Can I go to grad school despite a criminal case against me?

Graduate School
1

I graduated 4 years ago from undergrad with a pretty low GPA (2.8). I worked for TFA for a year After college. Hated teaching and got an internship with a political consultant firm. Unfortunately for me, I was young and dumb. I got married right out of college. I ended up becoming a server, in need of money to live.

My marriage was short. We argued all the time. One day, I had enough. I told her that I wanted a divorce. She yelled at me and came up to my face, so much so that I could feel her lips on my nose. I pushed her back away from me, walked into my room, and my marriage died right then and there.

Unfortunately, she filed for civil and criminal charges of domestic violence arguing that I pushed her to the floor and threatened her (which was not true). I had no witnesses. She used her mother as a witness. I lost the civil case, even though her mother and my ex gave VERY different testimony. When the criminal case was up, I got lucky enough to get the same judge. I got spooked. My lawyer advised me to take the plea deal. 3 years probation and I had to take a domestic violence class.

I am a year and a half into my probation (now unsupervised probation after completion of the class). I am trying to go back to graduate or law school and I know this is going to affect my application. I have no record besides this incident and I am not a violent or angry person. I have a strong passion and motivation to continue my studies and I want to better myself. I have been studying hard for my LSAT and GRE, but I’m wondering, even if I do well on my exams, would I have a chance to get into any graduate or law programs with this on my record?

2

Graduate schools don’t do background checks, and I’ve never seen a graduate application that asks those questions. I wouldn’t worry about your background. If you have a 2.8, you can still get in if you score well on the GRE. You could get into a less competitive local university without too much trouble. For law school, it’ll be a bit tougher. You could get into some law schools with the GPA, but post-graduation is where new lawyers tend to have more trouble. There’s an over abundance of lawyers with fewer jobs to fill, and the debt rate is high relative to the pay. If you want a legal profession, go in with caution.

With any job you apply to, you can expect them to do a criminal background check. You’ll want to talk to your attorney about whether the charges will appear on a background check and for how long. It varies from state-to-state. Hope that helps.

3

In addition to passing a State bar exam, to be an attorney you would have to satisfy the State Bar Association’s character and fitness requirements. Based on what you’ve said, you would have a good chance with this if you keep your nose clean.