The Trial Lawyer’s College is alive and well and is re-opening in-person classes after having gone virtual due to COVID-19 for much of the past year, according to the school's president.
“We're actively teaching and actively enrolling students in our programs,” said John Sloan, president of the Trial Lawyers College. “We already got our in-person programs scheduled starting in August, and we're going to have a three-week college at Estes Park in September.”
The school for lawyers founded by Gerry Spence, 91, is continuing classes despite being mired in litigation in the Central District of California, Wyoming Superior Court, and Wyoming federal court.
Spence, an attorney whose claim to fame is that he has not lost a jury trial since 1969 and has never failed at a criminal case, founded the Trial Lawyers College in 1994 to teach lawyers who represent people, not the government or corporations, how to win personal injury, product liability, and criminal cases.
As previously reported, former board member Rex Parris, who attended the school 25 years ago, sued Sloan, board members J.R. Clary, Dana Cole, and Milton Grimes in the Central District of California alleging they engaged in deceit and misrepresentation to deprive the elderly Spence of his money and property.
“It's just such a betrayal,” Sloan told the Southern California Record. “These are people that I felt really close to and that I considered to be friends of mine. Now, they are accusing us of horrible things that we would never do.”
Among the issues under dispute is $6 million that was allegedly transferred to Sloan’s bank without board approval but Sloan says the board did approve the transfer.
“The board minutes from December 2019 show the discussion we had about the money being moved from one bank to another in Louisiana and the reason for the move is because the first bank was charging a fee to manage the money and the second bank isn’t,” Sloan said. “It was a no-brainer and there was no complaint. There was no objection and, in fact, Gerry Spence praised J.R. Clary at the board meeting for the wonderful job that he does as treasurer.”
But on April 28, 2020, board members Parris, Spence, John Zelbst, Joseph Low, and Kent Spence sued the Trial Lawyers College requesting that two board members be removed.
“Their request was denied and the court determined that the six of us are the proper directors of the Trial Lawyers College and that the election completed on May 6, 2020, was proper in every way,” Sloan said.
In addition to Sloan as president, current board members are vice president Milton Grimes, treasurer J.R. Clary, secretaries Maren Chaloupka, Dana Cole, and Anne Valentine. Parris was not re-elected, according to the school's website.
“We didn’t oust Rex Parris,” Sloan said. “He just was not re-elected. It was a special election called for the purpose of trying to settle some of this mess down that was going on.”
After Parris and his group of former trustees filed papers with the secretary of state creating Gerry Spence's Trial Lawyer's College at Thunderhead Ranch, Sloan said trademark litigation ensued.
“They hijacked the Trial Lawyers College listserv and sent out emails to all of our alumni saying that there's some sort of hiccup or problem with the listserv and that now, they're sending these under their new listserv,” Sloan said. “We filed in federal court to protect our trademarks, which include the Trial Lawyers College name and the Thunderhead trademark logo.”
The Trial Lawyers College v. Gerry Spence's Trial Lawyers College at Thunderhead Ranch et al is currently pending in Wyoming District Court.
“The Trial Lawyers College has owned those trademarks at least since 2012 and now Rex Parris is saying that we somehow stole those from Gerry and by doing that, it’s elder abuse,” said Sloan. “The truth is that Gerry Spence voted in favor of applying for that trademark in 2012.”