You guys throw around security clearances a bit too easily. There is a big difference between a secret and a top secret.
When I went on active duty at 31 (as old as you could be without some special circumstances), I got a Secret, and I know for a fact they
only did an agency check, then put me in line for something more thorough sometime in the future, and that ended up being some 6 years later. I was meticulous in completing my secret clearance forms, and it took quite a bit of research and phone calls to get all the accurate details. (I wish I'd saved that because a good deal of what was on there is now beyond knowing and discovery). My one and only misdemeanor for minor in possession of beer was detailed in particular, and I was 17. They asked questions about your life earlier than 18.
Now you go for a Top Secret (or civilian Q), they go at it with a vengeance. They sent US consulate people out to Eskihisar Turkey to collect and interview my wife's Jr Hi and HS records and teachers. Many neighbors, friends, coworkers and a few relatives (including me) were interviewed. It may have been because she was a naturalized citizen, but not too many rocks were left unturned for her Q. And a few years ago, they redid it for the third time.
Now it's been a while so maybe some things have changed, but I bet not that much.
I've been interviewed for several top secrets (mostly fellow military who asked before listing me as a reference). A three tour in Iraq/Afghanistan Army Intel officer, and a career senior chief Quartermaster aboard the Blue and Gold teams on boomers. He's spent the last 15 years after retirement doing TS background investigations for the G.
My one misdemeanor has no official record anywhere (having been destroyed, not as a minor, just old paper records from upstairs in the Trenton MI fire-hall thrown in a fire. However, I had to discuss it in detail, to get into law school, to be take the MI bar exam, to enter the USAF, to enter the civil service. I can still remember the $58 fine (and the former-marine hangin' judge telling me I better never be in front of him again (and I believed him).
Yes I was detained (not arrested) for beer. It was extremely fortunate that besides the two freshly opened ones on the floor of my car, the other 10 in the 12-pack were still cold, so I was not drunk. If it had not been for my best friend (and co defendant) being a jerk and giving the cops a hard time (I came real close to punching him right in front of the cops), they would have let us go with a warning, taken our beer, and drove to the deserted North end of our island and drank it themselves. And I would have been deprived of my one official criminal conviction to spice up my paperwork.
So goes the compete randomness of life.
