From the Folks Who Brought You “Friendly Fire”

What do the U.S. military and the long-term care network have in common? It seems we’re competing for the same criminals (reformed, hopefully) to fill critical manpower shortages. In our case, the shortage is for nursing home employees and in-home attendants. In theirs, it’s for soldiers to fight an unpopular war. We’re both struggling with the uncertainties of deciding when past criminal conduct should not stand in the way. The military’s approach is to issue an increasing number of “moral waivers,” which permit would-be personnel who’ve committed disqualifying offenses to serve.

According to a New York Times article that ran last week, the number of moral waivers granted to Army recruits with criminal backgrounds has grown nearly 65% in the past 3 years. Prior to issuing the waivers, the military looks at the nature of the crimes, when they were committed, recruits’ degree of rehabilitation, and references from teachers, employers, coaches, and clergy. The sharpest increases have been for serious misdemeanors, which include aggravated assault, burglary, robbery, and vehicular homicide. In 2006, 11.7% of Army recruits had criminal histories.

In earlier posts, I’ve talked about how, as the pool of long-term care workers is depleted, the number of people with criminal histories being hired by nursing homes and frail elders has gone up (See Criminal Caregivers). In Texas, where people with certain convictions are barred from working in long-term care facilities or home health care settings, employers are provided with reports of all potential employees’ convictions. In 1995, facilities received reports on 3.4% of the potential employees. By 2000, that percentage had risen to 9.1%. A 2005 study of nursing homes in Michigan found that almost 10% of the state’s nursing home employees had criminal backgrounds, which included homicide, criminal sexual conduct, weapon charges, and drug offenses.

Given the current shortages, our network, like the military, has to make allowances. When New Jersey passed a law requiring all home care workers to have FBI fingerprint checks, they discovered that 400 current employees had committed disqualifying crimes. Many had been working for years, and losing them would have dealt a devastating blow to the system. The state sought to get them exempted.

I don’t believe that hiring people with criminal histories is entirely bad. Youthful mistakes don’t make people hardened criminals, and people deserve second chances. The problem is, we simply don’t know much about recidivism and patterns of re-offending. Nursing homes, or worse, the private homes of frail elders, are not exactly ideal venues for finding out (I’ll reserve comment about whether battlefields are).

What we do know about recidivism isn’t reassuring. A study commissioned by the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation (DHHS), Ensuring a Qualified Long Term Care Workforce: From Pre-Employment Screens to On-the-Job Monitoring, looked at whether nursing home employees with criminal histories are more likely to commit abuse. They are.

The military has also conceded that they’re having problems. According to the Times, “many criminals have at some point exhibited serious lapses in discipline and judgment.”

Personally, I find the term “moral waiver” offensive. Still, I think our network should consider adopting it. If word got out that nursing homes and home care agencies were issuing "moral waivers" to prospective employees with criminal histories, it might ignite the public outrage needed to get the government to fund critically needed research on recidivism. Perhaps the Army would like to join us in a study.