(giving you a roadmap of my website)
Thank you for visiting my web page. Let me give you some basic information about my background and what I do.
I am a lawyer licensed to practice in the State of New Jersey since 1989 from my offices, Jamie Epstein, Attorney at Law, which are located in Cherry Hill, Camden County and in Hamilton, Mercer County (just a few minutes from the New Jersey Office of Administrative Law). Although my offices are located in South and Central New Jersey, I serve students throughout the entire State of New Jersey.
My practice primarily involves the representation of students and their families who have had their regular education, special education or higher education law rights violated. This also includes civil litigation for students who have been discriminated against, injured or bullied. I have a sub-specialty in obtaining access to student records pursuant to the New Jersey Open Public Records Act. I have made numerous appearances before school boards and administrative, state and federal trial and appellate courts.
My policy is, for most cases, to only require my client pay a small portion of my attorney's fees if the clearly violated law calls for the payment of their fees be shifted to the school or other type of defendant. This is in furtherance of my philosophy that my client's access to the justice system should not be impaired by their financial status.
In addition to my current practice in education law and civil litigation, I practiced for many years in Family Law, which included abuse and neglect, child custody and juvenile proceedings.
Before I became a lawyer, I worked for about 15 years in the education/human services field. The services I provided included: direct educational services to children in private and public schools and residential placements; rehabilitation services to inmates at San Quentin Prison and juveniles on probation; ABA services to the developmentally disabled; chairperson of an interdisciplinary team responsible for the development and implementation of individual habilitation plans for the developmentally disabled; and managing director of a New Jersey Office of Special Education approved agency providing therapy services to special education students through school district child study teams.
I received a B.S.W. and Certificate in Child Care with honors from Temple University, a Masters in Management with honors from Central Michigan University, and a Juris Doctorate from Rutgers University.
The other pages on my website will provide you with testimonials from my clients, links to some of my cases that have been published by the courts and in the media, education law resources, directions to my office locations and a link to email me with any questions or comments.
On January 28, 2019, Jamie Epstein argued L.R. v. Camden City Public School District (Case #080333) before the New Jersey Supreme Court. The issue was whether student records, with the personal identification information of the student redacted, were available via an Open Public Records Act Request. To view the video - click on the video below or click here).
CB sent her school an Open Public Records Request for her child's student records. The school denied CB access. CB filed an Complaint with the New Jersey Government Records Council who ordered the school provide CB access to her child's student records and will decide CB's request for her attorney's fees.