Appellate Law

CA1: Unaccredited law school wins against own students using lawyers from accredited law school

By S. COTUS

Rodi v. Southern New England Law School, No. 07-1770.  The earlier opinion is here, and our coverage is here. A related case is here.  Take it from me.  Despite lawyer?s protestations about how the ABA?s accrediting regime is unfair or something, lawyers simply don?t like people that went to unaccredited law schools.  It fact, it is considered rude to even mention their names in some circles. So, when a plaintiff sues an unaccredited law school claiming ? claimed fraud and a violation of a consumer protection statute? that was ?provisionally accredited? you know where this is going.  Of some interest is that the dean tried to convince this unfortunate student from transferring to a real law school.  But, since real law schools have no time for people that associate with unaccredited law schools, he was denied admission.  This time around, the only issues are whether his reliance was reasonable as a matter of law.  His failed attempts to transfer to a real law school apparently show that he wasn?t really relying on what the deans were selling.  Then he claims that but for the dean trying to convince him not to transfers he would have pursued a PhD.  The First has no time for that.  This guy was going to an unaccredited law school, and writes ?if the deans' respective statements were not enough to convince Rodi to relinquish his pursuit of a transfer, it seems equally unlikely they would have been enough to persuade Rodi to shelve his pursuit of a Ph.D.?  What they really mean is ?Get serious.  By associating with an unaccredited law school, he demonstrates that he is not PhD material.?  Finally, the First points to the boilerplate language that the school used to say that it isn?t making representations, but ?The school, through its disclaimer, essentially urged Rodi and other SNESL students to ignore statements such as the one made by Dean Larkin.?  Moreover, since the ABA was really in charge of accrediting, there isn?t a way that it COULD have made such a representation. 

Anyway, after all the snark, there is some important stuff in here about motions for recusal v. motions for reassignment.  Essentially, unless the First says that a case should be reassigned, it isn?t an abuse of discretion not to reassign it.

Full post as published by Appellate Law and Practice on June 30, 2008 (boomark / email).