Once again, Winning Trial Advocacy Tips has an excellent article for those of us who try cases. Here is an excerpt: There’s something strange about how our brains work. For some reason, our brains don’t seem to comprehend the word “Don’t” very well. In fact, our brains have the power…
Philip Brown, author of MS Litigation Review and Commentary, has an interesting post on the impact of social networking on the work of trial lawyers. An excerpt: I have talked with lawyers who are worried about a juror going home and researching parties on social network sites. What if a juror…
Winning Trial Advocacy Tips continues to be a great source of information for those of us who try cases. This post, called "The Proper Use of Notes," does a fine job explaining how – and how not – to use notes at trial. An excerpt: When preparing the notes that…
Winning Trial Advocacy Tips has a great post on the subject of whether you should ever call a witness a liar. An excerpt: Because we’re lawyers, we don’t have any problems believing that someone will take the stand and lie to us. But jurors don’t think like that. Maybe they’re…
Defendant asserted his Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination throughout the discovery phase of a civil trial. During the fourth week of trial he attempted to waive the privilege and give substantive testimony. The Wisconsin Court of Appeals upheld the decision of the trial judge to prohibit the the witness from…
The good folks at the Winning Trial Advocacy Tips blog have assembled some more great information of interest to trial lawyers. This post is titled "Free Software for Trial Lawyers‘ and features a dozen free or almost free programs of interest to lawyers who try personal injury and wrongful death…
The Winning Trial Advocacy Tips blog has a great post titled "Sources for Closing Argument Stories." The post identifies nine different sources for stories that can be used in closing arguments. Here is brief excerpt: 1. Aesop’s Fables. Aesop’s Fables contains dozens of valuable themes for use in your next trial.…
Jim McElhaney is one of the best-known trial advocacy professors in the country and his "McElhaney on Litigation" columns in the ABA Journal are read by hundreds of thousands of lawyers each month. "Give Chronology a Timeout" is in the October, 2009 edition of the ABA Journal and is a…
Paul Luvera’s blog, Plaintiff Trial Lawyer Tips, includes a recent post from Paul titled "My General Views About Plaintiff Trial Work." I recommend the entire post to you, but here is a excerpt to wet your appetite for the rest: Most important, our trials must be focused and limited to…
Unfortunately, I have been in a trial where opposing counsel repeatedly violated a Court’s order on a motion in limine. Therefore, I must admit I took some pleasure in reading this opinion where the Roman Catholic Diocese of Burlington, Vermont was sanctioned because its counsel violated such an order. The…