Oklahoma man files suit over false background check information

7-18-2010 Oklahoma:

An Oklahoma City man who claims he was falsely listed as a sex offender has filed a $1 million Oklahoma City federal court lawsuit against two Internet companies that provide criminal background search information.

"It's amazing what I've been through," Tony Lee Green, 33, told The Oklahoman. "I ended up basically homeless. I was kicked out of my neighborhood. I was ostracized from all my friends. ... People just completely abandoned me."

Green alleges Confi-Chek, Inc., and Criminal Searches, Inc., libeled and slandered him by falsely reporting he was convicted of a sex offense involving children and other "horrendous crimes" that he did not commit.

The Sacramento, Calif., companies named in the lawsuit operated under the names PeopleFinders.com, Criminalsearch.com and VeriChek.com.

Repeated efforts to reach company officials for comment were unsuccessful.

Green claims false criminal background information those companies attributed to him caused a friend to back out of a proposed business partnership and friends to shun him in Palm Beach, Fla., where he lived a few years ago as he tried to re-establish his life and live a dream.

"Dating relationships, every aspect of my personal life has been completely shattered," he said.

"Basically, I was humiliated and shunned to the point I got the hey out of Dodge, and I moved back to Oklahoma. I had no choice," he said. "Dreams were broken. Hearts were broken. I was humiliated, shamed — lost my butt."

Green has tried since mid-2008 to get the information corrected, but the information remained on the sites until very recently despite promises from company officials that it would be removed and even claims that it had been removed, Green said.

Green said the information was finally removed recently, "but the damage is done."

"I have a criminal background, but it is nothing to the extreme these guys have portrayed," Green said.

Back in early 2001, Green said he got involved in a deal where he was selling auto parts for some people on eBay.

Green said he didn't realize at first that the parts were stolen but admits he later found out and continued selling them for another eight or nine months because he liked the money. Green said he quit after having a change of heart, but the legal system later caught up to him.

Green pleaded guilty in 2003 to receiving and concealing stolen property.

When the Internet criminal background search companies picked up that information, they also picked up convictions of his co-defendants and falsely attributed those convictions to him in the information they provided to people doing searches, he said.

As a result, they falsely accused Green of crimes that included possessing obscene material involving a minor, possession of counterfeit identification, assorted drug charges, embezzlement and burglary, Green said.

Practically every crime short of rape, murder or arson was listed, Green said.

"They had all of this stuff on me, and it was not true," he said.

Green said he made a mistake, paid for it, and has tried to do nothing but good since.

Green said a person can overcome a possession of stolen property conviction, but a person can't overcome being portrayed as a career criminal and child sex offender.

"The number one worst thing that a human being can possibly do to another person is molest or have some kind of sexual offense with a minor," Green said.

"It's horrendous. It's unthinkable. You cannot recover from something like that. Well, they've got me listed as it and it is not true," he said.

Green says he is in the business of selling high-end men's clothing.

"I'm now trying to rebuild again," he said. ..Source.. RANDY ELLIS