His full disclosure at rehiring couldn't undo a statutory bar the district had to enforce
An Ohio appeals court ruled that a school district could fire a custodian it mistakenly rehired, despite long knowing of his disqualifying conviction.
On July 31, 2026, the Court of Appeals of Ohio, Tenth Appellate District, affirmed the dismissal of a declaratory-judgment action against Columbus City Schools. The takeaway for HR teams is direct: a statutory bar on employment can trump an employer's earlier knowledge of a worker's record, and an employer can undo a hiring mistake even years later.
The worker served as a custodian for the district until he was terminated in 2008. In 2022, the district brought him back for the same job. He said he was rehired only after disclosing his full criminal history, which included a past aggravated robbery conviction.
Under Ohio law, that conviction is an "absolute bar offense." R.C. 3319.391 provides that a person with such a conviction cannot work in an Ohio school district unless they meet state rehabilitation standards. On August 28, 2023, the district told the custodian he was ineligible for continued employment and released him at once.
He sued for a declaratory judgment - a court ruling on his legal rights - arguing the firing broke Ohio law. He leaned on an administrative rule, Adm.Code 3301-20-03(C), which states the mandatory-release requirement "shall not apply to any convictions that the district learned about prior to the effective date of this rule." Because the district had known of his conviction since at least 2008, he argued, it could not release him now.
The trial court threw out the case, finding no real controversy to decide. The appeals court affirmed. It read the "shall not apply" language as giving districts discretion, not as stripping them of the power to release an ineligible worker. It also pointed to R.C. 3319.391(D), which required release unless the worker met rehabilitation standards. The rule, the court held, does not "force school districts to retain mistakenly hired, ineligible employees."
The court rejected the claim that this applied the law retroactively, and noted the custodian never argued he had a vested right to his job or lost accrued benefits.
For HR, the signal is clear: disclosure does not cure a statutory disqualification, and prior knowledge does not lock an employer into an unlawful hire.
