Expert: John L - 11/9/2008

Question
QUESTION: To the best of your knowledge, if you are recruiting an individual in the active army as an infantryman but he has 4 criminal charges against him in korea as a dependent under sofa status. What checks do you do? A PMO check? Law and Order? Court Only checks? Local check? What im saying is i have 2 friends who enlisted and both admitted to their offenses but nothing came up, they were saying tell the truth but if you weren't 18 and it wasn't in the states you didn't see a judge or go to court then it's probably not going to come up. I want to know the answer to this it's very important, because if i enlist here in Korea they will do Korea's local check which is PMO and he will see all charges and i will need a moral waiver under commander level, but maybe if im in the states like my friends depending if they just look at court level charges if nothing shows up i will just need a recruiter authority level waiver which is easier. So my main question is if i came into your office and said i have 4 juvenile charges no convictions or dispositions except 100 hours of community service for one of them what would you say? Would i have to mention where it happened? and what specific checks at what level do you use?

ANSWER: The military does local and state checks.  At Meps, you get fingerprinted and it goes to the FBI for a check there.  If you saw a non judge overseas, I doubt anytrhing would comeup, however, they want you to admit to anything you were ever arrsted for, whether you were found guilty or not.  If the charges are minor, don't sweat it, a waiver is easy to get.  If they are major, then there would be an issue.

I recommedn you downplay the charges and let thme search for nothing to come up.  Yopu may want to consider waiting until you come to the states to join.  They wont do a check in Korea.

Good luck.

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QUESTION: The charges were shoplifting,larceny of private property, larceny of private funds, and underage drinking. Two were 6-7 years ago and the other 2 were 3 years ago. All juvenile administrative action no court no judge.

1.Should i sweat this or do you need more deatils into the charges to decide?
2. Even if i tell them these four charges will they not ask where and when and then do a check there?
3. If you were me right now and you went to the states to enlist exactly what would you tell the army recruiter?
4. The larceny was 800 dollars and the other larceny was a 200-300 dollar scooter, i don't know if they will even ask me the details or not but this is the full details. I was trying to enlist here and my recruiter did a pmo check law and order check and some EBI check and pulled up my records easily since it was local, so i told him forget it i'll try college, with the intent to come to the states and enlist for my friends charges did not come up and they went in national guard as officers.
5. They wont check korea even if i lived there or the charges were from there?

ANSWER: I cant give you a good answer.  Most likely if you fess up, you will be disqualed becuase they are actually grand larceny, But if you never went in front of a judge, I don't know how it would be characterized.  I say, try in the states, you would have better luck.  I have never heard of doing a police check on a juvenile in another country.

Just go for it.  And keep your fingers crossed.

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QUESTION: Does everyone fill out a sf86 at meps these day? i heard different things, some say it depends on your mos some say you get it during meps and some say you can get it during your enlistment. I want to do infantry i don't think that even requires security clearance since i have 2 years of jrotc i would go in as an E-3 could i do 2-4 years and possibly not fill out an sf86?

Also do they do it so that everyone fills out an sf86 but only when required will they actually investigate the information?

One of them is grand larceny but the other one which is 200-300 that is also grand larceny? i thought it's over 500 dollars.

I got a free trip to the states because my dad is a retired E-8 and a gs-13 contractor at yongsan, how about i come to where you are and you enlist me into the army under 11b option 4, i'll ship out asap if you can get me a recruiter level authority waiver.

Answer
There is only one sf 86. Every one fills out the sf 86 to join. Every one goes thru a fbi check, but only investigations are done to those that require a secuirty clearance.  Just go to your hometown where you have people to stay with,  if you require waivers, it could be a while.

Just go for it, you'll be fine.  If its not meant to happen, you'll know you tried.