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How to Use Your iPad and OneNote as a Secret Weapon for Use in Trial
I was looking for a program that could emulate the structure of my paper file system that I use for jury trials. I looked at several programs that were touted as the answer for use on my iPad. I looked at all the Apple App World had to offer to no avail. I download one →
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What to Do When They Call Your Client a Liar, a Fraud and a Cheat.
The defense has enlisted the aid of a hired gun “expert” who insinuates or is going to testify that your client is a malingerer or a fraud. What can you do to address such tactics? Can you exclude the testimony? Should you address it head on or skirt the issue? Hopefully, this blog will offer →
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A Hung Jury: When a Stalemate Becomes Your Best Option.
Hung juries are generally considered to be a rare outcome to a trial. However, even though it is not a true resolution, it can be considered your best outcome. Hung juries are even rarer when you are dealing with civil cases, where the only thing that you obtain is money. If you are likely to →
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When Compromise Must Be Avoided
Justice oftentimes is victimized in the name of “compromise” and “fairness”. Have you ever been in a negotiation in a case with a mediator and asked for a range for settlement purposes. The natural inclination is to equally split the difference and assume that you are willing to do so. However, a range is just →
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Big City Chicago Style
Sitting in Water Tower Place I could not help but think about all the great and talented attorneys this City has produced. The legendary Clarence Darrow called this place home. He never shied away from taking on difficult cases, unpopular causes or clients. Darrow successfully defended Dr. Ossian Sweet, a black physician, who was charged →
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Why a Picture is Worth a Thousand Words
A picture is worth a thousand words. Napoleon Bonaparte One picture is worth 1,000 denials. Ronald Reagan Let’s face it, in the context of a trial pictures and other demonstrative evidence can have a very powerful impact on a jury. Back in the late 1800s and early 1900s, attorneys could give closing arguments that could →
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Jurors: Helping Them, Help You.
“I consider trial by jury as the only anchor ever yet imagined by man, by which a government can be held to the principles of its constitution.” —Thomas Jefferson to Thomas Paine, 1789. Jurors… They are truly the heart and soul of our justice system. No invention known to man has a greater potential to →
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Why It Doesn’t Always Pay to be the Smartest Guy in the Room
Ego… All good trial attorneys have it. Without a little ego it would be difficult to stand up and try to persuade a bunch of strangers you just met to acquit your client or award your client a significant sum of money. It takes not hard work and preparation, but a fair amount of moxie →
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Closing Arguments: Strict Liability, Dangerous Instrumentalities, Vicarious Liability and Use of the Lion Analogy
It always helps to use an analogy to explain an obtuse or complex legal principle. Strict liability for the actions of others or for events where no real negligence or lack of care has occurred is a difficult concept to convey to a jury. Strict liability can arise in a product liability setting, from vicarious →
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Success is Measured by Hard Work and Effort
One important key to success is self-confidence. An important key to self-confidence is preparation. – Arthur Ashe Let’s face it, preparation breeds confidence. Only a fool would enter an endeavor with confidence in absence of preparation. If you want to succeed as a trial attorney you need to be prepared. What does success entail? Scholarship, →
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Medical Records: Potential Problems You May Encounter in Entering Them Into Evidence
Medical Records and Charts: In most personal injury cases an attorney will be required to present medical records in order to prove their client’s claims. Careful attention needs to be paid to satisfying the requirements of the Rules of Evidence or key evidence could be excluded at the time of trial. If a stipulation of admissibility cannot be →
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Evidence of Subsequent Remedial Measures
Indiana Evidence Rule 407 provides: When after an event, measures are taken which, if taken previously, would have made the event less likely to occur, evidence of the subsequent measures is not admissible to prove negligence or culpable conduct in connection with the event. The rule does not require the exclusion of evidence of subsequent →
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Motion in Limine: An Effective Pretrial Tool and Weapon (Part 5)
Here are a few additional topics to cover in your motion in limine to keep red herrings from finding their way into your case: EXPRESSION OF REGRET OR APOLOGY BY DEFENDANTS Defendants should be prohibited from expressing any apologies or statements of regret to the jury in connection with the above-referenced matter, as whether one →
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Trial Post-Mortem
If you try cases long enough, you are going to eventually lose a few. You need to look at losses as an opportunity to improve. Quite honestly you should learn more from your loses, than your victories. If your are allowed, you should speak with the jurors and see what they thought was important. →
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When is an Exhibit Sticker More Than an Exhibit Sticker?
An exhibit sticker can do much more than identify an exhibit for the record. It can actually be used as an organizational tool to aid the jury in understanding what the exhibits are being used to prove, as well as, better understand your case and how it is being put together. When I was a →
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Integrity: A Client’s Most Valuable Asset
Clients sometime forget what is their case’s greatest asset. It is not the great photos, their expert witness, or even their attorney. The greatest asset their case has is the Client’s integrity and credibility as a witness. If a claims adjuster, an insurance defense attorney or jury thinks your client is a liar why would →
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Coaching the Witness: How to Handle the Speaking Objection.
You are in a deposition and you are hammering an opposing witness. The witness has backed off of her speed estimate and is just about to concede she has no real basis to estimate her speed when the opposing attorney interrupts and launches into a speech: Q. So, you would have to guess or speculate →
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Motion in Limine: An Effective Pretrial Tool and Weapon (Part 4)
Why do you need a motion in limine you may ask? Because the other side will try to unfairly muddy the water. The defense is just like an octopus hiding behind a cloud of black ink, they try to obscure your view with their arguments and B.S. However, all you have to do is just move →
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Motion in Limine: An Effective Pretrial Tool and Weapon (Part 3)
A “red herring” is normally used by people to divert the attention of others from something important; from the central point that is being considered. A “herring” is a kind of fish that turns red only when it is “cured” – that is, when it is smoked and salted. Such a fish emits a very strong smell and in the →
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The Barrister's Toolbox 