Posted August 5, 2014 9:10 PM ET; Last updated August 7, 2014 4:21 PM ET
CORI (Criminal Offender Record Information) files are maintained by the state of Massachusetts. Under current laws when a person applies for a job employers may not inquire of any record on CORI files. That is the explanation given by Boston city officials why a DPW employee with a lengthy arrest and conviction record was hired. He was arrested in August 2014 for selling illegal drugs while working at his city job. Compare how Mr. Boston DPW was treated, with the arrest of a Cambridge civilian after he filed written complaints to chiefs of police in Cambridge and Somerville in 1990 for police harassment. Cambridge police arrested him and had him held for 78 days contrary to law for a competency evaluation. He fired seven lawyers who were paid to NOT put on a defense to the arrest complaint. After one year that transaction was supposed to be erased from the CORI files. But in 2014, 24 years later it remains and indicates that there are two outstanding charges for the same complaint. It shows how arbitrary state and local government is. That is not to suggest that the White House acts any differently. Ignoring laws and the constitution is a way of life in the United States these days. One policeman in New Jersey actually referred to Obama's lawlessness to justify ignoring his duties.
http://www.infowars.com/cop-if-obama-doesnt-follow-the-constitution-we-dont-have-to/
[From article]
Suspended DPW worker Kenneth Clark, who pleaded not guilty yesterday to dealing heroin out of his work truck, has a rap sheet with some 100 charges that include convictions for armed assault and drug dealing near a school — all of which the city had no clue about when hiring him due to a relaxing of criminal background checks under the Menino administration.
Clark’s public works supervisors never sought a Criminal Offender Record Information report when screening him in 2011 because his job picking up dead animals and sweeping streets was not among the 145 positions — including dog catchers and grave diggers — the city felt required criminal background checks under a stripped-down CORI system adopted by the City Council in 2005.
[. . .]
“Mr. Clark has been indicted five times, five sentences served. He has been arraigned on approximately 42 cases, totaling approximately 100 charges,” prosecutor Michael Callahan told a judge of the Dorchester man’s lengthy record.
According to court records, he was sentenced in 1993 to five to 10 years for assault with a knife, assault with intent to murder and cocaine distribution, as well as a combined 71⁄2 years in 2002 for multiple counts of dealing heroin, including in a school zone. He has also been convicted of assaulting a police officer and unarmed robbery.
http://bostonherald.com/news_opinion/local_coverage/2014/08/cori_reforms_kept_suspected_drug_dealing_dpw_worker_s_rap_sheet
CORI reforms kept suspected drug-dealing DPW worker’s rap sheet under wraps
Tuesday, August 5, 2014
By: Richard Weir, prisca Pointdujour
Boston Herald
Published on Aug 4, 2014
A Boston Public Works employee is being held on $15,000 bond. Police say they caught him selling heroin out of a city truck.
