity theft and law enforcement officials who investigate the problem agree the real threat to your personal information and your bank account doesn’t come from publicly available records.

The Oklahoma Supreme Court is considering new rules that would eliminate birth dates and other identifying information from court records statewide as a response to fears of identity theft.

The move would make it virtually impossible to check the criminal backgrounds of those you deal with, but experts agree it won’t do much to prevent identity theft.

Richard Varn, executive director of the Coalition for Sensible Public Records Access, has worked as chief information officer for both the state of Iowa and the city of San Antonio.

Read more…

The U.S. deported nearly 400,000 illegal immigrants last year, and an increasing number of them were convicted criminals, according to figures set for release Tuesday by the Department of Homeland Security.

Deportations have been on the rise for the past decade, and the 396,906 illegal immigrants deported in fiscal year 2011 is the highest number yet, according to the figures.

Under the Obama administration, Homeland Security issued new priorities to focus deportations on convicted criminals, people who pose threats to national security and repeated border-crossers. Last year, 55% of those deported were convicted criminals, the highest percentage in nearly a decade.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement Director John Morton said the numbers reflect the administration’s “focus on sensible immigration.”

“In the face of limited resources, we have to prioritize, and that starts with criminal offenders,” Morton said. “We are making sure that people who game the system face the consequences.”

Read more…

A recent story from The Arizona Republic about a convicted sex offender who passed a background check and worked as an umpire and official for youth sports reveals how database information that federal and state governments provide on sex offenders for background checks can sometimes be inconsistent and unreliable.

The Arizona Republic reports the 67-year-old Surprise, AZ man – who passed a background check in 2009 and officiated roughly 70 games – was arrested on suspicion of sexually abusing two runaway children. Authorities said the suspect had a criminal history dating back to 1973 with records in New York, Texas, Kentucky, and Alabama that included six sex-crime violations.

According to the report, the Arizona Interscholastic Association – the governing body over high-school sports in the state – employs nearly 3,300 officials a year and is considering rescreening the thousands of officials. Security experts interviewed in the story say background checks are not foolproof and finding information on sex predators can be a costly and sometimes unreliable process since there is no criminal database that covers 100 percent of the country and the information used by background screeners may be flawed or not accessible in some states.

Attorney Lester Rosen, founder and CEO of Employment Screening Resources (ESR), a San Francisco-area background check company accredited by the National Association of Professional Background Screeners (NAPBS®), agrees that database searches can be unreliable and the results could give employers a false sense of security.

“Background checks based solely upon databases are subject to both false negatives and false positives and they have substantial issues in terms of timeliness, completeness, and accuracy,” explains Rosen, author of ‘The Safe Hiring Manual,’ a comprehensive guide to employment screening. “Because of the nature of databases, the appearance of a person’s name in a background check does not necessarily indicate that person is a criminal any more than the absence of a name shows that person has a clean record.”

Read more…

Like many other moms, Kathy was excited when her son started to play football in Davis County, and she volunteered to be a parent helper for his youth league.

Kathy had to submit to a routine background check performed by a private company in Midvale. When the check revealed she had been convicted of check forgery 10 years earlier, Kathy was stunned — but not because she didn’t commit the crime. She did.

No one was supposed to know about her conviction — Kathy had expunged her criminal record so the mistake she made would not continue to haunt her.

“I was mad because I had been told it had been taken care of,” said Kathy, a pseudonym for the woman, whom The Salt Lake Tribune has agreed not to name. “I was sick to my stomach, and you feel ashamed.”

Some of Utah’s reformed criminals are discovering expungements are not the clean slate they were expecting. The problem can be traced to the Digital Age and the proliferation of private companies offering background checks

Read more…

Ophadell Williams from Brooklyn was the driver of a doomed bus full of passengers returning from Mohegan Sun Casino when it flipped, slid, hit a pole, and was split open killing 15 people.

Williams, who survived, had reportedly worked for the company for six months despite having a prior arrest for a suspended license. At an early evening news conference, an NTSB investigator told reporters “We want to know about all aspects of this particular driver. About his training, and his experience. We want to know about fatigue management programs that the bus company has, all aspects of what the bus company does we are looking into that.”

The ongoing accident investigation is reveals disturbing and conflicting information about the 40-year-old driver’s actions and what happened to cause the accident.

A source close to the investigation told PIX 11 News that three of the crash victims in intensive care are able to speak to investigators through translators, and they are pointing the finger at the driver — saying they felt he was speeding and driving in a reckless manner — including repeatedly going over rumble strips on the road. passengers were reportedly so concerned they even questioned Williams about his driving, at which point he appeared angry for some unknown reason. The source furthermore said that at least one survivor has two broken legs and another may lose his hands due to the accident. Yet another a suffered severe facial disfigurement.

Read more…

American Idol runner-up Crystal Bowersox gained national acclaim belting out her style of folksy blues on the popular TV show.

But some of the attention the Toledo-area singer received back home in Ohio was unflattering, as police and others improperly checked to see if she had a criminal record or blemishes on her driving record.

From computers with access to personal information in confidential state databases, employees of five police agencies and a municipal court rummaged through Bowersox’s background.

And in Columbus, an Ohio Bureau of Motor Vehicles clerk examined vehicles registered in the performer’s name, and the home computer of an assistant city prosecutor was used to check on the newly minted star.

An Ohio Department of Public Safety official apologized in a July 1 letter to Bowersox for the unauthorized breaches of her privacy and wrote that there was no evidence that she had become an identity-theft victim.

“I had no idea it happened,” Bowersox told The Blade of Toledo last night from her home in Los Angeles. “I’m disgusted by it.

“You feel violated, but I guess it comes with the territory.”

The Bowersox checks are reminiscent of a case two years ago, when The Dispatch reported that state computers were improperly tapped for personal information on Samuel Joseph Wurzelbacher, also known as “Joe the Plumber.” Conducting a background check for an unauthorized purpose is illegal.

Read more…

Numerous internet sites have sprung up in recent years promising cheap or instant background checks that deliver criminal information on anyone. These sites utilize a so-called “National Criminal database” and vendors of such databases typically claim to have compiled million records from every state so users can know if someone is a criminal at the click of a button. These databases appear to offer employers an instant criminal check at a very low price.

Although a multi-state records database can be a powerful tool when used by a qualified employment screening firm as part of an overall background check, anyone who thinks they are getting a real criminal check can be in for a rude awaking when they discover that such searches are far from the real thing. Applicants with criminal records can easily be missed, and people without reportable records can be incorrectly identified as criminals, both results carrying negative financial and legal implications for employers.

Anyone using these databases, especially for employment purposes, needs to understand the limitations and legal exposure associated with using them. If they don’t, employers may find themselves embroiled in litigation. Here are just some of the issues:

* Multi-jurisdictional database are NOT official FBI database searches. FBI records are only available to certain employers or industries where Congress or a state has granted access. Searches offered by web sites are drawn from government data that is commercially available or has been made public.
* So-called national criminal searches are a research tool only and are not a substitute for a hands-on search at the county level under any circumstances (or the functional equivalent of a county level search). The best use for these databases is to indicate additional places for a background firm to search in case a record is found in a jurisdiction that was not searched at the county court level.
* In addition, many states have very limited database information that is available to employers. Examples of states where such databases may have very limited value are California and New York. Texas is another state where database information can be wildly inaccurate.
* Databases in each state are compiled from a number of sources. There are a number of reasons that database information may not be accurate or complete. Because of the nature of databases, the appearance of a person’s name on a database is not an indication the person is criminal any more than the absence of a name shows he/she is not a criminal. In other words, these databases can contain results that are a “false positive,” or a “false negative.” Any lack of a match is not the same as a person being “cleared.”

Read more…

In the UK, a criminal record is technically any conviction in a court of criminal offence. However, many motor vehicle offences are not deemed as crimes for criminal record purposes, since such offences carry fixed penalties and are not considered criminal convictions. Offences that are prosecuted by local authorities are sometimes classified as criminal offences, although they are unlikely to be in the Police National Computer (PNC). (Even if an individual has accepted a “police caution” as an alternative to prosecution, this would count as a criminal conviction).

The Criminal Records Bureau (CRB) Standard and Enhanced disclosures contain information about convictions, cautions, reprimands, and warnings retained in the PNC and the equivalent systems in Scotland and Northern Ireland. For the purposes of CRB disclosures, a caution, reprimand, or warning that has been entered into the PNC will constitute a criminal record.

Criminal convictions also are labeled as “spent” and “unspent.” A “spent” conviction is removed from public records, meaning that the defendant has served time and passed through a rehabilitation period. Until then, the conviction is “unspent.” Some convictions, such as crimes with a prison sentence of more than 2.5 years, remain “unspent” indefinitely, regardless of the elapsed time. For convicted minors under 18 years of age, the “unspent” period is cut in half.

Read more…

A man serving time for kidnapping and rape cannot block psychologists from reviewing his medical records and recommending that he be civilly committed as a sexually violent predator, the 9th Circuit ruled.

Michael Seaton challenged a decision by California mental health officials to have him civilly committed as he neared his early release date. He had served 16 years of a 31-year prison sentence for kidnapping and rape.

As his release date approached, the county sheriff’s department had him transferred to a state hospital where he was evaluated. His medical and criminal records were reviewed by psychologists.

The experts recommended that Seaton be committed after determining that he has a mental illness and is a sexually violent predator.

Seaton sued, claiming he has a constitutional right to keep his medical records private.

A federal judge dismissed Seaton’s lawsuit for failure to state a claim. The three-judge panel in Pasadena affirmed — but for a different reason.

It ruled that, in the interest of protecting the public, Seaton’s records were not subject to privacy laws.

“One who goes to a physician in order to obtain medical benefit to himself or his family has substantial privacy interests that may or may not be constitutionally protected,” Judge Andrew Kleinfeld wrote.

“One who is compelled to submit to medical examination for the benefit of the public, to determine whether because of mental disease he is likely to engage in sexually predatory behavior, does not.”

View Source…

A retired San Antonio motorcycle-salvage yard owner, who also is a convicted murderer, was looking for love on a popular online dating Web site last week.

Match.com doesn’t screen members for criminal records, which explains why Abraham Fortune was able to post a profile and interact with other members on the site.

After the San Antonio Express-News asked the site about how it deals with members who are violent felons, Fortune’s profile was removed.

Despite the fact that many online dating sites don’t perform background checks, users feel a certain comfort level that they won’t run into sexual offenders or other criminals because they have paid for the service.

“I can understand why daters are getting a false sense of security – they’re paying a fee to be on their site,” said Stephany Alexander, whose Web site WomanSavers.com allows women to research and rate a potential mate.

Read more…

A robber used a white bandanna to hide his face – but it ended up revealing who he was through the DNA he left on it, police say.

“His disguise was his demise,” quipped Lt. Mike Craft of the Butler County Sheriff’s Office.

Officers sent genetic evidence from the bandanna to a laboratory. Tests revealed a match to a DNA profile that was on file from the suspect’s previous convictions, the sheriff’s office said Thursday.

Deputies arrested Linville Scott Hall, 49, who lists addresses in Hamilton, Ohio, and Berea, Ky., at a construction site in Muncie, Ind., on Wednesday – the culmination of “good, old-fashioned detective work and modern technology at its best,” said sheriff’s Detective Lt. Jeff Riegert.

Hall, who has a lengthy record of drug and theft cases in Hamilton Municipal Court, was charged with aggravated robbery in the April 5 holdup of a Ross Township BP gas station.

“It’s just like ‘CSI’ (the TV show), except not as fast,” Riegert said Thursday.

Detective Mike Gutowski said the Ohio crime lab in London took at least a month to process the DNA samples and find the match to Hall – “and that’s very fast” for real-life DNA processing, he said.

Gutowski and other officers followed an evidence trail from the gas station to several locations, including a nearby store where a surveillance video showed the suspect purchasing a toy handgun and the bandanna that were used during the robbery. The store clerk had no idea that the weapon was a toy and was “pretty shaken up” by the incident, Gutowski said.

Read more…

California Attorney General Jerry Brown refused the San Francisco sheriff’s request to let his city opt out of a national program that checks fingerprints of arrested people against an Immigration and Customs Enforcement database. Brown wrote the sheriff that the so-called Secure Communities program “serves both public safety and the interests of justice.”

The federal database allegedly tracks whether the body connected to the fingerprints is in the country illegally or has a criminal record.

“ICE’s program advances an important law enforcement function by identifying those individuals who are in the country illegally and who have a history of serious crimes or who have previously been deported,” Brown wrote to Sheriff Michael Hennessey.

“In these matters, statewide uniformity makes sense. This is not simply a local issue. Many of the people booked in local jails end up in state prison or go on to commit crimes in other counties or states.
“I appreciate your concern. But I believe that working with the federal government in this matter advances important and legitimate law enforcement objectives,” Brown wrote in the letter he wrote Tuesday, the day he sent it to the sheriff.

View Source…