Actually it looks like it was on his 4th try that he passed the bar!

Catch-22 really DOES exist.

When you spend 26 years not paying back your student loans, perhaps it's not a good idea to be placed in charge of other people's money, as an attorney would eventually be.

Regardless of how it's taken him to pay back his student loan, refusing to allow him to earn a living using the degree his loans paid for is unseemly and ludicrous. I hope it is also deemed illegal.

I'll apologize in advance for this, but who in their right mind is going to hire an attorney who couldn't pass the bar on this second or third try? Some people simply aren't cut out to be lawyers. Perhaps the bar examiners are doing his future clients, and his malpractice carrier, a favor by keeping him from practicing. On top of that, anyone who racks up that kind of debt obviously doesn't have much sense. I realize this is harsh, but give me a break. Adversity, blah blah blah. The guy clearly doesn't have the greatest judgment AND needed 4 tries to pass the bar. Maybe it's time to find another career.

Wow. You didn't think it was worth noting that he has $400k in student loans and hasn't made a payment in 26 years?

@rugman11: How so? It's entirely possible to not be involved in financial matters other than payment as a lawyer

It sounds as though Sallie Mae was really not holding up their end of the bargain, but note that at least some of his student loan debt was in private loans instead of Stafford or Plus loans, which appears to be part of the issue. All the more reason not to get those--it's almost as bad as paying for tuition with a credit card.

@Esquire99: I think the NY bar is one of the hardest in the country. Someone please back me up here...

I don't think exams are a fair translation of how life is in the real world.

Full disclosure: I am not a lawyer and have never take a bar exam. I have however both failed and passed a number of exams which may or may not have been administered by humans/robots/god-of-your-understanding.

@WorldHarmony: It's not prohibiting him from making a living, it's not giving him lawyer status. Big difference.

He should appeal, get admitted to the bar, then declare bankruptcy.

Seriously, over $400? how do you crawl your way out of that?

@Jage: sorry, meant $400,000

I'm currently studying for my CPA in Texas. One of the requirements is passing a "moral character and fitness determination." I don't know who the licensing authority is for lawyers, but I'm sure there's probably a similar requirement for attorneys. (Yeah, insert joke about lawyers and moral character here.)

@Jage: Student loans are generally not able to be discharged in bankruptcy. It takes some pretty extraordinary circumstances for bankruptcy courts to rule that the debtor is facing an "undue hardship," and discharge is very rarely granted.

@Cant_stop_the_rock:
YOU FAIL READING COMPREHENSHION
Did you note the history and this part "The three lawyers who interviewed him in Albany in January found Mr. Bowman's "determination to pursue a postsecondary education remarkable," according to the written evaluation. As for the loans, they continued, "it appears unconscionable that a student loan indebtedness could go from $270,000 to $435,000 in four years."

All I had to read was @ his childhood, "foster child". I give him a PASS. These poor kids have the world stacked against them. I'd like to see this grown-up one have the chance to turn a bit of the establishment on its head. And with regard to the group of five state appellate judges who decided this, FUCK THEM, individually & collectively. I really wish them ill and hope .....

@deconecon: Fixed.

@Esquire99: The average in most states is 2-3 tries. In states with harder exams, like IL or NY, 4 is not uncommon at all. Witness Mayor Daley, by no one's estimation an incompetent, stupid or lazy man, who only passed the Illinois bar on his third try.

@JosephFinn: Okay, I agree with your general sentiment but VEHEMENTLY disagree with your assessment of Daley not being stupid or incompetent!

@Esquire99:' On top of that, anyone who racks up that kind of debt obviously doesn't have much sense."

So how exactly is one supposed to get a degree in law, medicine etc?
If you don't have rich parents willing to foot the bill and go to a private school its pretty much guaranteed.
I went to private school, got the MAX amount from the fed in loans, grants etc PLUS a huge scholarship from my school each year and STILL graduated owing nearly $30,000 in private loans, and I didn't go to law school.

Well, there are 49 other states and one district. Keep plugging away at it.

@coren: It is, but since lawyers very frequently have fiduciary responsibility, money issues are a HUGE thing the bar and your malpractice insurer look at. Virtually everything that jacks your rates, other than being involved in areas of law where clients sue you a lot, are risk factors for money problems -- lawyers with alcohol or substance abuse problems are much more likely to steal client money, for example.

I can't remember very much of what, specifically, was on the initial form now (since now I just do the renewal form every year), but they care a LOT what I MIGHT do if I got within 300 yards of someone else's money.

@Eyebrows McGee (now with more baby!): *not that I agree with the court here.

@Esquire99: NY has a very low pass rate. Also, some people simply test poorly, and it's difficult to imagine more stressful test conditions. (We knew someone who took day 3 of the California bar with a BLEEDING HEAD WOUND rather than sit through the first two days again!) I've known a couple people who took two tries just to get RELAXED enough in the bar exam situation to pass it on take three.

I've never seen any data that suggests people who take more tries to pass the bar are less-good lawyers, but I'd be interested to see it if it were out there.

@JosephFinn: Really? I didn't think IL was that hard. I shall feel smarter now. (One try.)

@dialing_wand: NY is one of the hardest bar exams. CA also has a low pass rate. That said, most other states have good pass rates (in the 80-90% range), so I don't think it's accurate to say that the average in most states is 2-3 tries.

@wvFrugan:

Consumerist didn't mention it in their summary. That's the "You" in question here, not the actual article.

@Liam Kinkaid: Yes, lawyers have to pass "character and fitness" before being admitted to practice in a state. The application is very extensive -- employment history, housing history, references, traffic violations, etc. Lawyers also have to pass an ethics test (Multistate Professional Responsibility Exam) before being admitted to practice.

@Jage:

That'll look great for future clients.

Also, as Ichiro51's said, student loans don't normally get discharged in bankruptcy. Same thing with back taxes and child support.

@Liam Kinkaid: There is, but almost NOBODY isn't admitted for moral character ... people who got caught cheating in law school, people who've abused the legal system, people with recent rap sheets: you name it, they'll admit them. And the things that the character and fitness committee latches on to are often very odd -- knew a prospective lawyer who got a call from C&F demanding he justify himself for having three speeding tickets in a two year period because that was "evidence of disregard for the law" while someone in the same law school class who'd been disciplined for rigging a moot court competition (it was reported to the bar) and had some misdemeanors during law school wasn't hassled by the same state.

Illinois has refused admission to exactly one person since the McCarthy era (when commies were fairly routinely denied admission on character and fitness grounds): Matt Hale, a screaming racist who runs the World Church of the Creator and, at the time of his bar application, had multiple felony & misdemeanor convictions (battery, criminal trespass, etc.). (Two days after he was denied admission, one of his minions, Benjamin Smith, went on a shooting spree across Illinois and Indiana and killed several people; one of the people he shot (but didn't kill) was actually a friend of mine from high school.)

When Hale was denied admission, there was actually an UPROAR from surprisingly large portions of the legal community nationwide who felt that denying him admission to the bar was basically encroachment on his First Amendment rights to be a screaming asshole, and that neither his racism nor his felony convictions in pursuit of that racism should be considered "moral turpitude" because it was a free speech issue. (Also entering into it is the fact that he intended to use the law specifically to advance his racial agenda, and whether that should influence his admission.)

Anyway, he ended up in federal prison for soliciting the murder of a federal judge from an FBI informant.

As may be expected, my feelings on Matt Hale are colored by the fact that a) his minion shot a friend of mine and b) it's my home state and my bar and no, I do not think it's okay for terrifying neo-Nazis to abuse the court system to advance a racist agenda and attempt to undermine Constitutional rights. (I suppose it's (legally) okay to use the legislative process to try to repeal those rights, although it's still assholic and immoral.)

It's nice you give someone a "pass" just because he's a foster child. I'm sure when you're in dire need of an attorney, you'll bypass the better lawyer and hire a lesser one if he happened to be a "foster child".@wvFrugan:

Let's be honest here. This guy is completely irresponsible. But there is one point that took me aback. Sallie Mae sold his loan to a private collection agency that immediately tacked on a 25% penalty. Did I read this right? How is this legal? What prevents them from tacking on a 50% or 100% penalty fee?

Granted an attorney with that much debt could be a risk for taking money from clients or doing other less ethical actions to pay it off. OTOH, the fact that fees and other penalties raised his debt from $230,000 to $425,000 in four years is outrageous and more evidence of the power that credit/loan companies have. Its especially harsh in this case because of the immense difficulty in discharging the student loan in bankruptcy. Considering how difficult a time he will have repaying the loan, especially if he isn't allowed to become an attorney, he actually might have a chance at a bankruptcy discharge and then too bad for the loan company.

So he should sue.

The bar examiners need to focus on whether he meets the criteria to be admitted to the bar, and it appears he does. They aren't deciding whether to loan him money for a new car. I'm sure the guy will make an excellent collections or bankruptcy lawyer. He's no doubt seen all the tricks of the trade.

PS to read the NYT article, you have to register with them, which I refuse to do.

@johnfrombrooklyn: This guy appears to be very tenacious -- he's probably is exactly the kind of lawyer I'd want. YMMV.

@JosephFinn:
[www.law.com]
Results by state (from 2002, but what I got with a very quick search pre coffee with a lot of jet lag...).

NY does have some pretty low pass rates just from a very quick scan, but I didn't look closely at the numbers.

@Jage: And people like you are the reason they had to pass the law making student loans non-dischargeable. A lot of people used to do just that.

@Esquire99: Yeah, seriously. It's like, sooo easy.

I mean, I passed the NY bar on my 0th try. I just put my name into the website, and got a really nifty official-looking certificate within a week. I can practice anywhere in Grenada.

@subtlefrog:
@Eyebrows McGee (now with more baby!):
New York's pass rate for first time takers is 90%. The pass rate for all takers, including those who are repeating the exam, is in the in the 70s, which tells me that those who fail the first time don't always pass the second.

Had this guy been in CA, I'd be more willing to give him a pass. CA is known to have the hardest bar in the Country; Stanford Law's Dean failed it the first time (after she had been admitted in NY years earlier and had become a partner at a large, prestigious firm).

I'm wiling to accept that not everyone passes the first time. Some people have bad days, etc. But to fail the exam not once, but three times? I recognize that does not necessarily mean he will be a bad lawyer, but it certainly doesn't reflect well and there is no way in hell I'd ever hire or recommend someone who failed the bar that many times.

[www.nybarexam.org]

@razremytuxbuddy: [www.bugmenot.com]

@Esquire99: "The pass rate for all takers, including those who are repeating the exam, is in the in the 70s, which tells me that those who fail the first time don't always pass the second."

That's true in every state -- February pass rates are always considerably lower than July pass rates, largely because of second-time takers.

@Eyebrows McGee (now with more baby!): you're 100% correct. we were warned about debt, substance abuse, arrests, etc in orientation many times before 1L even began.

@GuinevereRucker: Small difference. At a certain point of investment into a career there is no going back. Sure some people fail, but failing due to arbitrary rules is problematic.

It should certainly give prospective lawyers pause, because a 300k mortgage + 150K for law school could mean that trying to become a lawyer would be like joining a MLM scheme for them.

@Eyebrows McGee (now with more baby!):
I'm sure that is true. That state was pretty much extraneous anyway. My point was 90% first-time takers in New York pass. It took this guy 4 tries. And, if he gets admitted, he can be charged with protecting someone's life or livelihood. I accept that, in some respects, it's a bit of an elitist attitude to have. But come on, you've got a law degree; I'm sure, even if you don't practice, you've witnessed some horrible, horrible attorneys who have no business practicing law. Granted, I'm sure some of them passed on their first, second or third try, but I suspect a good deal of the bad lawyers out there took the bar multiple times. (I can't back that up, that's pure speculation).

I suppose a better question is, would anyone here knowingly hire a lawyer who failed the bar 3 times in a state where 90% of people pass it the first time?

@Esquire99:
bah, damn lack of an editing function (and proofreading skills).

"That STATEMENT was pretty much extraneous anyway".

@Esquire99: One of the best and most intelligent lawyers I know didn't pass until her fourth try. She is not a good test taker, and never has been. Another colleague took three trues, as she is dyslexic and was not permitted accommodations for the exam. I passed on the first try, but I was shocked when I got the result. And I fully admit to being an entirely average lawyer. I know lots of AWFUL lawyers that passed on the first attempt. The number of times you take the exam could be related to so many things other than competence.

@Karita:
I'm willing to accept that there are potential legitimate reasons for not passing until the 4th attempt. However, my guess is those are the exceptions and not the rule. I still would never hire an attorney that needed 4 attempts to pass the bar. While I agree that multi-attempts can relate to many things more than competence, I still think there is a large correlation with competence.

@Esquire99: I've hired lawyers based on their professional records as lawyers. I don't really care how they did on their bar exam.

26 years? Wake up, people. Going for the LLM was just another delay tactic. He didn't need an LLM to take the bar and practice law. It just allowed him to go deeper into debt and spend a year in London with his girlfriend.

And spare me the "bar exam is so hard" speech. The guy had an LLM! The bar is the basics. That's why most people pass the first time around, even in NY and CA.