SAN DIEGO – Colin Rudolph’s career path in law did not follow the beaten path.
The criminal defense and personal injury lawyer opened his Little Italy office near the courthouse just over two years ago, the culmination of a journey that veered from economics student to restaurant owner to head cook for a national league sports team to office worker and finally to lawyer.
And that last step of the journey was the most unconventional, as Rudolph is one of a very select few lawyers to pass the California Bar Exam and become a licensed attorney without ever attending law school.
“Since I hadn’t graduated college, I was trying to figure out how to be a lawyer and I learned there are about three or four states that offered being able to take the Bar without going to law school. California happened to be one of those states,” he said.
Unlike most lawyers who complete a four-year degree then attend an additional three-year law school program for a Juris Doctor degree, Rudolph took advantage of a unique program in the state called the Law Office Study Program.
The program allows aspiring lawyers to do independent study for four years at an attorney’s or judge’s office and complete “mile markers” along the way, Rudolph said.
“You create your own pathway. I studied by myself. With the program, you’re supposed to study with an attorney 20 hours a week, one-on-one,” he added. “And at the end of it, you get to take the Bar like everyone else who wants to be a lawyer in California.”
‘Statistical Zero’
Lawyers who pass the Bar from the LOS program are very rare. According to the National Conference of Bar Examiners, only 26 people from the program took the Bar in 2023, and of those only nine passed.
Rudolph, who passed the Bar in 2021, said he looked into the pass rate for the program before he joined and found that between 2008 and 2015 only 20 people from the program passed the bar.
“So it was on average just two people a year got their license the way that I did,” he said. “I’m a statistical zero is the way I look at it.”
One reason for the so few numbers of people to use the program and pass the Bar is because of the “mile markers” built into it. Like all aspiring lawyers, students in the program are required to take what Rudolph referred to as the “Baby Bar” – a pre-Bar exam that most law school students take at the end of their first year.
“It’s kind of a weening out program for the unaccredited schools and the LOS program because if you can’t pass the Baby Bar, you’ll never pass the real Bar. It’s set up the same way, except less subjects,” Rudolph said.
One high-profile example of the test’s difficulty is reality TV star and aspiring attorney Kim Kardashian, who was in the LOS program at the same time as Rudolph and passed the Baby Bar on her fourth attempt in 2021. Kardashian has yet to pass the Bar after several attempts but has said she is still committed to getting her law license.
Prepared “Right Out of the Gate’
Although perhaps not as fame-inducing as reality TV star, Rudolph’s job history before becoming a lawyer is one he said set him up for operating his business.
“All the jobs I had prepared me to run my own firm,” he said.
After spending just two years studying economics at a college in his native Illinois, Rudolph’s first job was starting a restaurant with his father. After three years of running the “successful” Barington Gourmet, Rudolph said the restaurant had “maxxed out” the location’s potential and he closed it to work at another restaurant whose chef was a teacher at famed culinary school Le Cordon Bleu. That job ultimately led him to another as head chef for the Chicago Blackhawks.
“That was a dream come true for me,” Rudolph said.
After living that dream, Rudolph traveled to Puerto Rico for a year to improve his Spanish and returned to the States for a new job working at his uncle’s law firm in San Diego, “making copies and doing all the low tasks,” ultimately working his way up to office manager, he said.
Throughout his time in the LOS program, Rudolph said he worked in different law offices – a lot in personal injury where he learned that practice, but it was his Spanish-speaking skills that exposed him to his calling in law, translating clients’ statements for criminal defense attorneys at the firms he was working at.
“I’m a big believer in the Constitution and I get to uphold the Constitution every day,” Rudolph said of his reason to pursue being a defense attorney. “Criminal law is the most interesting to me and it’s where I think I can help the most amount of people.”
After Rudolph got his law license, he utilized the connections he made during the LOS program to get work doing special appearances.
One of those firms he made appearances for is DOD Law, where he still works occasionally as an Of Council for the firm.
“That gave me a lot of exposure – criminal cases I wouldn’t have had otherwise,” he said.
Rudolph said a personal injury case he took over for another lawyer gave him the “cushion” he needed to open his own office by the courthouse two years ago. Since then, he has resigned his lease for another three years, hired a paralegal and now has more clients than he thought he would have at this point in his career.
The only disadvantage Rudolph said he has experienced from taking the self-taught-lawyer path is that he has had to build his network from scratch, unlike law school grads who belong to alumni organizations that provide massive networks to build on.
And the advantage of skipping law school?
“I got to start this business without any debt,” he said.
Colin Rudolph Law Firm
FOUNDED: 2023
HEADQUARTERS: Little Italy
BUSINESS: criminal defense, personal injury law firm
CONTACT: 619-321-7949
WEBSITE: www.therudolphfirm.com
NOTABLE: Rudolph also serves as Of Council for DOD Law
