Criminal Record Addendum. Please Critique Forum

[abarrios]

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[abarrios]

Anyone?

[firemed]

Seems okay. I would drop the part about "This can be observed... etc, etc, etc."

I would just leave it at the part where you say "I accept responsibility and this will never happen again. I have grown and matured since then." (drop the "believe" part and be confident).

[hefox]

perhaps go into detail about why you matured. maybe a simple sentenceof how being arrested made you realize the consequences of your actions. these marks on your record with their attached punishments have effectively detered you from commiting future crimes. then you can go into how this new found respect for the system has given you the drive to be an arbitrator of the law. idk

[bk1]

Don't go into a lengthy statement about your maturity. This is an addendum, not a personal statement.

[cartercl]

All of these things happened during my freshman year of college, and since then I believe I have significantly grown and matured. This can be observed through comparing all aspects of my freshman year, such as my low grades, lack of extracurricular involvement, and diminutive employment history, to those of my sophomore, junior, and senior year.

This is what I get when I read this: "I committed crime A; then I committed crime B. I completed the diversionary program so that I would not have to go to jail for crimes A & B and now I'm using that as evidence for why crimes A & B should be looked upon with less severity. If you need more proof that I've changed, dig through my file and make the inferences on your own."

I'm not digging this. And I'm not trying to be a jerk at all, but I do want you to realize how this sounds to the person reading it. It doesn't seem very sincere or remorseful at all. As a fellow applicant that will be sending in an addendum as well, I think you can be much more convincing with this. What have you done to ensure that you will not have to commit larceny anymore? Why did you do it in the first place? Did you just not have a job or money then and thought that stealing was the only way to get what you wanted?

I think you need to provide some sort of tangible reason for why you won't be stealing anymore. If you have a job and you have learned what it means to pay for your own things and have respect for the property of others now say that. But you need to say something. You have to demonstrate your remorse and maturity by showing, not just telling.

[hefox]

Don't go into a lengthy statement about your maturity. This is an addendum, not a personal statement.

true

[cartercl]

Don't go into a lengthy statement about your maturity. This is an addendum, not a personal statement.

I have to disagree with this. While I definitely don't think your statement about your maturity should be lengthy, I do think you need to make one. Otherwise, what's to keep adcomms from thinking you won't get to their law school and steal books from classmates, or steal other things from around campus. You definitely need to show that this is not the case and your addendum is the only place to do it, unless your PS is about this topic.

[bk1]

Honestly I think whether a law school will ding an applicant based on a criminal record is more about whether they really want that person's numbers than anything else.

I could be wrong. I'm not an adcomm.

[cartercl]

I think you're right. But I think playing it safe with the whole maturity spill is always helpful.

[abarrios]

All of these things happened during my freshman year of college, and since then I believe I have significantly grown and matured. This can be observed through comparing all aspects of my freshman year, such as my low grades, lack of extracurricular involvement, and diminutive employment history, to those of my sophomore, junior, and senior year.

This is what I get when I read this: "I committed crime A; then I committed crime B. I completed the diversionary program so that I would not have to go to jail for crimes A & B and now I'm using that as evidence for why crimes A & B should be looked upon with less severity. If you need more proof that I've changed, dig through my file and make the inferences on your own."

I'm not digging this. And I'm not trying to be a jerk at all, but I do want you to realize how this sounds to the person reading it. It doesn't seem very sincere or remorseful at all. As a fellow applicant that will be sending in an addendum as well, I think you can be much more convincing with this. What have you done to ensure that you will not have to commit larceny anymore? Why did you do it in the first place? Did you just not have a job or money then and thought that stealing was the only way to get what you wanted?

I think you need to provide some sort of tangible reason for why you won't be stealing anymore. If you have a job and you have learned what it means to pay for your own things and have respect for the property of others now say that. But you need to say something. You have to demonstrate your remorse and maturity by showing, not just telling.

Does everyone agree with this guy?

I thought it was best to be short and to the point. I could go into more detail about how I've changed, but I figured that would come off as whiny and petulant. I did steal the things in order to sell them back for money. I could add this and some other bullshit if necessary.

Any thoughts?

[abarrios]

Don't go into a lengthy statement about your maturity. This is an addendum, not a personal statement.

I have to disagree with this. While I definitely don't think your statement about your maturity should be lengthy, I do think you need to make one. Otherwise, what's to keep adcomms from thinking you won't get to their law school and steal books from classmates, or steal other things from around campus. You definitely need to show that this is not the case and your addendum is the only place to do it, unless your PS is about this topic.

No, my PS won't be about this topic. I would rather not have my entire application hover around it as I am pretty embarrassed about the situation.

I suppose I'll try to write it again with the all the maturity stuff, re-post, and see which one everyone thinks is better.

Thanks for the help, everyone.

[bk1]

As per the section on criminal addenda in http://www.top-law-schools.com/how-to-w ... endum.html I tend to agree with cartercl on this primarily because it is 2 incidents of the same crime. Read the second example and the critique of it.

[hefox]

dont make it too much longer, but you do need more. Admitting to your crimes it one part of the addendum. adequately explaining why you wont commit future crimes is other part. you dont explain that well enough, just by stating you have stayed out of trouble and your grades improved. what if you just got smarter on how not to get caught? I dont think you need to go into detail about why you commited the crimes, but you do need more detail about why you wont commit future crimes.

[forward]

All of these things happened during my freshman year of college, and since then I believe I have significantly grown and matured. This can be observed through comparing all aspects of my freshman year, such as my low grades, lack of extracurricular involvement, and diminutive employment history, to those of my sophomore, junior, and senior year.

This is what I get when I read this: "I committed crime A; then I committed crime B. I completed the diversionary program so that I would not have to go to jail for crimes A & B and now I'm using that as evidence for why crimes A & B should be looked upon with less severity. If you need more proof that I've changed, dig through my file and make the inferences on your own."

I'm not digging this. And I'm not trying to be a jerk at all, but I do want you to realize how this sounds to the person reading it. It doesn't seem very sincere or remorseful at all. As a fellow applicant that will be sending in an addendum as well, I think you can be much more convincing with this. What have you done to ensure that you will not have to commit larceny anymore? Why did you do it in the first place? Did you just not have a job or money then and thought that stealing was the only way to get what you wanted?

I think you need to provide some sort of tangible reason for why you won't be stealing anymore. If you have a job and you have learned what it means to pay for your own things and have respect for the property of others now say that. But you need to say something. You have to demonstrate your remorse and maturity by showing, not just telling.

Does everyone agree with this guy?

I thought it was best to be short and to the point. I could go into more detail about how I've changed, but I figured that would come off as whiny and petulant. I did steal the things in order to sell them back for money. I could add this and some other bullshit if necessary.

Any thoughts?

I agree that OP needs more. Short and to the point works for minor things - traffic violations where they're required, underage citations, perhaps even disorderly conduct depending on circumstances (rowdy parties, or stupid drunken antics, etc). Even one-time instances of minor theft may sufficiently be addressed with a brief, contrite statement.


OP has a history of theft, however, and this IMO requires more reflection as it wasn't a one-time mistake. Without further reflection, AdComms will likely wonder why he didn't learn his lesson the first time - particularly since the sentence was fairly lenient (community service & probation). More explanation is better when the incident(s) or circumstances aren't simple matters.

OP -- I actually think you should preface your statement by saying that you made a series of errors in judgement while a student at XXX before going into them. At the end of your first paragraph, I thought you were going to move on to a resolution/reflection/apology in the next. Paragraph 2's "then it happened again" was unexpected, at least for me. Alternatively, you could write both transgressions into a single paragraph.

[abarrios]

Thanks again, I'll repost when I rewrite it after work.