I go to school up at UND, and we had a few people over to our house last night. My three room mates and I were given "Noisy Party" violations. In North Dakota, this is a class b misdemeanor and a $250 fine. They make it to be a such a serious penalty for such a small issue. Basically I'm curious as to how this will affect me when I go interview for an airline job probably two years from now. I now will have to say I have a misdemeanor for a noisy party. I can explain that and be up front about it with them... there are plenty of misdemeanors which could be a lot worse than "loudness" that I could have. But I could spin this like I was the "PIC" of my house, and took responsibility for the situation by getting hit with this. I mean, the PIC takes responsibility for when things go wrong in the airplane... I did it at my house. Ha, but in all seriousness, will this affect me getting a job in the future?

 

I think your question is less a legal one and more appropriate for Lori Clark to answer. So, if we can persuade my favorite mod to move this, then this young man might get a response sooner.

 

Is there anyway someone could move this? I'm not sure how to correctly ask for it to be moved, thank you!!

 

This is totally minor and will not harm your career. Just don't develop a track record of multiple violations. When you get to the interview, be honest, take responsibility, tell them what you learned succinctly, then shut up. The sooner they move on to other topics, the better.

 

I agree and disagree with Rickair. This IS a big deal if you have anything else in your background that will make you of questionable character. A misdemeanor is a misdemeanor and if jobs get extremely competitive airlines will not be willing to take a risk. They have too much to lose both in the responsibility of souls on board but also with their public reputation. All things equal, if they have two candidates, one with a squeaky clean record and one with a misdemeanor charge, who do you think they would pick?

However, I do agree that it is not a big deal if this is your ONLY offense - that includes driving infractions, etc. So you had a party? Whoopee. We've all been there, done that. So you will want to explain exactly what happened, take responsibility for your actions (or perhaps lack thereof) and if there was a lesson learned. But please...don't use the PIC analogy you stated earlier. This is cheesy at best and also errs on you not really being accountable, but instead responsible by default.

When we would encounter this type of incident we would factor in whether or not the candidate had a commercial license. Our thinking was that once you obtain that rating you are deemed a "professional" and should know better. Or at least have enough respect for the profession to act the part.

As time passes, and your record remains clean, this situation will be less and less of a "black mark." Time is your friend in this case.

Hope this helps
Lori

 

PiperPower,

I'd suggest that you make an appearance in the court rather than pay the fine. Assuming that this is your first offense and the rest of your record is clean, show up dressed in a suit and apologize to the judge for your behavior. Explain that you realize that you were stupid and will not throw any more crazy parties. Tell the judge that the misdemeanor offense has the potential to affect your future career as a professional pilot and ask if there is any type of forgiveness our counseling program that you can participate in to have the offense reduced to a lesser penalty.

My guess is that if you come across as responsible and professional in court, the judge will most likely reduce the offense (perhaps to a simple noise violation) and you'll end up paying a similar find and court costs but not have a Misdemeanor on your record. (Civil penalty vs criminal penalty).

 

Most states have a "youthful offender" law that allows you to get a record expunged if there is a single offense that occurred at a young age (varies from 18 to 25). You might want to ask a North Dakota lawyer about that.