To Do Or Not To Do The Criminal Record Check

Remember, when your parents used to tell you to stay away from strangers. Today with the technology that is available to us, we know that we just can not trust anybody. It is impossible to tell, if the person you just met at the bookstore has a criminal record, and killed his neighbor, or even his wife. He just looked like the every day "Joe." How was I supposed to know? That is where our problem starts.

We don't know if the kid we hire to answer the phones, is a member of a gang, and has been arrested for armed robbery. We don't know if the nanny we are considering hiring is a violent person. Who are the people that live and work with us?

About 20 years ago, the best we could do, was to appraise a person by his physical demeanor. All we could rely on was our gut feeling, and that is certainly not worth much in today's time.

Thank God, today we have what is known as free criminal record searches. Because of the internet, it is now easy to perform a free record search on any person. This way we can hire a babysitter, hire a secretary, an administrator, etc. without worrying ourselves to death at night.

We can now conduct criminal checks on anyone we are considering employing at any time. There are many companies that do background checks by subcontracting a specialized company that does this type of work for them. And that company goes out to the relevant government office and asks for the information. It is then put into a report and sent to the hiring company. This service then ends up being expensive, and time consuming for both the subcontracted company and the hiring company.

Did you know that there are places where you can do criminal record checks free of charge?

1. State central repository. Most states will offer a repository where criminal records are stored for that state. These repositories may have a small fee they charge, but it wont be anything like that a subcontracted company will charge

2. City Database - These databases keep criminal records that have been filed in major cities. This is a great place to start your free search.

3. County Database. These register criminals according to the county in which they were arrested. These include district court and circuit court rulings.

Should you conduct a Record Check When Hiring Someone new?

There are mixed feelings to the above question. Many feel that businesses are violating their privacy rights by doing this, and to a degree they may be right. But it is truly important in this day and age to remain safe, and the only way to be more assured of your safety and that of other co workers is to conduct thorough criminal record checks.

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