Sex offenders paid to baby-sit

[classicman]

Cornelius Osborne may not seem like baby-sitting material.

He was convicted of raping two women. A succession of felonies, from robbery to failing to register as a sex offender, repeatedly sent him to prison, state records show.

But over more than two years, the state paid Osborne nearly $5,000 to baby-sit two children, before his latest conviction — for dealing drugs — put him back behind bars.

~snip~

All it took for Osborne was a 2004 application mailed with the help of his sister, whose two children he would be paid to watch in her Englewood apartment.

She was able to pick the baby sitter, and she told the Tribune she didn't worry about her brother hurting the kids. But she did worry the state would object.

"I thought he would be rejected," she said, "but they didn't. I never got a call. They never asked about it."

They should have. The program has long barred those convicted of sex crimes and the most violent felonies. But Osborne wasn't spotted because of how the form was filled out. It asked him if he had been convicted of any crimes and, if so, which ones. His response showed "drug trafficking" — a crime that at the time didn't disqualify him.

He didn't mention the prison stints for rape, robbery and kidnapping, which would have.

And there's no record anyone checked further.

At the time, the state trusted Osborne and tens of thousands of other applicants to be honest.

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Speechless.