Holder Gives Good Advice to UVa Grads

Attorney Eric Holder spoke at Virginia's commencement yesterday:

He asked of the audience, "I hope in the spirit of Robert Kennedy your most famous predecessor and mine, that you will dare greatly. That you will question what is accepted, and that you will change what is objectionable and that you will weed out injustice in all it's [sic] forms and that you will always remember the truth of his enduring words - 'The future is not a gift, it is an achievement'."

Absolutely.

I'm all for "weed[ing] out injustice in all its forms." Not that it's the most pressing form of injustice, but I certainly wouldn't object if they started with the law schools themselves.

On a related, here is the University of Virginia's "Facts and Statistics" page, where you can see that they're clinging to the '07, and '08 numbers:

More than 96% of the Class of 2008 reported employment at graduation

More than 99% of the Class of 2008 reported employment nine months after graduation.

Presence in Top Law Firms, Classes of 2007-09

• 73% with firms in American Lawyer's top 100 by gross revenue
• 11% with firms ranked between 100 and 200
• 16% with smaller firms

*Rankings according to American Lawyer 2008 survey

Public Interest Jobs, Classes of 2007-09

• 31 public interest groups
• 22 federal government
• 14 state and local government
• 16 military

Clerkships, Classes of 2007-09

• 9 U.S. Supreme Court (alumni clerkships, 2006-08)
• 44 U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals
• 93 U.S. District Courts and other federal courts
• 12 state courts
• 1 international court

It's now 2011. With a school the size of Virginia (>350 students per graduating class), there's no reason to lump classes together aside from rigging the statistics to allow the 2007 numbers to balance out the 2009 numbers. And you have to wonder why the 2010 graduates aren't mentioned at all.

Meanwhile, employment is so "99% guaranteed" amongst Virginia 3Ls that someone actually saw fit to publish this piece as an April fool's joke.

As its US News and World Report entry states, the salary discrepancy between public service employees and private sector employees (i.e. BigLaw) is over $100,000. But as this article states, the class of 2010 had a record number of people entering the public sector. Of course, the school tries to play it as a "we're committed to service" type of thing, but it can't be an accident that Virginia had a record number go into the government and public sectors in 2010 while the law school still finds it necessary to include 2006-2008 numbers in its employment and placement presentations, can it? Hmm....

Comments On The Latest Troll

This morning, I found, perhaps, the dumbest comment I've ever received on this blog:

You are no better than the elite that run this country.

Let me get this straight, if you were queen of the world you would ONLY allow the uber-smart people attend law school? Does is stop with law school? Or is this a general application of all fields of studies? Practicing law is not as glamorous as you purport it to be.

Personally, I have much more respect for someone that can plumb a house than another who can properly apply the facts to the elements of manslaughter.

You blog is nothing more than pseudo-intellectual masturbation. sickening.

Disgusting. Really.

I don't even know where to start with this troll, but I feel the idiocy therein leads to a few talking points:

1. "Let me get this straight, if you were queen of the world you would ONLY allow the uber-smart people attend law school?" Absolutely not! As actual readers of the blog know, I have very little regard for the LSAT, even though I did well on it. If an institution can admit people with moderate intelligence and achieve a high bar passage rate with a real positive return on investment, I would welcome it. For example, I think the University of South Dakota is a good law school, all things considered, even with its low median LSAT; I would recommend an in-state student go there instead of any number of "higher ranked" schools.

The problem with LaVerne is that it's not performing up to par with peer institutions. If it could admit 148 LSATs and put out a bar passage rate equal to Loyola, UC-Davis, etc., then I'd have no problem with it. But they aren't doing that, so their continuance of accepting 148 LSATs should warrant skepticism.

2. "Does is stop with law school? Or is this a general application of all fields of studies?" I think all post-graduate education should be ultimately governed by economic principles. Law is only unique to the extent that the government continues to authorize the antitrust behavior of the ABA.

3. "Practicing law is not as glamorous as you purport it to be." I have never claimed law to be a "glamorous" field. I actually object to the way law schools perpetuate the myth. Dignity and glamor are two entirely different concepts.

4. "Personally, I have much more respect for someone that can plumb a house than another who can properly apply the facts to the elements of manslaughter." I would say both are fully competent in their chosen professions, and that there's not much more that can be said. I think many students today would be better off as plumbers than as lawyers, but that doesn't mean a lawyer's work is not valuable. It absolutely is, in most cases.

All I'm advocating is that some type of standards be put in place to protect consumers from the perils of a bubble that produces heaps of non-dischargable debt and lost opportunity costs. Or, rather, to prevent further damage. As far as I'm concerned, this can take one of two shapes:

1. Market-based regulation, where the ABA loses its monopoly, the federal government stops back-stopping loans, barriers to entry are removed, and schools can compete like actual businesses. The overall cost of a law license would drop dramatically as schools would no longer have to follow ABA guidelines, but instead could sell a glorified long-term bar preparation courses to whomever wanted to buy. Plus, rising tuition would be checked by the fact that schools could no longer rely on Uncle Sam's thriftless loan policies.

2. Profession-based regulation, where the ABA keeps its monopoly, but it and state bar associations enforce more rigorous training and accreditation standards, enforce transparency regulations to ensure schools are being honest with students, force schools to audit their recent employment information, etc. The gist here is that the ABA would take active steps to prevent the massive oversupply of young attorneys who are misled into poor investments and/or unsustainable debt loads by gaining a pigeonholed credential in an oversaturated field.

The two obviously aren't mutually-exclusive.

More on La Verne College of Law's Accreditation

La Verne College of Law has received official notice from the ABA (by way of a 14-page letter; did this really take 14 pages?) that its accreditation committee recommended denying La Verne because of low bar passage rates.

This shouldn't surprise anyone when a school's bar passage rate is less than 70% after the 2nd try and the 1st try takers lag behind the state's other schools.

But of course, Dean Allen Easley has a defense/excuse: "we need more time!"

"We think that they've misunderstood some of the facts," Easley said of the committee's recommendation. "They have not given enough weight to all the changes we've made that are likely to produce better results in the future."

Making the requirements for admittance and grading more stringent could take years to show results, he said, adding that the university has also improved its legal-writing program and revamped its third-year bar exam support course.

You've had five years. Is that not the point of "provisional" accreditation, to give a school time to make adjustments before it becomes a fully-accredited institution? What were you doing in those five years? You had 3 full cycles of students. Why weren't these adjustments made already, as in 2-3 years ago? Or - if you had any institutional pride six years ago - after your 2005 class only had a 32% first-time pass rate? And where are these "more stringent" criteria for admissions? You're still apparently admitting kids with 148-150 LSATs. This kid and his/her 149/3.2 (public school poli sci) allegedly got $11,000 in scholarship money.

And let's not forget that the 1L transfer rate is over 17%. At least in my opinion, 1L attrition is a fairly solid indicator of the value of a school. Using LSN's numbers, the following schools are all over 20%: Florida Coastal, Cooley, Barry, St. Thomas (Florida), Cal-Western, Touro (37%!), Western New England, Jones/Faulkner, Liberty, Nova Southeastern, Oklahoma City, Detroit-Mercy, Valparaiso, Western State, Widener, Willamette, Florida International, and Golden Gate. I omitted Whitter because it was on probation at the time, and I probably missed one or two others. All of those are fully-accredited, and it reads as a who's who of poorly-regarded law schools. I think the ABA made a poor decision giving full accreditation to Jones/Faulkner and Liberty and I think any school that has 20+% of its students leave after the first year should be placed on automatic probation.

I'm also wondering how "more stringent" curves will make bar exam pass rates rise. What exactly is the thesis here? They'll force more drop-outs? That getting a C- in Torts instead of a C+ will make Joe Schmo study more?

Here's to hoping the ABA denies full accreditation. Sorting out the law school bubble will be no cut-and-dry task, but an ABA that enforces standards and refuses to add more schools to the mess is a positive step.

My (Hopefully) Final Entry on Rakofsky

I have tried to be as reasonable as possible on the entire Joseph Rakofsky fiasco and I plan to continue that course of action as much as I am able.

As part of the biggest olive branch I can possibly extend, I have decided to correct the possible technical errors in my original entry on the fiasco. Originally, paragraph number 2 read as follows:

To refresh everyone's memory, Rakofsky, a 2009 Touro grad with very little actual experience, and a law license in New Jersey, decided to try a murder case in Washington, D.C. Although he (smartly) solicited the aid of local counsel, he repeatedly let him own judgment trump his assistant's, actually boasted about his inexperience in his opening statement, awkwardly asked an investigator to "trick" a witness, and basically "won" a mistrial by incompetence (which he bragged about on Facebook).

The edited, new version reads like this:

To refresh everyone's memory, Rakofsky, a 2009 Touro grad with very little actual experience, and a law license in New Jersey, decided to try a murder case in Washington, D.C. As one might expect, it did not go well, and multiple people, including the judge and the Washington Post courthouse reporter, found Rakofsky's performance a sign of "incompetence." I trust their judgment.

I view these changes as technical and not altering the "gist" of the statements about Rakofsky; consequently, they do not represent a retraction or an admission of falsity. These changes were made to reflect that the Washington Post may have erred on minor details, including why Rakofsky solicited outside counsel, what that outside counsel's opinion was on the matter (although they were direct quotes), why the judge specifically granted Rakofsky's motion to withdraw, Rakofsky's motivations in doing what he did, what the meaning of the word "trick" is when talking to an investigator/interrogator, etc. I remain apathetic and entirely neutral on these points as they're ultimately irrelevant to my point(s).

In substance, my entry does not change one bit. I only used Rakofsky's story to illustrate a fundamental problem with the legal field that will affect our (my and Rakofsky's) generation the most. Whatever damage had been done to Rakofsky's career was done long before I summed up the Washington Post story in a simple introductory paragraph.

In any event, I stand by my opinion that Rakofsky is an idiot who went out of his league and failed miserably. I also stand by my criticisms of his website and the content of my second entry (discussing his own client's grandmother's explanation of events). I will not be bullied into contrition and I reiterate my opinion that filing this lawsuit was a completely brainless decision.

On Tuesday, Rakofsky sent me an email asking for a "a retraction and an apology" (he also expressly said he's not seeking compensation from me...). I wrote him in response that if he provided proof that the facts were different than what the Washington Post claimed, I would be happy to correct my entries and apologize accordingly. Although Rakofsky's story is completely ancillary to the main point of this blog, I'm more than willing to give space to correct perceptions of Rakofsky that may be based on false understandings. After all, if Rakofsky's concern were truly protection of his reputation, he would jump at the opportunity, right?

Instead, I got this:

I have a transcript, but you're the one who wrote the
story and you need to get it yourself. The transcript cost me $1400. I
insist that you not take my word for it and buy the transcript
yourself, which you should have done before you presumed to harm me.

Aside from thinking I "wrote the story," (I didn't) Rakofsky is attempting to set the most ridiculous standard in internet - nay, reporting - history. Those who want to comment on news events publicly can, apparently, no longer rely on major national newspapers for their news. The First Amendment can have no such result, and surely Rakofsky knows better than this (or maybe not).

As many of the co-defendants have noted, Rakofsky sought to use the internet to gloss over his relative inexperience, and now he's upset that it's been used to expose the truth about him to a broader audience. In the interests of telling that truth, I again reiterate my offer: I'll gladly use this space to publish Rakofsky's side of the story if he demonstrates to me that the Washington Post was wrong in substance.

Of course, it looks like Rakofsky posted a comment on the original Washington Post article and instead of pointing out the errors, apparently decided to pretend like a third party (see the comment by "triallawyerusa," which is Rakofsky's email handle) and view the article as follows:

I wonder if this is a case of a clever lawyer learning about the Government's case in a district where he has no reason to practice and then figuring out a way to achieve a Mistrial. If so, the lawyer accomplished a major victory for his client, in which case, the Government must feel duped....I find it very difficult to believe most of what is written, given that it is so poorly written. I would like to see this alleged "email" to the investigator, but that will likely never happen....

Um...yeah. Why didn't this mysterious "triallawyerusa" try to correct the errors by at least pretending to be someone in the courtroom?

In any event, I do have one additional comment on the original entry. It said this:

[H]e is by no means unique.

When you put it in the context of what I was discussing, he isn't. But in terms of this response? That, my friends, seems unique. At least, I hope it is.

Rakofsky also suggested via email that I put myself in his shoes. The glib (and correct) response is that I wouldn't be in his shoes. But playing the hypothetical, I would try to find honest non-legal employment as soon as possible. And then I would work hard. The end.

Unfortunately, I believe, Rakofsky has chosen a different approach to life. I sincerely hope he wakes up and realizes that this is not a good course of action, and one that ultimately does not make him look good; the widespread internet acclaim to Eric Tukewitz's vade et caca in pilleum et ipse traheatur super aures tuo should be his first clue. That is, if common sense didn't intervene in the first place.

North Carolina Central Grad. Speaker Lifts Speech

Now that we're back on normal programming (I hope), we are faced with an interesting question: what's the perfect way to cap off a third-class legal education?

Well, at North Carolina Central, the answer apparently is to have your graduation speaker rip off another speaker from a third-class undergrad institution:

A North Carolina Central University law school graduate is being criticized by school officials for delivering a commencement speech that heavily plagiarized a YouTube video.

The News and Observer of Raleigh reported Preston Mitchum gave remarks Friday that included much of a speech last year by Binghamton University student Anthony Corvino.

The article goes on to say that Mitchum intended to give credit to Corvino, and that he sought his permission in advance, so the plagiarism is apparently purely technical, but who on Earth spends three years in law school and has nothing better to fill the time with than lifting some other guy's speech from youtube?

And a Binghamton student from last year? Really? Was the library closed? Couldn't you at least plagiarize a famous lawyer? A working lawyer? A well-known writer? Corvino's speech may be good, yes, but that's completely beside the point.

As the Durham paper points out, Mitchum may face discipline:

"He graduated," the dean said. "He's gone. When students have graduated, that limits what the law school can do. This is almost definitely a matter we will have to pass on and leave to the North Carolina Board of Bar Examiners. It's very likely they will be the ones to make a decision about whether this could affect his license."

I think that's a little steep, just as I think some of the reactions are a bit over the top, consider Provost Kwesi Aggrey:

"We completely disavow this behavior by any of our students in any capacity."

Aggrey added that he, too, hoped "this incident will serve as a teaching moment for our students."

You disavow plagiarism? Wow, way to go out on a limb. "Teaching moment?" Uh, kids, plagiarism is bad. You shouldn't do it. That's it. Be disgruntled, laugh, move on. No reason to try to discipline a kid or get the bar examiners involved (it's not academic/professional dishonesty; it's a commencement speech at what I'm sure was a lame ceremony).

An Open Letter to Joseph Rakofsky Re: Rakofsky v. the Internet

Where have I been the last couple of days? I didn't find out until this morning that beleaguered New Jersey attorney Joseph Rakofsy (you might remember my original posts about him here and here) has sued a good portion of the legal blogsphere. This is what I get for associating with the "scamblog" niche.

Lo and Behold, it appears that this blog is a defendant along with 73 others. I have not (and will not) read the full complaint beyond the "parties" section, but you can see it here.

As co-defendant Leah Weaver has noted, this suit is obviously designed to get people to retract their statements, but will likely have a "Streisand" effect of backfiring. As co-defendant Jeff Gamso points out, Rakofsky should really stop digging himself deeper. Another co-defendant views being a defendant along with the Washington Post as a badge of honor. As my regard for the national media is low, I'm not sure I go that far. Co-defendant Carolyn Elefant isn't so gracious, but has pledged to "not be bullied." Finally, co-defendant Antonin Pribetic took the approach of mindful sarcasm after reading the New York long-arm statute:

I will demur in disclosing my position on the merits of the defamation lawsuit, since I haven’t read it yet. Personally, I think that any defamation claim arising from my post is resoundingly [redacted] and I strongly recommend that both the plaintiff and his counsel take my advice and go [redacted].

Finally, co-defendant Scott Greenberg did some digging and found that Rakofsky's attorney is as puffery-inclined as his client. A running list of blogs with commentary can be found here.

For my own part, I though the best approach to this issue would write the supposed plaintiff an open letter outlining my feelings.

Dear Mr. Rakofsky:

The simple and crude response to this frivolous joke of a lawsuit would be "suck my balls," and believe me, I contemplated it. But there are better things to discuss.

In my original entry, my one paragraph summation of your story contained no new factual allegations and merely repeated what I had gained from a good faith reading of all available sources on the subject. Finding the Washington Post and the ABA Journal credible sources, I posted them using quotation marks where appropriate.

The only factual allegations in the second article are repeated statements made by your own client's grandmother that were reported verbatim in the Washington Post.

To both of these factual sets, I added my opinion and interpretation to illustrate the problem of attorney oversupply and a broken law school system. If these factual elements were in error, I will gladly correct them. But I stand by my opinions assuming the validity of those facts, and I hasten to note that as a first-semester 1L I would have understood that you have no real claim for libel in this, Joseph.

Nor, it seems, do you have much common sense. A simple email to the same address you listed in your complaint could have cured whatever issues you have with my previous posts. Although this would have been the straightforward, cost-free, internet gentleman's way of resolving our apparent differences, I never received such an email. Instead, you tacked my name onto a laundry list of other idiot internet bloggers in a really, really stupid lawsuit that will only lead to more mockery and infamy. Not only do you need to find a better lawyer, you need a find a better PR person.

But above all, Joseph, I want you to know that I don't hate you, nor did I have any intent to speak ill of you. I haven't an ounce of malice or spite or ire towards you. If anything, I have complete and utter sympathy for you. Empathy, even.

I'm ultimately your ally, Joseph, because you're a victim, just like most of our generation of law graduates. To make it into and through law school, you obviously have higher than average intelligence. And it's clear that you have an entrepreneurial spirit. You apparently made a series of major mistakes, but honestly, I don't think it's your fault. You entered a system that, sadly, is rigged against people like you and me. You were given an accredited education and a law license and told to "go get 'em." You did that, and now you're being punished because you decided to hang a shingle and do what it was you thought you were trained to do. I think you were foolish, absolutely, but the ultimate blame, I think, goes directly to the system that produced you (and, it appears, your current attorney). Heck, I don't even think you should lose your law license.

But no competent court in this world would let this absurd crockery move forward. If anything, your filing of this hilarious monstrosity proves that you're a naive idiot who has much to learn about the world. And I say that, too, without hatred; my own mother calls me an idiot, as does my significant other, my friends, my siblings, etc. Having one's own foolishness pointed out is a good thing. It helps us learn, and for the last few months, you've had a wellspring of wonderful advice premised on calling out your mistakes.

It's in your best interests to take that advice and stop "digging yourself deeper." Stop bringing attention to these stories. History would counsel you to do such. The money you have spent on this silly lawsuit could have been spent taking out an ad in the New York Times or the Washington Post giving your side of the story. Instead, you've just pissed off/provided humor for a bunch of lawyers and media conglomerates. That's not a good course of action under any circumstances.

In the interest of helping you get your life back on track, I'm going to offer you a "settlement" of sorts without waiving any defense to this meritless garbage: (1) you dismiss this lawsuit in its entirety; (2) I give you an entry on RDTTL, with priority for a twenty-four hour period, where you can tell your life story. Email me at j.dog84@ymail.com if you wish to accept and we can work out the details from there. The non-negotiable offer is good until Friday at midnight, eastern time, and I believe it's by far the most charitable thing you're going to be offered.

My goal with this blog is ultimately to help change the system so that no one is again put in your position, Joseph, feeling pressured to take cases beyond their grasp for low-balled fees because the labor market is so saturated. I apologize if I repeated the ABA Journal or Washington Post's errors, but I will not apologize for my analysis of the situation as my good-faith reading led me to understand it.

If you choose to continue with this high comedy, I will laugh at your expense, defend my words vigorously, and contemplate legal action against you and the two-bit firm that brought this suit.

But as your ally, I hope you take the right path, because if you really want to get your career and life back on track and move beyond this debacle, this ain't going to help. If you can't see that the majority of people who comment on your story really don't hate you, and you continue to press this one-man suicide mission and only make your situation worse, well, then, you can suck my balls, dude.

Sincerely,
J-dog.

Indiana Tech Misses Memo; Will Open Law School

Indiana Tech's dim-witted Board of Trustees unanimously approved the building of a new law school after "careful research." I wonder what that "research" consisted of, since it's fairly obvious that the market for legal education is shrinking rapidly.

“There are potential students who desire a law school education who cannot get that education in this area, and there are people in our state who need legal services who don’t have access to them,” President Arthur Snyder said. “Indiana Tech can help close those gaps.”

This notion that every geographic subregion just has to have its own law school is laughable. Fort Wayne is about a two-hour drive to South Bend, where students can get a pseudo-T1 legal education. For those shooting lower, Indiana's crappiest law school, Valparaiso, is a mere two hours and twenty minutes away. IU-Indianapolis is roughly the same distance. Toledo is two hours to the east. Michigan State is a two-hour drive up I-69.

I cannot seriously believe that local demand for a school is that high. The number of working professionals in Fort Wayne who want a legal education who can't move down the road simply cannot be at the level to sustain a law school. Fort Wayne is roughly the same size as Reno, NV; Springfield, MO; Shreveport, LA; or Anchorage, AK. None of those places needs a law school, and in-depth studies of Anchorage show the demand just isn't there despite not being able to find a law school without going to the lower 48. Thus, I'm highly, highly skeptical of the Indiana Tech "research."

And this idea that more law graduates can suddenly provide legal services to poor people is one of the biggest lies told by head-up-their-asses administrators, and it's got some pretty stiff competition. Arthur, if you think the lack of access to legal services is caused by a labor shortage, you're an idiot who deserves the fate of one who builds into a declining bubble.

If there was any kind of legitimate labor shortage in northeast Indiana, you would see a flood of unemployed graduates and laid-off attorneys pouring in from the oversaturated surrounding areas, from places like IU-Indianapolis, IU-Bloomington, Notre Dame, Valpo, the Chicago schools (U. of Chicago, Northwestern, DePaul, Marshall, Chi-Kent, Loyola), Wayne State, Michigan, Michigan State, Cooley, Toledo, Ohio State, Dayton, Cincinnati, etc. Are you really so obtuse as to think piling another generic fourth-tier on top of the pile will open new doors? Roughly 40-50% of recent graduates from these schools lack full-time attorney positions!

If I were an Indiana citizen, I would be furious at this development. Indiana has one of the lowest lawyer per capita ratios in the country, thanks in part to its universities' restraint in not building new law schools in a state whose population has stagnated. Now Indiana Tech wants to ruin that by pumping out 100 more at 28k a pop.

Hopefully, these very foolish well-credentialed muppets will wake the heck up. Perhaps Indiana is like the Iowa of South Park and it's 3 years behind the rest of the country. Maybe in a few years they'll start to realize what those in Delaware already did, that it's downright stupid (and immoral, given the consequences to a majority of graduates) to build a law school on the current ABA model. I recognize that Indiana Tech's tuition will be low for a price-gouging private schools, but it's not low enough to justify market entry, and it's not going to offer a damn thing that isn't filled by the numerous other schools flooding the legal labor market.