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The class action suit against New York Law School for misrepresenting employment statistics in order to cull unwitting prospective student has been dropped. This is the first case of 20 that legal team Jesse Strauss and David Anziska have brought against various laws schools throughout the U.S.
In his 35 page ruling, Judge Melvin Schweitzer began with the words, “In this court’s view, the issues posed by this case exemplify the adage that not every ailment afflicting society may be redressed by a lawsuit.” He also said that the law students should have known better:
“By anyone’s definition, reasonable consumers — college graduates — seriously considering law schools are a sophisticated subset of education consumers, capable of sifting through data and weighing alternatives before making a decision regarding their post-college options.”
NYLS is of course pleased with the ruling, saying:
“We are delighted to announce that, this morning, Judge Melvin L. Schweitzer dismissed the lawsuit against New York Law School (Alexandra Gomez-Jimenez, et al. vs. New York Law School, et al.) in its entirety, in a clear, thoughtful and comprehensive decision.
“New York Law School works hard to communicate the realities of the legal job market to current and prospective students. We will continue to provide an excellent legal education to our students, and to support our students and graduates as they embark on their professional careers. We thank our dedicated community of faculty, students and alumni for their support throughout this process.”
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The Law School said this despite being poorly ranked and without admitting any responsibility in the poor communication of post grad reality. The specific deception they are not admitting to was telling consumers that 90 per cent to 92 per cent of their school’s graduates secured full time jobs as lawyers, but not mentioning that in fact, parts of those percentages are students in part time jobs or jobs unrelated to laws.
The Strauss/Anziska team is highly disappointed with this ruling, saying:
“We fully disagree with the judge’s decision and fully intend to appeal as soon as possible. Essentially, the judge’s two main points are that a reasonable consumer should have known better and should not have reasonably relied on NYLS’s detailed employment reports and that damages are too speculative. We believe that these issues are questions of fact — not law — and that the First Department will agree with us. This is one setback is a long-term process, and we always expected for many of these issues to ultimately be resolved on an appellate level. Moreover, we fully intend to soldier on and to sue many more law schools in the forthcoming weeks and months ahead.”
The dismissal of the 2011 lawsuit, which was seeking $225 million, may forebode similar dismissals for the suits brought against schools in California, Illinois, Delaware and Florida. But team Anziska is not losing any of its steam.
