MASSACHUSETTS
Boston Globe
By Katie Johnston
Globe Staff / May 7, 2012
The state on Monday launches a new online system to check criminal backgrounds that would provide wider and easier access for employers, but limit their searches of criminal history to 10 years back.
That limit, part of a new law that updates the system known as CORI, for Criminal Offender Record Information, is sparking a debate that pits the rights of employers to know the history of job applicants against the needs of people with decades-old convictions to work and move ahead with their lives.
It is also raising questions about the role of lightly regulated background-screening companies, which can dig far back into court records, sometimes reporting erroneous information about applicants to employers.
A coalition of 125 community organizations, religious institutions, and labor unions has proposed barring screening companies from using the state’s central system if they continue to rely on court records to gather more information than they can get in the registry. No other state has prohibited screening companies from using its CORI system if they also use the courts.
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