What kind of job(s) could I get with a crime in my past?

Approx. 20 years ago, I committed a crime (embezzlement) got probation and made
full restitution. Immediately following that incident
I went to work in the retail industry for 7 years, working till the large retail industry went out of biz.
At that time, I was a dept manager. Pursued college and 12 years in the construction biz
till due to an injury I could no longer perform the duties required. The retail job was what I
really enjoyed. Would my record, after all this time, keep me from pursuing that field
once again? I appreciate any info anyone would have on this matter. (I live in Illinois)

Path Less Travelled

Your chances impress me as tenuous, with a leaning toward the positive; this, because of a number of variables. Consider the following:

1) your infraction occurred 20 years ago; and the world is wholly different now than then.

2) your "track record" over that course of that time is in the affirmative -- 7 years in retail as a manager, which market -- retail -- is an otherwise highly "loss-prevention" prone occupation according to statistics. Further, you followed-up with a whole other line of endeavor and were successful till the injury occurred.

3) you pursued higher education: it is the intent that imports, regardless of whether you were conferred a degree or not.

4) the job market is tenuous overall for virtually any- and everyone, with or without a degree: nothing today is any longer all that was once cracked-up to be.

5) glaring miscarriages of justice have occurred in the commercial and investment markets in terms of high crimes by the wealthy and powerful more than enough, and in which the convictions have been suspended with light sentences, such that your conviction would go down as mere child's play in comparison. So fear not. If I were a hiring manager, your incident would be of little consequence to me.

6) many hiring professionals today are more likely to say "Why bother!" concerning themselves and applicants they review regarding something comparatively minor as yours -- they know unto themselves that highly likely have what they done in their respective lives been a lot worse than yours but simply were not caught and busted for doing it. And they know it!

I am convinced amid all the buzz and din ensuing today in many people's lives -- what, with all the home foreclosures and loss of innocence and jobs -- that having a heart comes forth in others a lot more readily than ever before, though while at the same time an equal number of people have indeed grown more jaded and cynical about the big man, -- not the little man.

It is the big man that has proved the jack asses: they committed their miscarriages when they really had no need to -- they already had it all; whereas the little guy usually fell into crime out of need, coupled with an absence of having enjoyed the clearest direction when in early youth.

Therefore, you break even with all the rest of us. At worst, your chances are tenuous but not in the least prohibitive. So again -- fear not.

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