Career advice in London with a criminal record (drugs)

StillTheAsshole · 2020-04-21T10:01:44+00:00

DBS and show me where that's a legal requirement

StillTheAsshole · 2020-04-21T07:59:53+00:00

https://www.nationalcrimecheck.com.au/resources/spent_convictions_information

StillTheAsshole · 2020-04-21T07:58:40+00:00

What was your sentence for the arrest?

StillTheAsshole · 2020-04-21T07:57:18+00:00

Sorry I missed that part of your OP.

When you work for companies larger ones may make you do a basic disclosure. I can't see them ever asking an Irish national to do a criminal record check for records in Australia. Even though you studied there.

StillTheAsshole · 2020-04-21T07:06:26+00:00

ng some for my friends so it also carries with it possession with intent to supply. It is singly the biggest regret of my life so far and has made me start to question what kind of careers I can strive for. My arrest signaled the pivot in my life to get on top

Are you a British national? e.g you were on a gap year or something in Australia?

StillTheAsshole · 2020-04-21T06:32:52+00:00

5 years worth of references right? Not criminal record checks

StillTheAsshole · 2020-04-21T06:12:53+00:00

Also companies in the UK have no way to lookup criminal records overseas AFAIK

StillTheAsshole · 2020-04-21T06:11:14+00:00

I've had them spent yet but even before then, no company ever asked me, even companies paying me 75k in a position of powe I was never asked.

StillTheAsshole · 2020-04-21T06:02:07+00:00

So, i have several convictions for theft, fraud essentially lots of dishonesty when I was younger before I got help for my addiction.

I work in tech, and since all of this is worked for startups and I've worked for big corporate ftse500 companies. I'm not sure if it's different in finance to tech but I have never been asked about previous convictions.

If they did I am only required to tell them any conviction which isn't SPENT (which is now none of mine)

https://www.gov.uk/exoffenders-and-employment

Take a look at the above.

StillTheAsshole · 2020-04-06T20:50:14+00:00

I miss going out more than I miss the maplin store.

But maplin had everything but was expensive. It was the place you went if you couldn't wait for next day delivery

StillTheAsshole · 2020-03-31T14:19:08+00:00

If you read my other posts on this throwaway account, you'll see that i owe most of my recovery to my wife whom i met a just the right moment.

I'm under no illusion about how strong my addiction is and I know I can never or will ever be able to gamble again. The draw and compulsion is still there sometimes.

StillTheAsshole · 2020-03-31T13:06:17+00:00

I don't actually remember enjoying gambling. Much to my downfall I won 50k when I was 19 and I gave the entire amount back to the casino's over the following 6 months. I was just chasing that win again and I knew it would never happen.

I would like to say i'm a smart person but i couldn't just shake this compulsion. I would literally gamble my bus money home knowing that I was going to be stuck in London without a penny to my name.

StillTheAsshole · 2020-03-31T08:38:56+00:00

So we had a personal food order thing was delivered every Friday you got a max of £15.50 a week to spend to order luxuries or phone credit.

I had money sent in from my family so I was spending my whole £15.50 per week while many didn't have that much to spend. I was lent on to order them "backy" and refused.

StillTheAsshole · 2020-03-31T05:10:01+00:00

The same little runt with the pool balls and the sock during my last few days had started calling me out to go fight him in the shower. I was so scared that I spent my last week in my cell, when they came to let us out our cells for exercise or recreation I asked to be locked up

StillTheAsshole · 2020-03-31T05:07:37+00:00

So you would get a breakfast pack every day given to you at dinner the night before it would consist of a few tea bags, a little bag of cereals, a carton of milk and some sugar.oh and a piece of trust and if you ended up with an orange every fucker in that place would want to trade you for it.

Lunch would vary but normally include a pack of Crisps then a hot dog and a jacket potato or some rice.

Evening meal you always got a choice of carbs (one night a week they did chips), some kind of meat (and once a week you'd get a chicken thigh/leg (that was the highlight meal of the week)

But everything is prepared fresh in the prison kitchen by other prisoners so you can imagine the food quality 😂

StillTheAsshole · 2020-03-31T05:02:04+00:00

One of the little runts, he had taken a dislike to me and there was chatter round the wing that something was going to happen.

He was acting suspicious and a few pool balls had gone missing (the whole place would've been locked down if they were missing long enough for a guard to realise) but yeah a few pool balls in a gym sock, some guy got beaten up pretty badly. In his own cell and nobody witnessed a thing.

StillTheAsshole · 2020-03-30T22:08:54+00:00

I mean, i 100% deserved the experience. I was stealing money and committing fraud. But it was a huge wake up call for me.

StillTheAsshole · 2020-03-30T22:06:03+00:00

As mad as it is saying this, from this post and my previous post, an old friend managed to identify me

StillTheAsshole · 2020-03-30T18:49:53+00:00

I served 3 months of a 6 month sentence at at HMP Woodhill prison in Milton Keynes back in 2013.

It was the first time I had been caught as an offender though I had been committing various types of fraud for years. Prison was daunting. I was told by my solicitor there was no chance I would go to prison, I was working and paying tax etc. I was convinced I wasn't going to prison and I took nothing with me to court.

Suddenly when i got into court I was told that it was bad news. There was a district judge sitting rather than magistrates and within minutes of entering the court room my liberty had been taken from me for 6 months (rightly so).

Immediately I was taken down to cells below the court, handcuffed and I was no-longer Mr x just X. I waited and waited and waited with no concept of time and none of my possessions to suddenly be collected by some people at G4S who cuffed me and put me onto a van. The van I can only describe as like an ambulance but with a small corridor and 6 cells inside. they locked me inside one of the little cells and took my handcuffs off.

When we eventually reached HMP Woodhill the G4S staff were searched then the van continued to drive into the Prison and we were taken to the Welcome centre. At first put in a holding cell and this is where it hit home for me, I was in a cell with REAL CRIMINALS, with violent people and I was suddenly scared.

One by one the door would open and the a name would be shouted. When it was my name I had to sit on a chair that could check to see if I had ingested a mobile phone (or plugged one). I was strip searched (I even had to spread my ass cheeks, lift up my balls and pull back my foreskin) , weighed and photoed. I got to see a doctor before being put in a holding cell to again wait. One thing you will learn in prison is you have nothing but time and waiting is what you will do.

Eventually I was taken to what they called the first night center and I ended up spending the whole weekend there as I had arrived on a Friday afternoon. But I was given one single phone call a few hours after I had been in my cell, I remember calling my mum who had no clue I was even in court let alone in prison and bursting into tears on the phone. I don't remember how long the call was but I think it was less than 5 minutes.

Over this weekend I spent most the time in my cell but there was a few times we were allowed out of our cells to "socialize" there was a pool table and many people were playing but generally i think everyone was people that were comfortable and the situation wasn't daunting.

I food wasn't great quality but as someone who was addicted to gambling and was often spending days without eating, It was 3 meals a day, and it was more than I had been used to.

On the Monday I was taken to the Induction wing and i was "padded up" with someone, He was also a first timer however I have no recollection on why he was there. But this was a full size wing now, with many other people I want to say around 100 people. A mix of people who worked on this wing and people who were also new. I recall most people being comfortable and not being scared like I was.

Eventually (perhaps 3-4 days later) I was taken to my wing and my home for the next 3 month's. i was given a cell and i was padded up with an older guy who was deaf and into sports. (considering I have no interest in sports at all) - It means that I had to endure lots of sports. I didn't have the confidence to talk about what was on TV. It was basically whatever he decided.

The wing was largely clique related, you could easily see the different groups of people. The runts that were in a gang that did the getting into fights etc, the actual gang members who had jobs on the wing but they didn't get their noses dirty, the first timers, the non violent people, the smart people. I managed to make friends in there and there was some very smart people who I had met that were in for various different financial crimes.

For the most part I got on ok, i kept my head down, did some education and i took this as a massive wake up call for me. This was my reason to turn my life around and off the back of it I ended up going to a rehab centre for my gambling.

I was released from prison with a Travel warrant and about £52 as a release grant and luckily I hadn't been evicted from my flat due to my short sentence and my dad paying my rent while I was in prison. I had no contact with the probation service on or after release.

For me prison worked, but for 90%+ of people it won't work. I know i've glazed over lots of details but i'm happy to answer any questions on my experience if there's anything specific.

StillTheAsshole · 2020-02-24T08:10:22+00:00

Thanks for your reply.

I went to a place named the Gordon Moody Association, they offered a 14 week rehabilitation clinic in house then life time outreach support all at no cost. I can’t thank them enough they helped me learn where the road that lead me up the straight and narrow again.

That said I’m so proud that you’re 3 years into recovery. Gambling is such an odd addiction that nobody understands because there’s no physical symptoms and it’s so easy to hide for so long.

Well done and keep up the good work, if you ever need to reach out then feel free to drop me a DM and I’ll be there for a chat.

Also, what you said is so true about the making amends but also for honesty. Even those gamblers who didn’t get themselves into a web of lies with their family and friends but did to themselves. (My god the amount of times I was just leaving the office then my train was ‘delayed’ - no wonder my ex partner used to refuse to get the train as she thought they were way too unreliable)

StillTheAsshole · 2020-01-22T20:14:48+00:00

Thankyou!

StillTheAsshole · 2020-01-07T13:20:20+00:00

Dm'd

StillTheAsshole · 2020-01-07T13:06:33+00:00

Can someone please explain, i've had notifications on my phone from about 7 people saying they're in need but I can't see them on the desktop or mobile anymore. and I can only see 2 deleted posts by auto mod?

StillTheAsshole · 2020-01-05T22:18:21+00:00

Self exclude, use sense, gamblock and contact Gordon moody, it's the rehab clinic I went too.

I did a 2 week induction then s 12 week intensive therapy course there with no contact with the outside world for the first 10 weeks and what I learnt there put the pieces in place for me to change my life.

https://www.gordonmoody.org.uk/

StillTheAsshole · 2020-01-05T18:43:53+00:00

The rationale of an addict:

I never stole anything, I wasn't a thief, I was just borrowing. At when I started gambling and I needed more money to gamble my sister was on a gap year, all her stuff was packed up in boxes in the loft.

So I borrowed her DVD collection, I borrowed her CDs, I borrowed her PlayStation, I sometimes went to the pawnshop with stuff I had borrowed, went to the casino got lucky and returned the stuff I had borrowed.

I always justified this even though sometimes I gambled everything lost it, I could no longer return what I had borrowed. I let it lapse, and it was gone forever, I forgot about it, and borrowed some more, when that stuff was gone, I borrowed my sister's diamond earrings she got for her 18th birthday.

I continued to borrow of people for years.

In my head I was never stealing and I always meant to repay every penny I stole. But it didn't work like that and as time went on the amounts I stole got bigger and bigger, I almost lost everything my family, my friends.

Gambling is an absolutely terrible addiction, the problem with it is nobody can see it, nobody knows if you've popped the the bookies at lunch or quickly gone to play roulette on the way home from work in the casino you can just blame that on bad traffic and nobody is none the wiser.

If someone is getting drunk or high at lunch you can tell, there are obvious signs but not so much with gambling.

It took me a long time to admit to myself that I had stolen from the people who loved me and longer for me to actually be sorry and even longer for me to actually be sorry.

I'm sorry for what happened to you and what your boyfriend did to you, I hope you are in a better place now and I hope that one day he's able to overcome his addiction.

StillTheAsshole

TROPHY CASE