Friday, August 31, 2007

Parents wonder why background investigation didn't reveal pedophile school bus driver


More than 800 children attend classes in the Altar Valley School District of Tucson Arizona. With news that one of the district’s bus drivers is accused of child molestation, parents are now questioning how the district conducts background investigations.

“I’m shocked,” one parent admits.

Malissa, the grandparent of an Alter Valley student adds, “I know from the Internet, there are several people that are convicted sex offenders that live out here.” It has become an all too familiar and
common responses after receiving word that 63-year-old Altar Valley School bus driver Harry Edward Wroten is in jail for allegedly molesting a 9-year-old girl. He has spent the past year as a driver for the school district.

“If they knew he had this kind of history in his background investigation, he should not be permitted to be around children,” Malissa reveals.

Another parent of an Alter Valley student, Liz, admits, “I would believe that they would do better background investigations, being that this person deals with our kids on a daily basis.”
The district says Wroten drove about 100 students on his route on a daily basis, but Alter Valley District Superintendent Doug Roe says bus drivers do go through careful background investigations.

“Bus drivers receive even more scrutiny than even teachers as far as getting approved to become an employee of the district,” Superintendent Roe explains. “They go under a thorough background investigation by the department of public safety and the school district before they’re allowed to drive a bus.”

Roe says that a background investigation showed no prior history of sexual molestation, yet now Wroten sits behind bars after detectives say he had several sexual encounters with the 9-year-old girl. This situation leaves parents with an unsettling feeling about who they leave their kids with throughout the course of the school day.

“You’ve got to be careful with your children these days. You just don’t know,” Malissa admits.

Wroten is currently in the Pima County Adult Detention Center on a $50,000 bond.

.

Thursday, August 30, 2007

Background Investigations underway at University of Colorado


The University of Colorado might be making sweeping reforms when it comes to background investigations and screening employees for criminal pasts.

"There's a lot for us to look at in the next week," CU spokesman Bronson Hilliard said. "It's a big undertaking. We're examining the policy from top to bottom."

Top campus officials will be reviewing the school's criminal background investigation policies following Monday's stabbing, in which a former student-center employee is accused of slicing a student's throat with a knife.

The university did not run a background investigation on suspect Kenton Drew Astin, who was sent to the state mental hospital after he was accused of attempting to stab a 21-year-old Longmont man in 2001. Astin's six-month temporary employment in the food court at CU was arranged through a partnership between the university and a rehabilitation service for mentally ill adults. Hilliard said the incident prompted CU to conduct a comprehensive review of its relationship with referral companies.

The university also will be running criminal background investigations on all of its newly hired employees, and that could include professors and staff members brought on board within the past month, officials say.

CU will decide whether background checks will be done on the more than 7,000 existing employees. And officials still need to decide if it would be a random check, and whether all employees should be screened. University policy now requires background investigations for applicants who are seeking security-sensitive positions. Those include employees who provide patient or childcare, have access to controlled substances, have master keys to dorms or work with confidential data.

The campus also screens professors who are on track to earn tenure, higher education's job security, Hilliard said.

The screenings of applicants, up until last year, hadn't cost the university. CU police had been conducting 2,000 background investigations every year for the school, until the Colorado Bureau of Investigation notified the department that it's not allowed to use federal and state law-enforcement databases to perform the checks. CU has since been contracting with a private company to do the pre-employment checks

There's been a split in approaches at colleges across the country, and CU's process, if applied to all employees, could become among the most stringent.

Higher-education hiring became a hot-button topic about four years ago, when officials at Pennsylvania State University learned one of their faculty members had been convicted of murdering three people in the mid-1960s.

CU senior Amy Foster said she "definitely" endorses the university conducting background investigations on all employees.
"We're not children anymore, but we've just transitioned from being at home where our parents looked out for our safety," Foster said.

Tuesday, August 28, 2007

MLB wants background investigations on Umpires


Major Legue Baseball (MLB) wants background investigations conducted on all of its umpires. In a fitting case of "after the fact politics," MLB has realized that complete background investigations need to be done on its umpire ranks. The World Umpires Association (WUA) is adamant that background investigations be closely tied to an enhanced umpire situation for post season play. The WUA says it will not help commissioner Bud Selig's office conduct background investigations of its members, claiming the investigations are a "knee-jerk, misguided" response to the NBA referee betting scandal, in which official Tim Donaghy is under investigation for allegedly betting on games - including ones in which he officiated - and providing inside information to gamblers.

WUA spokesman Lamell McMorris said his union's members want to negotiate how background information will be gathered and used. He said he is concerned that confidential data might not remain so private.

"We understand the need for security and thorough background investigations," McMorris said. "But we are not going to give a green light to a knee-jerk, misguided witch hunt."

But Rob Manfred, MLB's executive vice president of labor relations, said the union is using the background checks as a bargaining chip to pressure baseball into adding a seventh official to postseason umpiring crews, which MLB says is unnecessary. Tyra Hearns of the background investigation firm Pebi Services ( wwww.Pebiservices.com ) says that the need for background investigations far exceeds the limits of the playing field. "Aside from the obvious, the umpires themselves are traveling from city to city representing the league. Without a complete background investigation how do you know that an umpire transitioning from one place to another has not been arrested or charged with a crime and then moved on to their home city without the league knowing it?"

During a meeting with WUA officials, Manfred told union leaders that MLB wanted to conduct background investigations on its umpires in response to the news that Donaghy, a 13-year NBA referee, is under investigation by the FBI. But Manfred said the union is trying to create an unnecessary job by holding the integrity of the game hostage.

Sunday, August 26, 2007

Background Investigation never done on arrested 911 Operator


MOULTRIE — The recent arrest of an emergency 911 operator revealed that a background investigation was never completed prior to her employment. The sensitivity of her job description mandates that a pre employment background investigation be conducted prior to hiring. The agency may be in violation of federal laws if they knowingly omitted a background investigation of all their employees.Colquitt County E-911 Director Teresa Warburg described Amanda Nicole Brooks as an “excellent dispatcher,” one of her best, until about six months ago when she was thought to become involved with Jason Baird, a suspect in a recent burglary spree spanning four counties.

Brooks, 20, of 1522 Funston-Sale City Road, was charged in Colquitt County Saturday with the false report of a crime and filing a false police report. She also faces attempted burglary charges in Worth County after she admitted to being present at the burglary in which her silver Toyota Corolla was used, Colquitt County Sheriff Al Whittington said. Brooks’ live-in boyfriend Baird is on the run. He could be driving a stolen tan Chevrolet dually truck.
Baird and his brother, Stephen, allegedly led lawmen on a high-speed chase Friday through Mitchell and Dougherty counties, wrecked and fled on foot. Stephen Baird later was apprehended and jailed.

Brooks filed a report Saturday that her Corolla was stolen after she allegedly learned of the crash, Whittington said.
Warburg said she has learned that Brooks, now fired, was afraid of Baird and said that Brooks had showed up for work with some scratches, bruising and dark circles around her eyes. Brooks turned down help offered her and remained in a relationship with Baird, she said.

“She had talked with several here, and they tried to counsel her and to help her, but she didn’t heed any of their help,” she said.

Calls from her boyfriend allegedly came in to Brooks while she was on shift, Whittington and Warburg said. Baird allegedly asked her to return his call on another line within the building, an unrecorded line in a conference room, they said, and she did when she had the opportunity. It’s unclear at this point what was discussed, Whittington said.
That line has since been removed, Warburg said. Also, Warburg implemented a policy of no cell phones allowed in the secured dispatch room. Only authorized personnel are allowed access into the dispatch room.

Warburg implemented background checks on all new employees after she became director nearly two years ago. However, Brooks had already been employed as a dispatcher for a short time, so she did not have to undergo a background check.
Warburg said she wants more thorough investigation of would-be dispatchers, and the sheriff agrees.
“We need to beef up background checks. That’s what I asked Teresa and the commissioners. We’ve got to start looking more closely, because this is our lifeline, and I don’t want anybody to get hurt,” Whittington said.

“Things like this unfortunately happen from time to time,” the sheriff said. “Some of them will fall through the cracks. Regretfully, it does give the law enforcement community as a whole a black eye. What we need to do is be more careful on backgrounds as we possibly can, but when we have someone in a position such as this that violates the law, I think that certainly they should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.”
The E-911 department is under the control of the county administrator and the Board of Commissioners. Whittington serves on an advisory panel to E-911 made up of law enforcement agency and emergency services representatives.

Commissioner Billy Herndon is the only commissioner on the liaison committee to the E-911 department.
“If there’s nothing against her in the background, then what can you do?” Herndon said, noting that the county administrator is responsible for hiring and firing employees.

Saturday, August 25, 2007

Background Investigation reveals sex offender


The Chatham County Sheriff's Department arrested John Kelly Lee Young, 39, on charges of violating sex offender registry laws in Georgia.
A background investigation conducted on a youth minister revealed the minister was a registered sex offender. The complete background check provided an NCIC alert which was quickly discovered in a background check.
Young moved here three years ago from Tennessee where he was a registered sex offender. He was working at St. Paul Academy for Boys and at Stout Chapel CME, where he served as a minister.

Young came to Savannah-Chatham Metropolitan Police Department headquarters to obtain a background check required by St. Paul. The background check reveled Young was a sex offender in Tennessee. Investigators with the sheriff's department's sex offender registry team found that Young had not notified Tennessee he left and had not registered in Georgia.

Young was arrested and gave permission for his home to be searched.

Tennessee is seeking warrants for Young's leaving the state without notification.

The investigation is ongoing.

Authorities say the arrest and investigation are a great example of interagency cooperation between the sheriff's department and Savannah-Chatham Metropolitan Police Department.

How monster.com was targeted


How monster.com was targeted by cyber crooks
• October. A program, called wnspoem, appears in hacker markets. It can sniff sensitive data from Windows internal memory.
• May. Wnspoem appears for sale in kits that inject the computer code via weaknesses in programs such as WinZip and QuickTime.
• June. Crooks begin sending out e-mails asking recipients to click on a Web link for services offered by Monster. They also post pop-up ads on Monster. Clicking on the link injects wnspoem.
• July. Crooks collect the username and password for a company recruiter who patronizes Monster, allowing them to download contact information for 1.3 million job candidates.
• August. The crooks send another round of e-mail scams to target job seekers for infection.
How to protect yourself: Keep security patches, anti-virus and firewall updated. Be suspicious of any e-mail or Web ad that asks you to click on Web link, no matter how convincing.

Cyberthieves stole 1.3 million names.


By Byron Acohido, USA TODAY
SEATTLE — Monster Worldwide (MNST) acknowledged Thursday that intruders swiped sensitive data for at least 1.3 million job seekers from its popular employment website.

The company issued a statement saying it shut down the "rogue server" where the stolen data was being stored and that only names, addresses, phone numbers and e-mail addresses were found. The company declined further comment, saying it is cooperating with law enforcement.

However, security experts say the rogue server was likely just one of dozens used to steal and store data from Monster in an elaborate theft campaign that has been ongoing since May.

There could be many more than 1.3 million Monster patrons whose data have been breached, and there is little stopping the crooks from continuing the attacks, says Robert Sandilands, chief researcher at security firm Authentium.

"It is a very good first step by Monster," Sandilands says. "There will have to be more changes to prevent this from happening again. This was a smaller part of a much bigger operation."
FIND MORE STORIES IN: Monster | Don Jackson

In targeting Monster, intruders sent out e-mail come-ons and pop-up ads pitching job-finding services to get victims to click on a tainted Web link. Clicking on it results in an error message, and turns control of the PC over to the intruder, says Don Jackson, virus researcher at security firm SecureWorks.

Monster has posted detailed precautions at http://help.monster.com/besafe.

Infected PCs are being incorporated into "zombie" networks to spread e-mail spam, deliver more infections and collect and store stolen data. Meanwhile, all information typed by the user into the Web browser, including user names and passwords for online accounts, gets collected.

Jackson has tracked down several servers being used to store data collected over time from victims' browser activity, including Social Security numbers and other data. One such storage unit held rich data for 46,000 individuals, he says.

The crooks appear to have used such data to log into a job recruiter's Monster account and order contact information for 1.3 million job candidates. That data, in turn, was used to target known job seekers for e-mail scams touting Monster's services.

The Monster attack has been so successful that security experts expect it to be attempted at other employment websites. For that matter, all websites that collect user profiles, particularly social and business networking and media websites, are susceptible as targets, security experts say.

"The advice to just stay out of the dark corners of the Internet really doesn't hold water any more," says David Cole, director of Symantec Security Response team. "The bad guys are going to legitimate websites and attacking people."

Thursday, August 23, 2007

Deputy in crash had bad driving record



UPI (Florida)
A Florida police deputy had a bad driving record prior to being hired by the Sheriff's office. The officer, a deputy with the Broward Sheriff's Office. Although the deputy's driving record was known via his background investigation, the Broward Sheriff's Office (BSO) still hired the deputy. The Broward Sheriff's Office deputy involved in a fatal traffic accident had his license suspended several times, according to his personnel file released Wednesday.

Deputy Paul Pletcher's driver's license was suspended three times from 1992 to 1998 because of speeding and underage drinking in Pennsylvania. The suspensions occurred before he became a BSO deputy in 2004.

In 1992, when he was a teenager, his license was suspended for 90 days following two speeding tickets and an underage drinking charge.

In 1995, his license was suspended again after he received a ticket for driving 105 mph in a 55 mph zone. In 1998, after several more speeding charges, his license was suspended for driving 77 mph in a 65 mph zone.

Pletcher, 33, first applied to BSO in 2002, but was told to reapply in one year because of his driving record, according to his file. He was hired two years later.

As a deputy, Pletcher has received letters of commendation and was named Employee of the Month for the Pompano Beach district in September 2005.

Eric Jonathan French, 26, was riding his motorbike north on 30th Avenue in Pompano Beach on Monday when he crashed into the side of Pletcher's patrol car.

Pletcher was heading east on Fourth Street around 6:45 p.m. when he pulled out from a stop sign at the intersection, according to the Florida Highway Patrol, which is investigating at BSO's request.

French did not have a stop sign on 30th Avenue.

The impact knocked French off the bike. He was pronounced dead at the scene.

''It's still under investigation,'' said FHP Sgt. Mark Wysocky. ``It will be awhile before we know who was at fault here.''

French, who was not wearing a helmet, had no registration, mirrors, lights or tags on the motorbike. His driver's license had been revoked, according to FHP.

Neither Pletcher nor his passenger, Deputy Jose Rosado, 36, required medical treatment, according to FHP.

Pletcher, originally from Lancaster, Pa., joined BSO in October 2004. He graduated from Pennsylvania Manor High School and went on to study business administration at Harrisburg Area Community College.

Before joining BSO, Pletcher was a supervisor at a gasoline station owned by his family, where he supervised the night-shift employees, helped with repairs and conducted the store's monthly inventory.

He had applied to several Pennsylvania police departments, including Manheim Township, York and Lancaster, before applying to BSO.

His records also show he admitted to using marijuana twice in 1992.

In March 2006, Pletcher's lieutenant praised Pletcher's ''excellent police work'' when he helped a detective solve a burglary and recovering two stolen guns.

The detective said Pletcher showed ``professionalism and dedication to service.''

Wednesday, August 22, 2007

Vermont leads the way in new identity measures


Vermont leads the way in new identity measures. The state of Vermont has taken a bold step in assisting background investigators with new enhanced driver's licenses. The new Vermont identification will not only be a boost to background investigations but will also be an enhanced security measure. the new licenses are being fazed in through the remainder of 2007. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security agreed to launch a project with the state of Vermont that will enrich the security of state driver's licenses and potentially serve as an acceptable alternative document for crossing the United States' land and sea borders.

The Vermont project, much like the agreement reached with Washington state earlier this year, is one possible compliance alternative to Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative (WHTI) requirements. As announced in June, on Jan. 31, 2008, U.S. and Canadian citizens will need to present either a WHTI-compliant document or a government-issued photo ID, such as a driver's license, plus proof of citizenship such as a birth certificate, for admissibility into the United States. DHS intends to end the routine practice of accepting oral declarations alone at land and sea ports of entry, and also proposes to begin alternative procedures for U.S. and Canadian children at that time.

The state of Vermont will develop an enhanced driver's license that will provide their residents, who voluntarily apply and qualify, with a document that is acceptable for use at U.S. land and sea ports. The enhanced driver's license will be slightly more expensive than a standard Vermont state driver's license and will require proof of citizenship, identity, and residence, as well as contain security features similar to a U.S. passport.

The 9/11 Commission endorsed secure documentation for determining admissibility into the country, and Congress mandated WHTI implementation in the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004. At present, U.S. Customs and Border Protection personnel consider more than 8,000 distinct state issued birth certificates, driver's licenses or other forms of identification when making decisions on who and what to admit into the country.

At a date to be determined by the Secretary of Homeland Security in consultation with the Secretary of State, the departments will implement the full requirements of the land and sea phase of WHTI. DHS and DOS expect the date of full WHTI implementation to be in the summer of 2008. The precise implementation date will be formally announced with at least 60 days notice.

Monday, August 20, 2007

What's in a name?


Recently my company encountered a situation that although very benign needs to be mentioned. When an applicant submits his or her paperwork and work experience for a potential job opening the applicant needs to know a few things. What you were named at birth may be totally different than the name you choose to be known by today. One of my investigators was canvassing a local neighborhood doing what is known as a background neighborhood check. The background neighborhood check is when one of my investigators goes to your place of residence and interviews your neighbors to get a different perspective of what kind of a future employee you may be. By talking with those in your neighborhood a whole other dimension of who you as an applicant are can be discovered. If your parents gave you a first name you are not happy with it and you choose to be known by a middle or unrelated name, it is necessary for the background investigator to know this. My investigator kept speaking to the neighbors about an applicant calling him one name while the neighbors had no knowledge of the applicant due to the fact they all knew him as something else.

This can be a red flag for a background investigator.

Are there bad debts, or fraudulent drivers licenses in this secondary name? Does a complete and thorough background on both the birth name and the name the applicant "goes by" need to be done? Has the applicant applied for or received workman's compensation, social security benefits, or other items under the secondary name? Has he or she ever been arrested under the secondary name? The lesson to be learned is simple. If you are known by neighbors, former coworkers, or even the gang at the bowling league by a different name let the background investigator know so that they can rule it out, before it rules you out!

Tyra Hearns
President of Pebi Services Inc.
www.Pebiservices.com

Saturday, August 18, 2007

Washington insiders aiding terrorists?


By Michael Cutler

There is an article appearing in the August 15 edition of the Washington Times that should alarm every citizen of the United States. According to Washington Times reporter, Sara Carter:

"A criminal investigations report says several U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services employees are accused of aiding Islamic extremists with identification fraud and of exploiting the visa system for personal gain. "The confidential 2006 USCIS report said that despite the severity of the potential security breaches, most are not investigated 'due to lack of resources' in the agency's internal affairs department.” Consider a statement made by the Director of USCIS, Emilio T. Gonzalez that appears in the Times article:

USCIS Director Emilio Gonzalez in March told Congress that he could not establish how many terror suspects or persons of special interest have been granted immigration benefits.

"While USCIS has in place strong background check and adjudication suspension policies to avoid granting status to known terror risks, it is possible for USCIS to grant status to an individual before a risk is known, or when the security risk is not identified through standard background checks," said a statement provided to lawmakers. "USCIS is not in a position to quantify all cases in which this may have happened. Recognizing that there may be presently known terror risks in the ranks of those who have obtained status previously."

There is a world of difference between a background check and a background investigation.

The background check Mr. Gonzalez refers to would simply require that an applicant's name and fingerprints be run through computer databases to determine if the prints or the name relate to a known terrorist or criminal. Terrorists understand that in order to be effective they need to do everything in their power never to be fingerprinted in the United States before making any application for an immigration benefit. Then they provide a false name to immigration with clean fingerprints. Since the name and the fingerprints result in "No hit," that is to say no matches are found, the terrorist alien in question will receive an official identity document in the false name he (she) provided to USCIS.
Clearly Mr. Gonzalez has no idea as the scope and magnitude of the corruption and incompetence at an agency that hands out the "Keys to the Kingdom." The bottom line is, as the article noted, a terrorist needs to obtain official immigration status as a means of embedding himself in our country to be able to hide in plain sight.

Thursday, August 16, 2007

Is there a gimmick to being hired?


Unfortunately there really is no gimmick to being hired other than making yourself a desirable applicant. Aside from your employment skills, one of the biggest determining factors on whether you get hired lies in the background check. A well trained background investigator will be able confirm or deny your approval for hiring based on the information he or she presents to your perspective employer. Applicants erroneously think that leaving a previous employer abruptly, attaining large commercial credit debt, and being arrested "a long time ago" will not haunt their employment chances. Nothing could be further from the truth. The best possible way for you to achieve the career of your dreams is to be upfront and forthright with any possible questionary actions, or activities. As a trained background investigator who owns my own firm ( www.pebiservices.com) it is better to hear it from you directly with an explainable reason to discover it later on.

Tyra Hearns
President of Pebi Services Inc.
www.Pebiservices.com

Friday, August 10, 2007

The oral interview is not the final say on whether you get hired



Many times applicants erroneously believe that the oral interview is the final phase of the hiring process. Contrary to popular belief the oral interview may just be the middle or early part of the hiring process. A complete and thorough background investigation will begin to emerge as the trained background investigator continues to accrue new and revealing facts about an applicant. Hand shakes in the boardroom do not necessarily mean you will be hired or retained. A comprehensive and complete background investigation will be conducted by myself and my talented staff at www.PebiServices.com

Tyra Hearns
President of Pebi Services Inc.
www.Pebiservices.com

Thursday, August 9, 2007

FBI drug standard lowered for hiring

By Kevin Johnson, USA TODAY
WASHINGTON — Aspiring FBI agents who once dabbled in marijuana use won't be barred from getting a job with the elite crime-fighting agency, which has loosened its drug policy amid a campaign to hire hundreds of agents.
The bureau's pot-smoking standard, in place for at least 13 years, was revised after internal debate about whether the policy was eliminating prospects because of drug experimentation, said Jeff Berkin, deputy director of the FBI's Security Division. The policy disqualified candidates if they had used marijuana more than 15 times.

There was no public announcement of the change. It took effect in January. The decision comes as the FBI continues its hiring campaign and as law enforcement agencies across the USA grapple with high rates of disqualification based in part on applicants' past drug use.

Berkin said the previous policy was based on a scoring system that had become "arbitrary." He also said it created problems for applicants who couldn't remember how many times they had smoked pot when asked in polygraph examinations.

"It encourages honesty and allows us to look at the whole person," Berkin said of the revised policy. He said it was too early to tell whether the new standard has encouraged an increasing number of applicants as the FBI attempts to hire 221 agents and 121 intelligence analysts.

"Increasingly, the goal for the screening of security clearance applicants is whether you are a current drug user, rather than whether you used in the past," said Tom Riley, a spokesman for the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy. "It's not whether you have smoked pot four times or 16 times 20 years ago. It's about whether you smoked last week and lied about it."

Elaine Deck, a senior program manager with the International Association of Chiefs of Police, said police departments report problems with an increasing number of applicants failing background investigations because of drug use and financial irregularities.

In Santa Fe, where recruiters are attempting to fill 15 vacancies this year, more than 60% of applicants are routinely found to be unfit after background investigations, Police Chief Eric Johnson said. Applicants are disqualified if they are found to have used drugs within the past three years, Johnson said, adding that the department does tolerate some past marijuana use.

In Las Vegas, where the department is attempting to hire 2,000 officers over the next five years, the background failure rate is about 70%. The department does not disclose details of its drug policy for applicants in part as a test of candidates' candor. Police Lt. Charles Hank said past marijuana use is not an automatic disqualifier.

Johnson said a smaller pool of prospects is one factor that contributes to the high disqualification rate. The prolonged Iraq war, he said, has snapped up thousands of candidates who might have been drawn to law enforcement.

Long Odds to Join Las Vegas Force

By Kevin Johnson USA Today

LAS VEGAS — Kayvan Kazemi spent the night before his police entrance exam studying the gambling tables.
The 24-year-old Long Island, N.Y., officer candidate lost about $400 in the casinos before calling it a night. But nothing he did violated the law or disqualified him for a spot in the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department academy. It was just a typical night in Vegas, where Kazemi is still in the running for a job. And Lt. Charles Hank, the department's personnel chief, says there are worse examples of pre-test preparation.

Of the finalists for the 400 available jobs this year, a staggering 70% are expected to fail the required background and polygraph examinations for attempting to conceal a range of criminal activities, from prostitution to fraud and drug use.
If the recruiting effort were a one-year campaign, the washout rate might be a lesser concern. But Vegas plans to hire at least 400 officers every year for the next five years to keep pace with the region's explosive growth. And Vegas' experience is not unlike that of a number of departments nationwide.

War siphons pool of recruits

In Phoenix, where recruiters are in their own long-term hiring campaign, more than a third of the applicants are failing polygraph examinations. In Orlando, about half are not surviving critical pre-polygraph interviews.

One of the Orlando candidates flew in for an interview earlier this year and was dismissed after listing two fraudulent college degrees that the candidate had purchased online, said Sgt. Christine Gigicos, Orlando's recruiting unit director.

"As much as we tell 'em not to lie, they come in here and lie and they think we're not going to find out. Maybe they forget: We are the police," Vegas police Sgt. Dan Zehnder said.

The last time police officials were voicing such concern about the quality of recruits was seven years ago when the federal government began phasing out the landmark police hiring program aimed at adding 100,000 to the ranks across the country.

Now, a protracted war is siphoning away scores of traditional recruits, forcing departments to cast a wider net to fill thousands of jobs. Many of the jobs have been created in response to rapid community growth and the steady retirements of hundreds of baby-boomer officers.

But many are citing the war as having exacted a particularly heavy toll in the police ranks. Last year, an analysis of Justice Department data found that the deployment of thousands of local officers to Iraq and Afghanistan as military reservists was outstripping the pace of hires.

The analysis found that 11,380 officers were called for military Reserve service in 2003, compared with 2,600 new hires. Since that report was published, Justice statistician Matthew Hickman said anecdotal evidence suggests that departments are "having a lot of trouble" with both recruitment and retention.

Jeremy Wilson, associate director of the Rand Center on Quality Policing, says the national law enforcement hiring market is caught in its own "perfect storm" stoked by intense competition for a shrinking universe of applicants even as departments have relaunched aggressive recruiting campaigns.

A vice squad void of vices?

Vegas police recruiters were all smiles when a record 647 officer candidates streamed into a cavernous convention center July 10 to sit for the first in a day-long battery of entrance exams.

Nearly 150 applicants had come from as far as Vermont, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, Iowa and Michigan to fill the hundreds of available slots.

Sgt. Zehnder, a department training instructor, offered a sobering dose of reality. For every 100 candidates, maybe 10 will eventually make it through the training academy and then to the street.

About 23% of candidates never get past a multiple-choice basic knowledge test. Forty percent fail the physical training workout — a mix of calisthenics, agility and running drills. But no other test comes close to producing the failure rate — seven in 10 — than the department's background check and polygraph exam.

"I can't tell you how many candidates I've lost," recruiter Luke Jancsek said of those caught lying. Many, he said, try to conceal the frequency of past drug use, some of which would not necessarily disqualify them. "I want to smack 'em in the head sometimes."

At an applicant reception on the night before the July 10 test day, recruiting officers urged a gathering of about 100 candidates to come forward if they thought past conduct might bar them from law enforcement. When the meeting was over, a handful of candidates grudgingly acknowledged a range of criminal activity in private meetings with recruiters.

Lt. Hank said one acknowledged paying for sex "just a few months ago" at a bachelor party. Another candidate from the East Coast, who had flown in at his own expense, also admitted to paying a prostitute. Both were encouraged to look elsewhere for work.

Most of the private meetings, however, involved questions about prior drug use.

If there was good news in the eleventh-hour confessions, it was that they came before the start of the lengthy and costly testing and training process. Candidates begin drawing a $47,777 annual salary while they are attending the 23-week academy.

Employing tourist-trap tactics

Given the high disqualification rate and the department's enormous expansion plans, Sgt. Eric Fricker said the department must maintain the current pace of attracting about 600 applicants a month.

To keep those numbers up, the department is using the same kinds of tactics the city has used to attract 40 million tourists and 50,000 new residents each year.

In the department's recruiting trips to the Midwest, the department emphasizes the warm, dry climate and surging economy.

A big part of the department's hiring campaign is being managed by the same marketing company that developed the city's signature motto: "What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas." Fricker is unapologetic about using the city's natural lures and vices to keep candidates coming. "It's Vegas," he said.