My brother quit a management job with the state after 22 years and, the day after his 46th birthday, took off for law school. Hit it hard for 3 years, opened his own practice and did well, largely because he had a stellar reputation, is honest and works his ass off. He got elected to the bench and recently retired (state requires judges to retire in the year they turn 70.) He now takes legal work that he feels like taking. My son, in December, told the place he'd been working 13 1/2 years, knocking down $150K in rural Missouri, to "take this job and shove it." He'd already done his BS and an MBA and has decided to go to law school. He recently showed me his acceptance letter. He'll start in September...at 46 years old.
PM me VLBs if you want to talk. I'm a 27-yr litigation attorney, much of which was in Virginia. I'm extremely conservative and honest, like many of my colleagues. I don't think it would be efficient to give you substantially-helpful advice other than via a conversation. Too much to consider.
Any professional school is going to have an admission exam.
If your BA is in place, take the test and see how you do, before ya pull any pins.
No college, just trade school. I'd be starting from scratch.
Not ta talk ya out of it, but how ya gonna cover the nut, whilst ya get in position ta start law school?
Finances can be a helluva distraction.
Work and go to school at night, or online. Just like my dad did. He was enrolled in a master's program while he was in Iraq, and did another program again in Afghanistan.
PM me VLBs if you want to talk. I'm a 27-yr litigation attorney, much of which was in Virginia. I'm extremely conservative and honest, like many of my colleagues. I don't think it would be efficient to give you substantially-helpful advice other than via a conversation. Too much to consider.
You won't find many lawyers who are conservative either.
As an attorney, most attorney's are honest. Your professional reputation with Judges and other attorneys depends on it. I will not sacrifice my integrity for any reason. Therefore, Judges, clerks and other attorneys trust me. Once an attorney loses credibility, it's gone forever, and it's a lot tougher to get anything done.
Any professional school is going to have an admission exam.
If your BA is in place, take the test and see how you do, before ya pull any pins.
No college, just trade school. I'd be starting from scratch.
Not ta talk ya out of it, but how ya gonna cover the nut, whilst ya get in position ta start law school?
Finances can be a helluva distraction.
Work and go to school at night, or online. Just like my dad did. He was enrolled in a master's program while he was in Iraq, and did another program again in Afghanistan.
Then go for it.
Ya gotta love it ta get to it, and you'll find out if ya love it on the way, cause it'll be a PITA.
Liberty is an interesting place to interact with as a non-student. But it's certainly somewhere I'm going to take a look at and talk to for sure.
IMHO... Liberty is one of the least "Woke" schools in America... that is why I would suggest it over Darden, Wharton, W&M, U of R et al.
Regent University School of Law is also has a good program if you could stand living in Virginia Beach... My lawyer went there and he is a M***** F*****
Who is your attorney? As a VA attorney, I'd be interested to know. I have been extremely unimpressed with Liberty attorneys as a whole. I know a couple that are OK. Most seem to start of as solos or working for other inexperienced attorneys, and never benefit from good mentorship or training. Beyond that, there admissions test scores are terrible. Their mean LSAT score is a 152. Almost have their students are under a 150. Hard to take that seriously.
Verylargeboots- I went to law school when I was in my late 20s. I had been a Sheriff's deputy for several years when the county lost some federal revenue sharing funds. They laid off the road patrol, so I was suddenly unemployed. They were putting a road patrol millage on the ballot later in the year, but my wife and I decided that I should do law school. Better hours and more money.
Did law school and a couple of months before graduation, the county prosecutor back home gave me a call and asked if I was planning on coming back north after graduation. We were and he offered me a job as assistant prosecutor and a partnership in his private practice. We live in a sparsely populated rural area and the prosecutor's office is part time. We did all of the criminal prosecutions and did civil work on the side. We couldn't take any civil case that might interfere with a prosecution. For instance we couldn't take a divorce if one of the parties had a domestic violence pending against the other. It worked out well, overall.
I much preferred doing criminal work over civil. Hated divorce work. Loved doing motion hearings and trials. Some people like the court room, others don't. I really enjoyed it.
Our judicial district at the time was a two county district, later expanded to four counties. The district judge was from the other county and was appointed by a democrat governor and was not popular with either the attorneys or the general public. Attorneys considered him an aszhole, and he was generally believed to be a womanizer and a drunk by a lot of people in the district(pretty conservative, predominantly farming area). There were only a half dozen or so attorneys in my county and a couple of them approached me in early 1996 and suggested that I might consider running against the current district judge. I did, beat him 57%-43%.
I was district judge for 20 years and retired just before my 56th birthday. Thoroughly enjoyed the bench for most of my time there; but the last few years got progressively worse with regards to what regulations were imposed on us as individual judges by the state supreme court. It was rapidly getting to the point where the "independent" judiciary wasn't independent at all. It was toe the line or be removed from office. Haven't missed that crap at all.
I don't know that I could recommend the law to someone today unless they didn't want to work in the criminal justice system. The criminal side would be really frustrating for a conservative person these days. Things have gotten really bad there. If you want to work on the civil side, go for it. Money can be good. Hours can be what you want them to be if you go into practice for yourself.
Verylargeboots- I went to law school when I was in my late 20s. I had been a Sheriff's deputy for several years when the county lost some federal revenue sharing funds. They laid off the road patrol, so I was suddenly unemployed. They were putting a road patrol millage on the ballot later in the year, but my wife and I decided that I should do law school. Better hours and more money.
Did law school and a couple of months before graduation, the county prosecutor back home gave me a call and asked if I was planning on coming back north after graduation. We were and he offered me a job as assistant prosecutor and a partnership in his private practice. We live in a sparsely populated rural area and the prosecutor's office is part time. We did all of the criminal prosecutions and did civil work on the side. We couldn't take any civil case that might interfere with a prosecution. For instance we couldn't take a divorce if one of the parties had a domestic violence pending against the other. It worked out well, overall.
I much preferred doing criminal work over civil. Hated divorce work. Loved doing motion hearings and trials. Some people like the court room, others don't. I really enjoyed it.
Our judicial district at the time was a two county district, later expanded to four counties. The district judge was from the other county and was appointed by a democrat governor and was not popular with either the attorneys or the general public. Attorneys considered him an aszhole, and he was generally believed to be a womanizer and a drunk by a lot of people in the district(pretty conservative, predominantly farming area). There were only a half dozen or so attorneys in my county and a couple of them approached me in early 1996 and suggested that I might consider running against the current district judge. I did, beat him 57%-43%.
I was district judge for 20 years and retired just before my 56th birthday. Thoroughly enjoyed the bench for most of my time there; but the last few years got progressively worse with regards to what regulations were imposed on us as individual judges by the state supreme court. It was rapidly getting to the point where the "independent" judiciary wasn't independent at all. It was toe the line or be removed from office. Haven't missed that crap at all.
I don't know that I could recommend the law to someone today unless they didn't want to work in the criminal justice system. The criminal side would be really frustrating for a conservative person these days. Things have gotten really bad there. If you want to work on the civil side, go for it. Money can be good. Hours can be what you want them to be if you go into practice for yourself.
One of the most honest men I ever knew was a water rights lawyer here, turned down judge positions right and left, he truly lived for confrontation...the bigger the Goliath the better. He was also a traveller, saw a lot of Europe...in 1944.
Well this is a fine pickle we're in, should'a listened to Joe McCarthy and George Orwell I guess.
