JB hired A felon, at least that was what the discussion was. And he isn't there anymore, probably because his history came to light. We don't know if HR knew about him and dropped him when it became news, or if he was able to hide it from HR, my guess is option 2. A clean record is something probably 90%+ of airline applicants (should?) have. But "a couple of check ride fails" is definitely something that HR should be interested in, and not in a good way, depending on what/when was failed.