VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. — At 21, Jesse Wiese was serving a 10-year sentence in an Iowa jail for armed robbery. Inside, he found faith — and a new purpose.
“I didn’t know what fight I had in front of me, but I was full of hope,” Wiese said.
He enrolled in law school at Regent University, but his felony record made admission to the Virginia bar an uphill battle. He reached out to Professor Randy Singer, known nationally for taking tough cases.
“I shared my story with him and my passion for becoming a lawyer, then I asked him to do it for free,” Wiese said with a laugh.
“This is really about whether people deserve second chances and whether people can change. I really believe they can,” Singer said.
When the Virginia bar denied Wiese, Singer appealed to the Virginia Supreme Court. “They said no on a 4-3 vote,” Singer said. Wiese and his lawyer kept fighting.
Tenacity is a hallmark of Singer’s career. Regent created the Singer Center for Advocacy to reflect his work teaching courtroom skills and ethics. “I want to give students skills so they can be ethical but also excellent advocates,” Singer said.
Former Virginia governor Bob McDonnell, who hosted a fundraiser for the center, praised Singer’s influence. “He’s poured his life into other people — his clients in his law practice and his students at Regent University, teaching them advocacy skills,” McDonnell said. The fundraiser drew nearly 400 people and raised $1.3 million.
The accolades come as Singer faces his toughest fight yet: stage 4 esophageal cancer. Gov. McDonnell describes him as living each day fully. “You’re around him, you talk to him. He is living life to the fullest, one day at a time,” he said.
“What greater legacy can you have than to mentor someone else to do what you love doing?” said Singer.
After a third appeal, the Virginia Supreme Court in 2021 ruled in Wiese’s favor, clearing the way for him to pursue a legal career. “It changed my life,” Wiese said. “When you have somebody who will step in and fight for you — when you can’t, or shouldn’t, be the one fighting — that is what being a lawyer is all about.”
Singer and the attorneys who follow his lead have become a point of pride for Hampton Roads, where mentorship and second chances are reshaping lives and legal careers.
https://give.regent.edu/donate/the-singer-center-for-advocacy
