So I may be going for a top secret clearance soon. About a year and a half ago, I sold a small amount of Adderall to a friend, once. I didn’t want this hanging over my head nor did I want it to come up in a polygraph, so for my ongoing Secret investigation clearance, I told the truth on the sf86 and during the subject interview.
My question is, will investigators ask for my friend’s name and investigate him? He is going for a top secret as well and lied about his involvement because his coworkers in his company told him selling drugs is a death sentence. If they investigated him because of me, I don’t know if he would lose his clearance and his job. I don’t have it in my to destroy someone’s career just for mine. I feel like my omission should be enough since I’m well aware selling drugs, no matter what amount, is almost like an automatic denial, but I’m not an investigator/adjudicator so idk.
Usually I’ve never seen this happen. You’re going through a background investigation, not a criminal investigation. What they care about in backgrounds is whether any of your references say, oh yeah he sold drugs but he also had a meth lab under his house or something. They’re not trying to build a criminal case and find all the players in your drug activity. That being said, your friend is in quite a pickle should the truth ever come out.
*Edit for grammar
First, you can’t throw him under the bus and ruin his career to save yours. The bus is still going to hit you. Your first concern should be keeping YOUR clearance and his should be gaining his own.
In my view, neither of you have a clearance at this time. You will have a difficult time clearing after selling prescription drugs (I am giving you the benefit of the doubt by assuming that you have a prescription.)
However, I seriously doubt that they will tie the two of you together.
BTW: The two of you should NOT use each other as references.
We always ask for specifics, including names.
Be prepared to answer fully.
The original question included . . . “will they investigate him?” I appreciate your response but would be interested in hearing what else you might have to say.
My question is, will investigators ask for my friend’s name and investigate him?
To get the full details of the situation, you may very well be asked for specific names. But other then that the investigator isn’t going to go and “investigate” that person, that would be outside our scope. These are background investigations and not criminal investigations. When you fill out a security questionnaire such as the SF-86, you’re consenting to undergo the process and also providing signed releases authorizing us to obtain records pertaining to you and you alone. It would be impossible for us to conduct investigations on people we do not have signed releases for. We can’t go off the rails and just start investigating other people all willy nilly
Only drug I’ve done was weed. My investigator asked me specifically to name a person I used to smoke with. They interviewed this person (twice, actually) regarding if I sold weed, used any other drugs, how much I smoked, etc.
We never share info with sources during any interviews. We ask the same set of questions across the board, some more in detail depending on the source’s response(s) to the questions. In other words, we conduct every source intvw like we have no idea about the Subject’s background. Investigators will sometimes share case info for mentoring purposes but not for purposes of gaining additional info for a specific case that they are not sharing. With that said, yes we will ask you for names and contact info for any and all individuals involved with the incident. And yes, we will contact that person as a source but like I mentioned, we cannot inject what we already know into any source’s testimony. His testimony regarding your background investigation will likely have zero impact on his own clearance and investigation.
I agree with the comment above, be concerned about your own clearance and your ability to be truthful throughout your investigation.