The continuing crisis

In January, Jerome Felske was fired as a truck driver for the city of Chicago when investigators learned that he had 22 criminal convictions on his record. Felske appealed, and in September, the city's Human Resources Board reinstated him, noting that Felske had actually disclosed six of them on his original application and, as to the others, the board said, the city had not proved Felske "intentionally" hid them. Felske, his lawyer had argued, had simply forgotten about the other 16 (all of which occurred before 1991): "I challenge anyone ... to recall their grocery list from ... two weeks ago."