My wife's team has a pretty stressful job. It's a small team (3 people + 1 supervisor). One team member was very vocal about things that were bad, scheduling, overtime, on-call, etc. and quit and took another job internal to the company. On her way out, she was very vocal about the problems on the team in particular calling out the team supervisor as a bad "manager" to the next-level manager.
Well, of course, the grass wasn't greener. My wife's team role is expanding and has 2 openings on the growing team, and this team member wants to come back. The problem is that nothing has changed in regards to the job. All of the things that made this person leave in the first place are still there, and arguably some aspects are even more stressful.
When considering the candidates for the open positions, this person is a slam dunk in being able to do the tasks. It would be a huge time saver not to have to train up a new person. Despite the fact that everyone likes this person on a personal level, I think the consensus is that the team doesn't want to reintroduce the drama this person brought previously. Can the team give this candidate a completely different interview focusing on things like "hey, the job hasn't changed, why do you want to come back?, how will you handle it different/better this time?", etc.
Are there any potential pitfalls to turning this candidate down for being a bad "fit" for the team any more? My wife was even wondering about the look of the situation for her boss since she was called out when this other person left months ago.
edit: A big part of the issue is the supervisor (not my wife) who is the "yes man" type. Despite being called out, this person would likely be ok with letting this person back just to avoid having to say no.