A Winning Tip is jointly written by Dr. Noelle Nelson and Diane Rumbaugh. Dr. Nelson is a clinical psychologist, author, and consultant. Ms. Rumbaugh is a PR consultant and author. Together they provide helpful advice on trial proceedings.
Facts are
boring. Stories are riveting. Facts put jurors to sleep. Stories keep them
awake. Facts are essential to the case; stories are what make those facts
persuasive. Each case has a story to tell no matter how apparently…
Successful
CEOs, entrepreneurs and surgeons (among others) can be difficult clients. Their
very success too often leads them to believe they know everything about succeeding
in their legal matter. Which usually involves their wanting you to do something
entirely…
I was assisting with voir
dire recently when opposing counsel, questioning the prospective jurors, was
told by the judge to “Move along, counselor,” to which the attorney replied,
“But Your Honor…” I barely listened to the rest of what…
Your opening may read brilliantly on paper, but here’s the
thing: the jurors won’t be reading your opening; they’ll be listening to it.
Listening involves different pathways in our brains. What may make a great deal
of sense when…
“What you see is what you believe” – is true not just of how
jurors gauge the veracity of a witness or party’s testimony, but also of how
jurors assess you when you sit at counsel table.
History sometimes provides us with useful lessons for present-day
concerns – even if seemingly unrelated to trial techniques. One of my personal
favorites is the story of how a potential Broadway flop, Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark, went…
A few years back, a Brigham City orthopedic surgeon (Dr.
Dewey MacKay) claimed that the jury mistakenly convicted him of illegally
prescribing medication because they neither understood the facts of the case,
nor how chronic pain is managed.Jurors interviewed…
Most cases that don’t settle end up in trial because there
are grey areas in the case–situations or testimony that can be interpreted in
different ways. Computer/AI animation in court is often thought of as an
effective, albeit expensive,…
The names, acronyms and abbreviations
so familiar to you are not to the jurors. You may think that saying, for
example, “Acme Building Supply, which we’ll now call ABS for convenience,” is
enough to warrant saying “ABS” through the…
In a courtroom, it isn’t necessarily the attorney with the
best facts who wins, but the attorney who best explains the relevance of those
facts both to the case and to the
jurors.Certainly, you need solid evidence, but here…
