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Comment by emiliobumachar | Hacker News Reader

Let me echo onion2k's point:

That kid can no longer truthfully answer "no" to "Have you ever been arrested?". This alone can change his life completely.

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Is that bad in the US? Nobody cares if it was because of a mistake?

Yes, it changes a lot of dynamics including his future employment.

The fact that a criminal record cannot be revised if it contains false allegations and convictions seems to be about as flawed as facial recognition software leading to a false arrest. Seems like a good opportunity to fix both.

If you're arrested, but not charged, and have no criminal record?

Generally speaking if you answer "no" on an employment form and then get denied for having been arrested even though no charges ever stuck and that is specifically the reason for denial (most employers aren't this stupid though) then there is a settlement check in your future.

It's complicated in the United states, federal law (FCRA and employment law) and state law are both involved.

Since this teenager is in New York, this arrest record (which will not be publicly available forever, and could be sealed immediately by court order) should not be a factor in their future interviewing in that state.

https://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/new-york-law-employe...

Employers may not ask about or consider arrests or charges that did not result in conviction, unless they are currently pending, when making hiring decisions. They also may not ask about or consider records that have been sealed or youthful offender adjudications.

Yes that's bad in the US, many important and high paying jobs ask this question during the interview process, and it could disqualify someone if a roughly equivalent candidate who answers "no" to this question is also in the pool of applicants.

It gets even trickier when applying for jobs related to the government. If nothing else, it adds stress and time to the application process because you have to explain it several times.

Based on the number of articles that get posted on here complaining about suboptimal hiring processes in US tech jobs, I think it's fairly obvious that this guy is not going to have a good time applying to jobs for the rest of his life.

1. He can get it expunged or sealed.

2. Those are like detector tests. The potential employer already knows he was arrested because they do background checks.

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