Hofstra to Rename Law School After Donation

Hofstra University received a $20 million donation, the largest in its history, from Maurice Deane, who entered the law school at age 50 and graduated first in his class after more than two decades in the drug industry.

Hofstra is renaming its law school for Deane, who graduated in 1981, the university in Hempstead, New York, said today in an e-mailed statement.

Deane retired as president of the company now called Endo Pharmaceuticals Holdings Inc., the maker of the painkiller Percocet, before entering law school. While he was at Endo, the company was acquired by DuPont-Merck Pharmaceutical Co. Endo, based in Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania, began trading publicly in 2004. Deane served as a Hofstra trustee from 1982 to 2007.

“Maurice holds a very special place in the history and development of the law school,” Hofstra President Stuart Rabinowitz said in the statement. “The naming of a school after an individual is among the highest honors a university can bestow.”

Hofstra, founded in 1935, is a private university with about 12,000 students. Graduates include Francis Ford Coppola, the movie director; Peter Kalikow, the former chairman of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, and Bernard Madoff, who pleaded guilty in 2009 to running the biggest Ponzi scheme in history.

To contact the reporter on this story: Oliver Staley in New York at ostaley@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Jonathan Kaufman at jkaufman17@bloomberg.net