Luck of the law

Kristi Tousignant//July 3, 2012

Luck of the law

By Kristi Tousignant

//July 3, 2012

After graduating law school, some people spend their summer studying for the bar exam and some people win hundreds of thousands of dollars playing poker.

Vanessa Selbst graduated from Yale Law School in January. Now, she is $244,259 richer having won an event at the World Series of Poker in Las Vegas. Selbst has won a total of $5.3 million total in her poker career.

When she started law school, Selbst picked up the books and put down the cards for a few years, she told the Las Vegas Review-Journal. Her last year, though, she upped the ante and balanced poker with law school, winning a total of $1.1 million at events at the Mohegan Sun casino near New Haven.

After she is done winning at the World Series, Selbst wants to get a position volunteering at a law firm in Los Angeles. She plans to take the bar exam next year, likely in California and hopes to eventually practice public interest law.

But, law career or not, don’t expect to fold her poker career anytime soon.

Networking Calendar

Submit an entry for the business calendar

MY ACCOUNT