Test your investigative and security skills and tell me what is wrong with the following news account of a recent court conviction:

COLUMBUS, GA (WTVM) -  Two women have admitted they stole hundreds of thousands of dollars from a Columbus church.

According to their plea deal, the women must pay back $450,000 they stole from Fourth Street Missionary Baptist Church downtown.

According to the state, Nikiena Bowden was a convicted felon when she was hired as a bookkeeper at Fourth Street Church back in 2003.

Prosecutors say she embezzled money from her previous employer and told the judge she did the same thing at Fourth Street, allegedly taking church checks and cashing them for herself over a period of two years.

[read the whole story: http://www.wtvm.com/Global/story.asp?S=13273689]

Figure it out yet?

The church bookkeeper was a convicted felon, for a prior embezzlement, when she was hired by the church - think they did a background check on her?

Here is another incident that is more serious; again, test your skills:

OKLAHOMA CITY -- An Oklahoma City woman is attacked and raped at a local church.

The suspect occasionally worked at the church doing odd jobs.

Walker has a lengthy criminal record, including convictions for burglary and violating a victim's protective order.

[news account in CSN archive]

Or how about this one:

BALTIMORE (AP) -- A registered sex offender has been charged with fondling an 11-year-old girl at a Baltimore church

Police say the girl is a parishioner and the pastor had hired Key (the offender) to do work.

[news account in CSN archive]

Loss of church money is enough of a serious incident, which could have been prevented by a background check, but sexual assaults on staff and worst of all molestation of a young girl by a sex offender - when will the church wake up and realize everyone gets a background check done - no exceptions.

Background checks are so basic, yet we see incidents like this over and over again.

I am not sure what the issue may be for not doing them?

Costs?

Well, wake up call, this is the cost of doing business, any business. You do it to protect people and assets. How do you explain to the parents of the young child that is sexually molested that the $30 or so for a background check was too great of a cost to protect their daughter?

Time?

With web-based companies, like ones recommended by the Christian Security Network, all the work is done for you. It literally takes minutes to enter the information and minutes to review the results.

Too complicated?

Again, use a reputable, web-based service provider and they will train you and make sure you are compliant with all laws.

We encourage you to request information from our background check sponsor and receive their free information: click here

Also, the Christian Security Network started a new poll for this last quarter of 2010 on the front of our website asking if your church does background checks on ALL staff and volunteers; we ask that you participate, your responses are not tracked in any way and the collective information is important for research and education.

Last question: how many more victims will there have to be before all churches just make this a standard practice?

In Christ,
Jeff Hawkins
Executive Director

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