From the Eastern Echo: “EMU fires sex offenders.” The headline makes that sound pretty straight-forward, but the story suggests something a little more complicated. The first couple paragraphs:
Two Eastern Michigan University employees were fired two weeks ago because of past convictions of criminal sexual conduct, according to documents obtained by The Eastern Echo under the Freedom of Information Act.
EMU employed both at the time of their crimes, and the employees were on the Michigan Public Sex Offender Registry.
In 1998, one of the employees was convicted of criminal sexual conduct with the intent to commit sexual penetration. Because the convicted do not need to alert their employers, EMU officials did not become aware of the offense until 2006. The employee served his jail time on weekends, from September 1998 to April 1999, while continuing his duties at work during the week.
According to Craig Reidsma, director of employment at EMU, the university currently has no written policy on how to deal with employees who are convicted of a crime. He said the university is considering implementing periodic background checks.
I dunno about this. It seems to me that it’s kinda bogus that EMU is firing someone over a crime that was committed over 10 years ago and after the convicted served his time. Needless to say, the union involved, “American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Local 3866,” is getting involved, I presume filing some sort of grievance.
I understand the delay from 1998 to 2006; EMU wasn’t aware of the criminal record. What seems particularly odd to me is that EMU knew about it in 2006, but didn’t fire the individual until 2010.