The Panty Sniffer Parable

So we hired a sex offender, what’s the worst that could happen? I get it, you’re asking yourself “What kind of HR professional would hire a sex offender?,” but I promise it can happen, especially before you’re jaded, while you still have a heart, and believe the best in people.

After a great interview, I emphatically hired Greg for a sales position at our company, which included much autonomous field work. After he graciously accepted the offer, the HR team credentialed him by conducting references, and performing all other background checks, including criminal background, reviewing his driving abstract, educational verification, etc.

Everything checked out just fine… and then his criminal background came back. I was both concerned and amused by the fact that stemming from 1988 (!), he pled guilty to various crimes, including, “Harassment; communicated to or about such other person any lewd, lascivious, threatening or obscene words, language, drawings or caricatures,” “Indecent exposure,” and “Open lewdness.”

Most of the charges were older than seven years, and therefore we excluded them from our decision making. However, we questioned him about his most recent charge, which was a little over five years old at the time. Greg explained that he was drunk and caught urinating in an alleyway and was charged with indecent exposure. Because of his pattern of prior charges, he was sentenced to a year in prison, with five years of probation to follow.

I wasn’t necessarily buying the story, but our legal counsel advised that we should have proceeded with hiring him because over five years passed without any further incidents. She also mentioned if the incident was related to some sort of substance use issue that there could be potential ADA ramifications. In addition, he was still on probation for almost another year, and our counsel further explained that someone on probation is constantly being checked-in on, and is often too scared to fuck it up. So we hired him.

A few months into Greg’s tenure, Mark, a colleague of mine (from a different company) discovered that we hired Greg. Mark called me and with just a quick “Hi,” began to interrogate me on Greg. “You hired Greg!? Why did you hire Greg!? Didn't you run a background check on this guy!?” Already regretting answering the phone and now mortified that someone was questioning my judgment, I responded, “Yeah, we hired Greg, and so far he's doing great.” And he was. He was really picking up on intricacies of the role and was meeting all of his sales quotas.

As an aside, this is one of the many reasons why I like to hire people who need a second chance. First, it's the right thing to do. Just because someone has a sorted past doesn't mean they can't change. People make mistakes. And it’s been my experience that for the most part, when you give them that second chance they’re so grateful and appreciative that it makes them that much more dedicated and eager to work. And better yet, it makes me feel good to see someone most people would doubt succeed. So yeah, Mark, I fucking hired Greg!

But Mark continued, “So then you know about his arrest record?” I politely responded that my team ran his background checks and we did not find anything on it that concerned us. (See, I can be a professional… sometimes.) Mark responded, “What about… You know what, just Google him. You’ll see what comes up.” We caught up for a little and hung up. I immediately Googled Greg.

And there it was, all of Greg’s horrific past, staring back at me, after just typing his name in the search bar. Numerous headlines about indecent exposure and stalking charges. Articles that read something along the lines of, “Man with multiple stints in prison and even more arrests for lewdness, indecent exposure, and corrupting a minor was locked up again, this time for allegedly harassing several women at a local college.”

The articles further mentioned that Greg basically had a thirty year history of this behavior. At least one article did say he had been behaving himself since 1995. But they all said that he was back to his old tricks, as multiple young women (all over 18) filed harassment and/or indecent exposure charges against him. Greg was parked in his vehicle, called the women over, and asked them questions about their sex lives. In 2-3 of these incidents, he exposed his genitalia to the women. By this point, he had already been working for us for months, he was performing well, and we had to hope for the best. Sure, I could have terminated him for lying to me, but we had no complaints and I felt like the timing was off and discovered this information in a unprofessional way.

But about nine month into his role, things began to get suspicious. For example, a member of the executive team (who was very attractive), received a few phone calls from an unidentified male. She complained that the caller was breathing heavy and told her he had her panties and was sniffing them. The calls continued until the Executive eventually said, “Stop fucking calling here you little creep,” and called the police. The police arrived several hours later that day to tell her that there was nothing that they could do as the caller blocked their number. She went back and forth with them for quite some time, and was actually embarrassingly unreasonable and really thought that police would waste their resources to investigate two inappropriate calls. I couldn't tell if they truly couldn't do anything or they just didn't think the issue was important enough (my guess was that it was the latter).

About a month later, we received a call from a partner organization. One of the women at this company, who we’ll call Susan, explained that Greg had tried to build a relationship with a client they had in common. She felt as though Greg was coming off strong while trying to build the relationship and was too persistent. On one occasion, Greg interrupted her meeting with the client three times: The first time he poked his head in to say hi, the second time he came in to offer her and the client something from Dunkin' Donuts, and a third time, when he brought the client a hot chocolate that she requested. Overall, she was basically describing Greg as a scooch.

Susan told me that Greg asked for her phone number to discuss the client and the two exchanged business cards. A few weeks later, Susan explained that she began receiving lewd phone calls, some of which she sent to voicemail. She said that on all of the voicemails, the caller said, “I got your panties, do you want them back?,” accompanied by heavy breathing. She accused Greg, stating that she thought she recognized his voice.

During the conversation, she expressed anger that we hired Greg, especially since he had been charged with kidnapping and other worrying crimes in the past and that Greg had a 30-year criminal history, describing him as a sexual predator. She then stated that she did not want someone with Greg’s history around her client and implied that we were negligent in hiring him because we did not consider the charges brought against him.

We explained that it was unlawful for our company to consider criminal charges that did not result in a conviction when making hiring decisions (specifically, the kid napping, which didn’t even show up on the state criminal background records). She all but said she didn’t believe us for following the law, and continued to insinuate we didn’t perform our due diligence. Finally she explained that after receiving those phone calls, she asked her female coworkers if they had received lewd telephone calls. She explained that two other employees received similar phone calls and that they both had contact with Greg.

Her phone call was basically evidence that she had researched Greg’s criminal history through a public record database. We feared that there was no convincing her that Greg should represent us in their offices, but the issue was that we didn't have concrete evidence that these voicemails were Greg’s voice, even after listening to them ourselves. It’s not that we didn't think it was possible, we just weren't sure and it would have been unfair for us to make that assumption based on his previous behavior.

Of course, Greg didn’t make things easy on himself. During the investigation, he was arrested for allegedly crossing state lines, which would have been a parole violation. Greg obviously alleged that he did not do so, and that sending copies of his timesheets to his wife, would assist him. Due to other vacancies on his team, we decided to hold his job for a few weeks, until he met with the judge. We felt that it would be unfair to take adverse action against Greg unless he was actually convicted. Coincidentally, while Greg was in confinement, the investigation wrapped up and there wasn’t enough evidence to confirm the allegations, therefore, we considered him innocent.

When Greg returned, I met with him to discuss the allegations that came in, that both internal and external parties had been receiving obscene phone calls, and that some have identified him as the caller. I explained that if it were him, that we would work with him to seek assistance through the EAP and/or other resources. Since the investigation was unfounded, and I still wasn’t convinced he didn’t do it, I at least wanted to give him the opportunity to seek help and hope that he wouldn't do it again. I also explained that if he were to deny the allegations, and it were to come to light that it was indeed him, that he would be terminated based on interfering in the course of an investigation.

Greg vehemently denied making the calls, even after being given multiple opportunities to admit to making the calls with the promise that he would not be terminated if he did. At that point, I cleared him to return to work and reminded him that if we discovered that he lied during the course of the investigation, his employment would be terminated immediately. I also made the decision to switch out any clients that would put him in close proximity with Susan.

Greg remained calm throughout the whole conversation, and thanked me for forwarding his timesheets to his wife. For the year he remained employed after the incidents, we never received further complaints about obscene phone calls within or outside of the company.

Part of me wants to believe it was either a strange coincidence or that he realized he got away with it and that really straightened him up. Unfortunately, roughly a year later, we terminated Greg for timesheet fraud. (Maybe he did cross state lines?) Although we’ll never know for certain if Greg was the panty sniffer or not, it’s most probable that he was. While referencing the articles to remind myself of the article’s specifics, I found that Greg struck again. While working at a furniture sales company, Greg inappropriately accessed one of his female client’s contact information and made “offensive” phone calls to her home. The woman reported the calls to the police and after an extensive investigation, they identified Greg as the caller. He was charged with stalking and harassment.

In the comment section of the article, a woman explained that she was a past survivor of Greg’s stalking, and that he stole her underwear out of her apartment’s community laundry space in the late 80s. She was able to catch him by having her friend knock on his door while he was on the phone with her, telling her what he was doing with her underwear. He also made similar phone calls from jail, which she reported, and she was NOT happy he was still up to his shit. So I guess a leopard doesn't always change their spots, but there's still hope.

Until next time…