Every year, University Police investigate several "inside jobs" allegedly committed by Penn employees.
Some of the people arrested in connection with these incidents turn out to have prior criminal records, arrests or convictions that might have shown up in a criminal background check -- if Penn routinely conducted such a check.
But the University does not have a universal background check policy, and sometimes, individuals with criminal records are hired without officials being aware of their prior arrests or convictions.
Last month, for example, University Police arrested 24-year-old Lakia Lomax, a Quadrangle mailroom employee, for allegedly stealing cash from students' mail. Lomax had an outstanding warrant against her for aggravated assault, which University officials did not know because no criminal background check was performed.
To help prevent these crimes perpetrated by insiders, the Division of Human Resources is now conducting a pilot criminal background check program in some sectors of the University.
"We're doing it to increase safety of our faculty and staff," Vice President for Human Resources John Heuer said. "We're doing it to reduce risk -- theft, negligent hiring -- and we're really doing it to reduce cost, in some ways. If there's a criminal conviction-type issue, we end up having to terminate a person, have another search for a new employee [and we] may have involvement of a number of University offices."
Prior to the start of the pilot program, two categories of University employees were required to undergo criminal background checks -- police officers and childcare workers.
The program, which has been in place for about a year, involves performing post-offer, pre-employment background checks on individuals applying to work in areas under the supervision of Executive Vice President John Fry. The checks search for criminal convictions spanning the last seven years, so Lomax's warrant might not have come up even if she had been checked.
Background checks are "a rather complex issue, and we wanted to see how we could do it ourselves before we rolled it out to the rest of the University community," Heuer said.
The departments which report to Fry are Audit and Compliance, Business Services, Facilities Services, Finance, Human Resources, Information Systems and Computing, Public Safety and P2B Ventures.
Two other parts of the University, the School of Engineering and Applied Science and the University Museum, also chose to take part in the pilot program.
Heuer said that employment candidates with criminal records would not be automatically disqualified and that the decision would depend on the nature of the incidents and how long ago they occurred.
"Somebody who was convicted of embezzlement we would probably not hire tomorrow to work in the financial area," Heuer said wryly.
University Police Deputy Chief of Investigations William Danks said even if the University chooses to hire someone with a police record, it is better to be informed.
"When you do background checks on somebody" and find he or she has a record, it "doesn't mean you're not going to hire them," Danks said. "But it certainly is good to know so you can make that decision."
Danks said those allegedly responsible for mailroom thefts over the past few years have been employees with criminal records.
"We've had a problem at the Quad mailroom last year, the year before, [and] the source of the problems were all folks who had prior records," Danks said.
Fels Center of Government Director and Criminology Professor Lawrence Sherman said the institution of criminal background checks raises several important issues.
The first big question is whether arrest records, as opposed to just conviction records, should be available for background checks.
"The second issue is what do you do with the information once you get it, because it's very hard to interpret this unless you have some scientific basis for doing so," Sherman said, explaining that data gleaned from background checks is most useful when analyzed using statistical models.
"The third issue is the question of unfair law enforcement and the fact that poor people are a lot more likely to get arrested than richer people for the same kind of behavior," Sherman said.
Civil liberties advocates, while they do not oppose all background checks, are wary of how they may be utilized.
"We have two concerns," said Larry Frankel, executive director of the Pennsylvania chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union. "One is how broad this is going -- is it any employee or is it employees where security is a concern, where honesty is a concern?"
The ACLU's second worry, according to Frankel, is how far back employers choose to go with background checks.
"We don't think it's unreasonable to check and make sure people who are having contact with students have not been convicted of rape or armed robbery," he said.
Frankel added that the organization is opposed to "a general blanket rule that says no matter what employee and when it might have occurred," background checks will be conducted.
In addition to the pilot program, the University is in the process of contacting its vendors and contractors to find out if they conduct background checks and if it is advisable for the University to require them.
