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British Legal Assistant's Lawsuit Blaming Law College for Failing Bar Exams Thrown Out

By Lynne DeVenny

Call me strange if you like, but if I were a successful legal professional at a well-established law firm, I would not want all of my colleagues - and the world - to know that I failed crucial law exams needed to become a solicitor in England and America.

And I wouldn't want a Google search of my name to reveal that I blamed the legal college I attended for my inability to pass the tests, including the New York Bar Exam, and for "ruining" my legal career.

The Mirror reports that Russian-born Maria Abramova's lawsuit against the Oxford Institute of Legal Practice (not to be confused with the venerable University of Oxford)  was thrown out in High Court last week.

According to The Mirror, The Hon. Justice Burnett was not sympathetic to Abramova's plight:

Mr Justice Burnett told Bristol crown court Ms ­Abramova?s evidence had been ?less than frank?.

He said yesterday: ?She was, without foundation in my view, willing to ­[criticize] those who taught her.

?She still finds it difficult to comprehend why she failed and still thinks that her answers were right.?

Abramova is described as a gifted linguist who garnered a number of academic awards before enrolling in the postgraduate legal practitioner's course at OXILP. She blames the program for failing to give her sufficient test-taking techniques, and says now it is too "psychologically difficult" for her to try the exams again.

Described by most British news outlets as either a paralegal or a legal assistant at a UK aviation firm, Abramova's firm bio for London law firm Gates and Partners says she is a lawyer, qualified and admitted to practice law in Russia in 2007.

Everyone approaches standardized test-taking differently, but there are successful lawyers who have taken bar exams more than once, either right out of law school, or while attempting to become licensed in another state. I also know paralegals that have not passed all or part of state or national certification exams on the first try, but successfully took them again in an effort to advance their legal careers. If you want licensing or certification badly enough, isn't it worth trying again?

Sources: The Daily Mail; The Mirror

Full post as published by Practical Paralegalism on March 19, 2011 (boomark / email).