Choosing a Law School can be a difficult decision. Besides the obvious things such as ranking, expense, location and reputation many potential law students are interested to know what famous attorneys came from the schools they are thinking of attending. Yet, unless someone does independent research on numerous institutions or wants to research the backgrounds of a particular attorney they are a fan of there is no real good resource that provides such information. To remedy this, I thought I’d pick out a handful of my favorite attorneys and list where they got their Juris Doctors from.
My personal favorite attorney has to be former California Prosecutor Vincent Bugliosi of ‘The Manson Murders’ fame. Mr. Bugliosi was able to convict Charles Manson despite the fact that Manson never was actually at the crime scene and committed his crime by brainwashing and planning the Tate/La Bianca murders from afar. He has since gone on to be an internationally acclaimed writer beginning with the legendary ‘Helter Skelter’ and including the more recent ‘Outrage’ and ‘The prosecution of George W. Bush For Murder’. Vincent Bugliosi attended UCLA Law School and graduated in 1964.
Next up is the famous ‘country’ lawyer and tv Six Figure commentator, Gerry Spence. Mr. Spence is well known as a commentator during the OJ Simpson trials and has the distinction of having never lost a case in 40 years. He attended the University of Wyoming Law School gaining his degree in 1952. He is known for pioneering the ‘Matlock’ style of ‘narrative’ lawyering. He uses stories, allegories, metaphors and carefully crafted emotional hooks to convince a jury of his convictions.
No list would be complete without Professor Alan Dershowitz of Harvard Law School. Besides his role in the OJ trial, Mr. Dershowitz has obtained a reputation as a great civil liberties lawyer. He graduated first in his class at Yale Law School and was Editor-in-chief of the Yale Law Journal. He has one of the most prestigious client lists of any attorney including such notables as Michael Milken, Leona Helmsley, Mike Tyson, Penthouse, Patricia Hearst, John Landis and even fellow attorneys F. Lee Bailey(Boston University Law School 1960) and William Kunstler(Columbia Law School).
Speaking of the OJ Simpson trial, Johnnie Cochran attended Loyola University School of Law in Los Angeles as did the fiery tv and radio commentator Gloria Allred. Barry Scheck of the ‘Innocence Project’ at Cardozo Law School got his degree at UC Berkeley School of Law. Robert Shapiro, OJ’s lawyer through much of the early stages of the trial attended UCLA Law School. On the other side of the court, Marcia Clark attended Southwestern University School of Law and Christopher Darden attended the University of California, Hastings College of The Law. Last, on the other side of the bench, judge Lance Ito obtained his law degree from UC Berkeley (1975).
Finally, I thought I’d throw in some of my own personal favorites mostly based on their accomplishments and personality. I’m a big fan of the radio host Larry Elder and Larry got his JD from the University of Michigan School of Law in 1977. His sometime rival on KABC radio is civil rights attorney Leo Terrel who attended UCLA School of Law. Since Larry’s been off the air I’ve become a fan of Mark Levin who got his JD from Temple University. Mark has achieved tremendous success over the past two years and most recently authored his best selling book ‘Liberty and Tyranny’
