Troubled American School of Law Gets New Dean, New Name
Troubles for the Kentucky-based American Justice School of Law are far from over, despite its new owners and settlement of a student-led lawsuit.
Indeed, the school’s interim dean has resigned, citing a failure by the new owners to provide funding, pay bills or recruit students. Even creditors are knocking and water has been turned off at the school’s library.
The Louisville Courier-Journal reports that Dean John Daughaday, a former Kentucky circuit judge, has left the Paducah school. In his resignation letter, Daughaday reportedly said that any future ABA accreditation of the school may be in jeopardy because there is no operating budget.
Student Jamie Rust, who the paper identifies as an assistant to the dean, also tendered her resignation and told the paper that the school’s Nexis account has been suspended and that staff are now without disability and workers’ comp benefits.
The Courier-Journal notes that the resignation of Daughaday and his Assistant Dean Robert Collins came to light when the owners announced that they have hired a full-time dean and will change the name of the school to the Alben W. Barkley School of Law.
Barkley was a U.S. senator from Paducah who became vice president under Harry S. Truman.
The new dean is reportedly Larry Putt, a visiting professor at Washburn University School of Law in Topeka, Kan.
