"Find talent everyone else is missing."
Once knew a guy online that had done something stupid when he was a teenager. He was a big, scruffy guy and altogether would've been a hard sell to an employer. But he was exceptionally smart and funny - would make a great colleague - and I bet many employers would've overlooked him.
Some do, yes. I shared an office who hired ex-cons who got a huge rebate on wages in our municipality (up to 55%). He had 2 or 3 doing office work. Very pleasant people, not that large of an applicant pool however. If we had been hiring at the time (bootstrapping), I would have definitely taken advantage.
The general rule with Silicon Valley and San Francisco companies is to take everything they say in public or through their carefully worded P.R. with a grain of salt, and actually find out first hand if they practice what they preach hiring outliers with respect to diversity, records/credit/etc, non-Ivy League degrees, etc.