It was a BAD week for lawyers breaking the law, after the former dean of Southern Methodist University Dedman School of Law was arrested early Sunday on a charge of prostitution. John B. Attanasio, 60, is free on $500 bail for a class B misdemeanor, the Dallas Morning News reports. Attanasio served three terms as dean from 1998 to 2013, when the law school declined to renew his contract, though the reason is still unknown.
He is currently the Judge William Hawley Atwell Chair of Constitutional Law and professor. He will not be attending scheduled classes this week, a spokeswoman said.
“I can confirm that John Attanasio is a full-time member of the SMU law school,” spokeswoman Patricia Ann LaSalle told the Dallas Morning News in a written statement. “It would not be appropriate, however, for SMU to comment on matters that are being investigated by area police.”
When Attanasio’s deanship expired in 2013, several faculty members and alumni, including two former Texas Supreme Court judges, signed a letter in support of Attanasio. Leslie Ware, a member of the law school’s executive board and supporter of the former dean, resigned over not being informed of the school’s decision not to renew Attanasio’s deanship.
