School District Violated Labor Code By Rejecting Applicants Based On Expunged Misdemeanor Convictions
A.S. v. Los Angeles Unified Sch. Dist., 123 Cal. App. 5th 519 (2026)
Two applicants for employment with the Los Angeles Unified School District (one for a part-time after-school program position and the other for a legal secretary position) were rejected based on their prior misdemeanor convictions (for battery and grand theft, respectively), both of which had been expunged pursuant to Cal. Penal Code § 1203.4. The District contended that its duty to protect students required it to screen out applicants with nearly any criminal conviction, notwithstanding expungement. The trial courts in the two separate actions granted summary judgment to the applicants, and the Court of Appeal affirmed in this consolidated appeal, holding that the District violated Cal. Lab. Code § 432.7, which prohibits employers from asking about or utilizing expunged convictions. The Court further held that the statutory exceptions upon which the District relied did not apply because no law required the District to obtain information about, or prohibited it from hiring individuals with, the particular misdemeanor convictions at issue (misdemeanor battery and misdemeanor grand theft).