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During the past six years, Minnesota has granted more than 15,000 waivers to people with criminal records seeking employment in nursing homes and other state-regulated care programs, state records show.

Under state law, people are automatically rejected for those jobs if background checks reveal they have committed any crime on a list of disqualifying offenses. But through a little-publicized appeals process allowed under the law, former criminals who request a second chance usually get their wish.

The most forgiving state agency among the two that grant waivers is the Health Department, which approved 75 percent of 10,000-plus appeals with little public scrutiny, records show.

More than 5,000 waivers went to people who wanted to work in nursing homes or home care agencies. Those applicants were convicted of misdemeanors to felonies, including assault, fraud, false imprisonment, forgery, robbery, theft and making terroristic threats, as well as drug and alcohol offenses, records show.

State regulators said they don't know how many of those ex-criminals actually went to work in nursing homes and other facilities because they don't track that information. They also don't follow how many of those individuals subsequently harmed their vulnerable clients or committed additional crimes.

But it's clear that not all ex-criminals changed their ways.

In some cases, workers who obtained or sought waivers later harmed their clients or were caught stealing money from people in their care, records show.

Others with criminal backgrounds went on to commit new crimes while they were registered as nursing aides. A Star Tribune analysis of more than 900 aides who registered since 2000 despite a criminal past showed that 44 of those people were later convicted of serious crimes that would disqualify them under the current standard.

The state was unable to say how many of those individuals may have received waivers, officially known as variances and set-asides.

'Not an office job'

Advocates for the elderly say the state's process of conducting criminal background checks can mislead family members because it suggests all caregivers have clean records. They say more information about worker criminal histories should be disclosed.

"This is not an office job," said Harbir Kaur, an abuse prevention expert with the ElderCare Rights Alliance of Minnesota. "If they are putting them on the floor working with the vulnerable adult, on what level [do] they feel comfortable that nothing is going to happen?"

In addition to nursing homes, former criminals can obtain waivers to work in a wide variety of care settings, including hospitals, assisted living facilities, group homes for the disabled and home care providers.

A 2011 federal inspector general's report found that 92 percent of nursing homes surveyed nationwide employ at least one person with a criminal conviction while almost half of all facilities have at least five workers with criminal records.

"There are a lot of criminals who end up trying to go to work in long-term care and that places those residents at risk," said Martin Kennedy, director of the Division of Continuing Care Providers with the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services in Baltimore. "Our elders are among our most vulnerable people."

A months-long investigation by the Star Tribune has exposed breakdowns across a regulatory system that is supposed to protect elderly and disabled adults in Minnesota from abuse and neglect. The state has been repeatedly cited by federal regulators for its failure to properly investigate maltreatment complaints in nursing homes. In several cases, employers and state officials failed to flag suspicious workers who later mistreated their clients.