Nonviolent prisoners who have served as firefighters during their incarceration can have their records expunged since a 2021 law (and it’s retroactive): https://www.cdcr.ca.gov/facility-locator/conservation-camps/...

This was a big deal after the Camp and Complex fires because of some viral articles that drew well justified outrage among Californians so they went a step above and just allowed them to expunge their records completely (so that they can get hired everywhere else too, they don’t have to become fire fighters).

There are some stipulations like the sentence they served must be at most 8 years, but they’re not all banned from continuing their work.

Well good, since professional and volunteer firefighters are the most common arsonists. People with violent criminal records should not be in those fields at all.

Do you have a source for that claim? On the face, it seems pretty outrageous.

Yes .

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/edmonton/fires-set-by-firefig...

I'm honestly surprised at the downvotes. I thought this was common knowledge.

Your article cites 100 annual firefighter convictions for arson in North America. For your claim to be true, that means fewer than 200 arson convictions annually in all of Canada, US, and Mexico. It says firefighter arson is common, but does not appear to claim that they are the most common offender.

That seems really really low!

It's a matter of proportion. If someone wants to be a firefighter they are also that much more likely to want to be an arsonist.

Also, arson convictions are extremely rare. Most arsons are unsolved.

You can imagine how much more likely it is to be unsolved if the person investigating is also setting the fires