Just received my monthly Utah Bar Journal. I always check the "Discipline Corner" for the latest names of fellow bar members being publicly disciplined mainly for dishonest conduct. The bar in Utah like every state is comprised of attorneys that went to law schools all over the country. Every single month when I match up the names with where they went to law school, BYU has the most attorneys being disciplined. (Very few are ever from the U of Utah law school.) BYU doens't just have a few more but usually at least half of them are from BYU law school. This month it was 4 out of the 5 whose names were public. A couple months ago it was 4 out of 6 but the other two lived in Provo and went to school in Idaho so we know they're TBM.

It never ceases to amaze me.

Does it say what they are being disciplined for?

Stealing money held in trust is a recurring themse, charging fees for work they didn't do is another frequent flyer--those are the biggies that get public discipline, which includes suspensions, disbarrment, and public reprimands. But lots of other stuff like disappearing on clients trying to find them, taking cases they were incomptent to handle, etc.

Biggest liars I've ever dealt with have all been from BYU law school.

When you can't be honest with yourself, you can't be honest with your fellow man.

I know of a few people in the state that avoid doing business in Utah county because of all the dishonesty issues.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/08/2012 01:14AM by archytas.

My ex in-law is a Y law grad, presently lectures in the law school there, is very manipulative and perhaps a bit deceitful. In that family is another lawyer a few years apart who did not go to the Y, and is much more humble, truthful and pleasant.

Cristina Wrote:
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> Stealing money held in trust is a recurring
> theme, charging fees for work they didn't do is
> another frequent flyer

But they have a load of mouths to feed and an image of God-blessed prosperity to maintain.

how many law schools in Utah?

I guess attys who've graduated from 'all over' now practice in Utah, so YBU may be 'over-represented'.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/08/2012 01:39AM by guynoirprivateeye.

guynoirprivateeye Wrote:
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> how many law schools in Utah?

2 BYU, UofU

Cristina Wrote:
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>(Very few are ever from the U of Utah law school.)

They would probably respond with the bs, the church is perfect, not the people.

Why does it seem to be ATTRACTING these types of "imperfect" people? And breeding them?

(Totes rhetorical. Obviously. ;)

THAT is interesting...

TSCC is rotten to the core...they simply follow the examples of their leaders.

The journal is available online, but I cannot see where it states the school the attorney's being disciplined went to?

To find out where they went to school, you have to look up the attorney directory on the Utah State Bar online. Just take the names of the attorneys disciplined, put it into the directory and it will bring up all their information.

The journal for this month is not online yet (it takes a couple months) which is why I didn't link it.

Christina,

Do everyone a BIG favor. Can you create a graph for a representative time period that graphically shows the long term trend of discipline cases in Utah by school of origin?

That would be an extraordinary thing to pass around on the web! Especially if it included the reasons for discipline. BYU is so proud of its "standards" and the quality of its law school.

I would title the display: "By Their Fruits (at BYU)"

The problem I see here is the question of how many U law grads stay in state to practice law vs. how many YBU students do the same. This has to be accounted for otherwise any correlations drawn are useless and too easy to poke holes in. If 60% of U grads stay vs. 75% of YBU grads stay and they have the same size classes then statistically there is a greater chance that a YBU grad will end up being on a list of disciplinary action by the Utah State Bar by sheer numbers alone. There are so many statistical issues with drawing this correlation without more analysis- for example what percentage of the disciplinary board is made up of U grads vs. YBU grads, how many total grads practicing in state from each school, etc. Sorry for the nerd comment- I'm a stats nerd and I can't help it! I never saw a research conclusion I didn't want to poke holes in! :)

Yeah, I'd be willing to do a graph. Where would we post it? I almost thought of doing it here with the names but was afraid it would be deleted.

On the statistics, I agree many BYU graduates stay here. But I don't believe the bar is made up of a majority of BYU grads. The non-BYu grads are the majority in the state bar here. So on that basis, BYU should not have the majority of disbarred or disciplined attorneys.

BYU only admits 150 students a year, and of those some drop out and others fail the bar. So even if they had 100 becoming atts here a year (which I think is too high) and 4-6 get public discipline per month (the most serious as non public discipline is for more minor offenses) and 1 or 2 disbarred outright, that seems rather high.

Especially when you would think religious standards would make them more honest....

Three years ago, I was making my final decision for law school. Despite how TBM my parents were and how tense my situation was, it was an unspoken understanding that I would not go to BYU Law and we all seemed to agree quietly on that point.

Three years later, I've just finished up at McGill University in Montreal. Knowing what I now know about the role law schools play in pluralized Western democracies, I simply cannot imagine what BYU must be like. This is one of those times that their being a peculiar people really troubles me on a fundamental, secular level. Though immersed in Mormondom, my business undergrad degree from BYU wasn't tainted in ways that I think would cloud my ability to succeed in business. I do not feel I could have said the same about my ability to be a reasonable, objective lawyer having studied in the same environment. Particularly given the nature of objectivity and constitutional respect the law demands and which is so often (if not self-righteously) absent in Provo.

Hey!! That's not entirely fair... Some of us BYU law school grads not only conduct their careers honestly but also have managed to see the light and leave the church. :)

Well I certainly wouldn't want to paint them all with the same brush. Good on you, too! :)