Applying for job with court case pending

[Melly19]

My DH is waiting to find out of the CPS will charge him with theft and take him to court. There is a slim chance the case will be dropped.

In the meantime, can he legitimately apply for jobs and does he have to disclose this unless he is asked?

Can anyone help with this, any advice welcome!

I work in HR - we typically have a tick box form that says do you have any convictions ? At the time of filling it out he wouldn’t have been convicted so could say no .

If they run a Disclosure Scotland / DBS check I imagine that wouldn’t show either . Google what shows I’m not one hundred percent

Innocent until proven guilty (or insufficient evidence to prosecute) is the law of the land so I'd say applying for jobs is fine until you know the outcome.

He just needs to be honest when applying for jobs so if they ask if he's under investigation or has a court appearance pending (likely for finance industry jobs) then he needs to declare.

If they only ask about convictions then there currently isn't a need to but would need to disclose any conviction if successful.

When is his case due to be heard? If he is due to appear in Court in the very near future, it may be in his best interests to hold off, because if he gets a job and then has that hanging over him, having to appear in Court could become messy and difficult to explain. Knowing what he knows, he needs to think carefully about how the next 1-2 months could play out.

Does he have legal representation? If so, he should consult with them as they can give him more RL information about timescales and what could happen.

Although you say the charge / court case is only a "maybe" at this stage, he will know how long the situation has been going on for, so far and whether it's imminent..

In addition to any convictions my employer asks if there is anything pending you should be reasonably aware of, also there are regular 'employee conduct' questionnaires for those already employed, so it would have to be declared at some stage if convicted.
If he's found guilty a conviction of theft is going to look pretty bad OP.

He also needs to be realistic as to whether he will be able to sit in an interview situation knowing he has a potential legal situation hanging over him.

Interviews are nerve wracking enough as they are, without having that as well!

Thank you. The type of work he is considering won't have lengthy interview processes and is semi casual work. I think his best bet is to be honest if asked.

He's not been charged yet so not sure about court case timings but expect it to be a couple of months from now according to solicitor. If he is convicted then he will be honest at that stage.