day that i got clean. >> reporter: flash forward a decade. mays, now married and a father, was studying to become an electrician. >> i did something they said had never been done, and that was got 100 on each of the 12 tests during my first year. >> reporter: despite this, the city of cincinnati revoked its electrician job offer. david singleton is mays' lawyer. >> the city looked at gene, saw he had two felony convictions in his past, and say therefore, you can't work for the city. it didn't care about his rehabilitation, it didn't care that he was ranked number one in his class each of the five years of the electrician's training program. >> reporter: singleton successfully got cincinnati to remove the criminal history question from its job application. the point is to give ex-offenders a chance at an interview. >> it's not felon first,