Criminal Background Checks Reveals One in Twenty Nine College Students has Criminal Records

An investigative country wide survey conducted by a private background checking agency has revealed a startling statistic, approximately one out of every twenty-nine college students has had some type of previous criminal or violation record. The statistic was derived from multiple checks conducted on 13,859 students in 125 colleges, universities, career colleges, and other educational institutions.

On the background checks done during the survey, the agency only looked for criminal convictions and criminal records, they did not include any dismissed charges or any juvenile records, which are sealed by the courts and not publicly accessible. The statistic also did not include any arrest records that did not result in a conviction.

Percentage of Crime Types Uncovered:

Child Molestation or Child Abuse - 2.40 %
Fraud/Financial Fraud - 2.70 %
Assault/Battery/ Attempted Assault - 4.00 %
Sexual Abuse and Sexual Crimes - 5.20 %
Drug Possession/Trafficking - 7.40 %
Theft/Robbery - 8.80 %
Disorderly Conduct - 9.50 %
Driving Violations/DUI - 60.00 %

A record would only affect a person's criminal history unless it is classified as a crime, and in the case of the survey, driving violations were the most common crime found on the college student's records. These would include reckless driving, driving under the influence or driving with a suspended license.

The numbers on the statistic may seem scary to some people, and may alarm some students across the country, but the purpose of this survey is to inform parents and university heads of the unnoticed and growing rates of college students getting into trouble with the law, and with these numbers perhaps also a risk to other members of these universities.

Recently, more and more universities are performing extensive background checks on applicants, and are performing assessments on those they consider to be a risk, and at most times allow people with less serious crimes to enroll, while weeding out the ones that could pose a danger to their students and faculty.

There are a lot of groups and parents against the said move by universities nationwide, but time and time again, it has been proven that our schools are not doing their job of protecting the students, and perhaps need to rethink their evaluation and application methods because of the rise of college violence and crimes, as evident in the columbine and Virginia tech shooting that happened a few years back.

Nursing Board Background Checks found Dozens of Criminally Convicted Registered RNs

California - Newly implemented fingerprint background checks for new and currently registered nurses has uncovered dozens of registered nurses who have had past conviction some of them for serious crimes including sex offenses, murder, assault and robbery.

After numerous published stories as well as public and media concerns, the State Board of Registered Nursing has expanded it efforts to review its nurses and their criminal records. In 1990, it had become mandatory for applying nurses to submit their fingerprints for criminal background checks, this was the first instance of a nursing board in the country to requiring the these types of fingerprint criminal background checks.

Before the move, nurses that had already been licensed before 1990 were not included and exempted from providing fingerprints, but now the State Board is requiring those nurses as well as new applicants to all submit their fingerprints.

Nearly 64,000 nurses belonging to those who have been registered before 1990 have submitted their fingerprints to the board, while more than 400 licenses were temporarily put on hold because they have not complied with the new regulation and have not submitted their prints. These fingerprint background checks are the State Boards continuing efforts to overhaul its regulations and procedures following numerous reports of nurses caught having previous criminal records.

Most of the crimes and convictions that have surfaced after the fingerprint background checks were mostly minor crimes and misdemeanors such as petty theft, driving under the influence, fraud, but do include some more serious convictions. As of recent, there were two murder convictions, an attempted murder, vehicular homicide, and a manslaughter conviction.

Due to the success of the program by the State Nursing Board, efforts are being made to include all other licensed health professionals in the state, but one main problem exist for this to be achieved, the different health regulatory agencies and boards have their own regulations and set of rules regarding licensing and background check requirements. As of present, it is believed that there are 937,100 different licensed health care workers that have not been submitted to criminal background checks.