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Second Opinions
How Can a Litigator Go From the Dark Ages to Enlightenment in One Quick Step?
By Tom O'Connor
AS IS THE case with any technology purchase, the first evaluation must be to determine what software and hardware are needed to perform the required task. The first and most important rule: "Make the technology fit your practice."
Don't rush out to buy the hottest technology and try to make your practice fit the technology. This is especially true when it comes to litigation: The type and size of the case as well as the technological experience of the attorney should determine the technology to be used.
Is our Pennsylvania lawyer a solo practitioner who wants to defend a DUI client, using visual evidence, including accident reconstruction graphics? Or is she a large firm practitioner who handles commercial litigation with numerous documents? How much time is there before trial? Has she handled this type of case before, so that implementing technology will be easy? Or is this her first major case? If she has not used a computer, is she adaptable and quick to learn new skills, or computer-phobic?
Compelling Visuals
My own experience with courtroom technology is in working with databases in complex litigation such as asbestos, breast implant and tobacco cases. In the early days, we found that using a variety of visual aids in court was the most compelling to juries. A well planned combination of standard exhibit boards, video and computer-based exhibits is better than trying to fit all your evidence into one type of display. (Again, make the technology fit your case.)
Large exhibit boards are best used to show big picture points, especially during a particular argument. Presentations or slide shows can be created in PowerPoint, but often are better outsourced to professionals who can maximize impact of graphics.
Older overhead projectors and slides for exhibits have been replaced by LCD projectors that can display directly from computers and from video sources such as a VCR, or an Elmo, (a document camera with built-in, flexible lights for projecting transparencies and images of objects).
Single System
Finally all of your evidence can be controlled from a single system, such as Trial Director by inData Corporation or Sanction from Verdict Systems. These programs allow you to import scanned images, video, audio, slide shows or other graphic evidence. Their document manager then provides a viewer in which you can see any document you highlight. Using a database function, you can also assign exhibit numbers and description text to each item. From within the viewer, you are able to do "mark-ups" and redaction. Each change is saved separately as a revision. You can then either print each document with a bar code in the footer or print out a list of bar codes for all of your evidence. Then, in the programs presentation mode, you can swipe the bar code and display the exhibit on a screen where you can also do live mark-ups (highlight, draw circles or arrows, etc.), move images around on the screen or even bring up multiple images for comparison.
Don't think, however, that you need all this technology. Even experienced techno-savvy litigators use only what they need to make the case. George Socha, of Halleland Lewis Nilan Sipkins & Johnson, in Minneapolis, described a week-long trial, where he used an Elmo a VCR, a Proxima projection unit, a screen, and an IBM ThinkPad 560 laptop. In another case, he took only a laptop, projection unit and the screen.
"There is not one right answer that will fit all situations," he says. In both cases, he cleared use of this equipment with the court and got early access for set up and testing.
Jonathan Porter, an electronic trial consultant in Florida, currently owns Automated Legal Solutions, a litigation support company I founded.
"First, we would determine the size and value of the case," he says. "If it is a small case, then a laptop and a high end projector would be sufficient. In a large document case, we would suggest multiple monitors and the use of a switching system."
Porter is preparing for an upcoming large trial, where he plans to use a specially built computer, with a switching system that will allow the other four parties to share a common set of monitors and projectors.
Porter plans to use a Pentium III computer, with a 667 MHz processor, 256 MB RAM, 32 MB video graphics, dual video monitor output, and two 50 GB external hard drives. The set-up also will allow document camera or VCR hook-ups. Monitors will have light pen capability, to enable attorneys or witnesses to annotate or enlarge areas of the documents.
Not Cheap
Keep in mind that these systems are not cheap to assemble, and are best handled by professional operators (who must also be paid). But in a multi-million dollar toxic tort or defective product case, the expense can be warranted.
And hiring a consultant allows you to focus on the case, not the technology. Even the most technically savvy judge will not tolerate an inexperienced attorney fumbling with a computer and a jury positively will resent it.
Demonstrative tools can be invaluable when dealing with complex issues, or in trials where high tech exhibits can dramatically illustrate the reality of accidents.
Use the technology to enhance your trial technique, not to replace it with an entirely new method of practice.
Tom O'Connor is a court consultant with Courtlink, based in Bellevue, Wash.
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