Is the guy working behind the counter with your teenager a sex offender? Is the fellow with the broom in the play area a convicted child molester? It could be at McDonalds.

No company has attracted children more successfully than McDonald's.

"They tout their environment as being safe and kid friendly."

It's a message delivered through its commercials, its products, even its kid-friendly spokesman.

"You always think of Happy Meals, the playground, the golden arch, Ronald McDonald."

By some estimates, 96 percent of all American children recognize Ronald McDonald -- second only to Santa Claus.

And the company boasts that Ronald's Play Places make it the world's largest operator of children's playgrounds.

"And it's a mecca, it's a magnet apparently for child molesters."

Customer Thomas Wesley says, "The last thing you expect is somebody who's a monster working behind the counter."

But when Wesley visited a McDonald's in Franklin, Tennessee, that's just what he says he discovered: a sex offender -- convicted of soliciting sex from a minor -- who'd also approached him for sex in a public park.

"Right when I saw him, I thought, 'Oh, God that's the same guy that told me he worked at a McDonald's and I knew was a pedophile," Wesley recalls.

Probation officers had rated Nicolas Aloyo as a "high-risk" to commit new sex crimes -- and the judge released him on condition that he accept "no employment ... in contact with minors."

McDonald’s has a corporate policy to do background checks – but it may not always be followed by all stores owned by the company. And franchise units are not required to run background checks at all.

Doesn’t corporate responsibility require background checks? And what about state monitoring of perverts – are they not enforcing “no contact with children” policies?

How many more kids will be abused because of such failures?

Posted by: Greg at 12:38 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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