When you received the letter from the Hearing Board of the Judicial Council telling you that you'd been found Responsible for (guilty of) an offense, it should have included instructions for filing an appeal. An appeal is never an easy proposition, and there are certainly no guarantees of success. You need to keep fighting, though.
Why? Because, at this point, you have nothing to lose and everything to gain by going through the appeals process. If you've been found Responsible for a serious offense, you may very well be facing dismissal. Dismissal doesn't just mean dismissal from the University of Rochester. If you don't appeal the finding in your case, your transcript will forever carry a notation of that dismissal. Very few colleges and universities are willing to admit students with these kinds of records. In short, your academic career could be over. Even lesser sanctions, such as suspension and probation, can keep you from getting into graduate school and raise questions during job interviews.
You may not have hired an attorney to help you with your investigation and hearing. After all, the University of Rochester discourages students from seeking legal counsel and refuses to allow attorneys to attend official meetings and proceedings. You should know, though, that you always have a right to obtain legal advice. Even if your lawyer can't accompany you to hearings, they can play a crucial role in building your defense. That's true when it comes to filing appeals, as well.
Don't go into this final phase of your case alone, though. There's too much at stake. You need an attorney and not just any attorney. You need a Lento Law Firm attorney. Our Student Defense Team is committed to protecting your rights. We understand what you're up against, and we're determined to see that justice is done in your case. We know the law, we know the University of Rochester judicial system, and we're ready to use both to defend you.
To find out more, call 888-535-3686 or use our online questionnaire to tell us more about your case. Don't wait, though. You have a limited window of opportunity to file your appeal.
The Appeals Process at the University of Rochester
You may be smarting from your hearing, especially if the verdict in your case is wrong or you feel as though you were mistreated in some way by the process. However, the University of Rochester does want justice to be done in your case. That's why it conducted an investigation and allowed you to make your case at a formal hearing. That's why you were granted due process rights like the presumption of “Not Responsible” (innocence) and an opportunity to review all evidence in the case.
The right to appeal is another of those due process rights. To use this right properly, though, you need to understand exactly what it is.
Let's start by talking about what an appeal isn't. It isn't a chance to re-argue your case. It isn't a second hearing to make sure the first hearing got it right. It isn't an opportunity to complain about the verdict you received.
A hearing is a check on the system. It's the University of Rochester's chance to make sure you were treated fairly and that justice was done. Questions of guilt and innocence aren't at issue. If the appeal body reviewing your case decides that you were denied a fair hearing, you may get a chance at a new hearing, but that body cannot simply overturn your verdict.
Filing an appeal, then, isn't about coming up with the best arguments for your innocence or a strong explanation for why you did what you're alleged to have done. Appeal arguments are called "grounds," and they are very specific. In fact, at the University of Rochester, there are only three possible grounds for an appeal.
- The hearing body's response was not appropriate. Either the verdict isn't supported by evidence, or the sanction is disproportionate to the nature of the offense.
- New information has arisen that wasn't available at the time of the hearing but that could have some bearing on the hearing outcome.
- Some procedural error occurred that in some way interfered with your due process rights.
Developing grounds for your appeal is certainly your biggest hurdle. It's far from the only hurdle your appeal faces, though.
- You no longer have all of the rights you had when your case began. Of particular importance, you are no longer presumed innocent. Actually, you're presumed "guilty," having been found so during the hearing. This means the burden is now on you to prove that you deserve a new hearing or that your sanction is in some way unfair.
- You will not have an opportunity to make your case before the appeal body. Decision-makers will meet behind closed doors to review the case and make their final decisions.
- Unless you have discovered new evidence, you are not allowed to submit any new material. Rather, the appeal body will base its decision entirely on the record of the hearing and the written contents of your appeal.
- Winning an appeal doesn't mean the end of your case. It simply means you have the opportunity to make your case again at a new hearing.
None of these facts should dissuade you from pursuing an appeal. Beyond the fact that you have nothing to lose by continuing the fight, students can and do win appeals all the time. University justice systems are plagued with problems. You can understand why. They aren't run by attorneys and judges with law degrees but by mathematics professors and fourth-year students. They tend to be informal, with lax rules when it comes to evidence and hearsay testimony.
You are going to need help, though. You're going to need help coming up with the strongest possible grounds for your appeal. You're going to need help gathering and organizing evidence to help back up those grounds. And you're certainly going to need help drafting your appeal itself. That document must be airtight. It must be clearly written. It must be persuasive and compelling. The attorneys at the Lento Law Firm have worked on hundreds of appeals in all types of cases. You can count on them to know what the appeal body expects and to put together a document that puts you in the very best possible light.
Fight for Your Future
We need to be completely honest with you at this point: we cannot promise to win your appeal. No one can do that. You're in a difficult situation with limited options. You don't have a lot of rights left to you, and you've already been found “Responsible” for an offense.
Here's what we can promise you, though: no one gives you a better chance of winning your appeal than the Lento Law Firm's Student Defense Team. No one knows the system the way we do, and no one is better positioned to leverage that system to your benefit.
You cannot afford to wait, though. The window for filing your appeal at the University of Rochester is narrow. Contact the Lento Law Firm today at 888-535-3686 or use our online form.
