How I can help
I offer modular services, tailored to your needs. On a typical case, I might conduct some interviews of the client and key lay witnesses alongside the lawyer, and then help the lawyer to craft and rehearse their opening statement. Every case is different, and every lawyer’s needs are different, but whatever work we do together, I will use every tool at my disposal to help you shape your case, tell the story, educate jurors, and construct your argument in ways that land with the jury.
Client and Witness Interviews
I will sit down with you and your client (in person or by Zoom) and lead a conversation to dig out the emotional core of your client’s story. In the interview process, I will:
Draw stories out of reticent, shy, or closed-off clients, and help them to open up more
Prepare clients to share their stories with the jury in an engaging and authentic way
Help clients and lay witnesses to describe their experiences fully
Foster a relationship built on compassion and mutual trust, where clients’ comfort leads to greater openness
By guiding clients through a detailed telling of their stories, we will uncover harms and losses that connect your client to the jury and drive damages. One of the important benefits of this work is that a plaintiff whose testimony is rooted in a place of vulnerability and truth comes across as more sympathetic and more likable.
Statement Workshops
I will help you craft statements that are compelling, memorable, convincing, and above all, genuine. Working side-by-side with you, I will help you to:
Structure and rehearse your opening statement
Craft themes and stories that will most effectively show the jury your clients’ harms and losses
Stage your statement in ways that keep jurors’ interest (and your own!)
Deposition Preparations
Depending on your client’s needs, I can prepare them for their deposition in from one to four sessions, each focused on instilling skills and mindsets in your client that will lead to a more successful deposition. After our sessions, your client will be better prepared to:
Answer every question posed as briefly as possible, without diminishing their experiences
Fully embrace the facts and truths of their case, so they come across as completely truthful and straightforward
Remain non-confrontational and express a hopeful attitude about their future
Trust in you, their lawyer, to handle the strategizing and advocating, so they can focus on conveying the seriousness and magnitude of their harms and losses
The overall goals of our preparations are to empower your client with the certain knowledge that they are up to the challenges of being deposed and to help them to practice some tools that will help them to succeed. It makes a world of difference for a client to enter their deposition with confidence in themselves and their lawyer.
These prep sessions go hand-in-glove with further client meetings to draw out their stories and damages.
Voir Dire
I will work with you to identify areas of concern and to strategize ways to address them in voir dire. I can:
Help develop a clear strategy to get the most from your voir dire
Observe voir dire and track potential jurors
Strategize on how to get jurors excused for cause, and on which jurors to exercise preemptory strikes
Answering Interrogatories
Sometimes a client has difficulty focusing on the core of their losses and damages for the purposes of interrogatories, which creates more work for you and can cause the defense to undervalue their claims. When this is the case, I can help your client get to what’s at the heart of their experiences so we can craft effective interrogatory answers.
Complimentary Initial Consultations
Non-economic damages are the heart of your clients’ harms and losses, and we only know what the non-economic damages are when we really get to know the client and their story. Our first conversation might be about the facts of the case and the ideas you have so far, and then we can do some preliminary strategizing about next steps and the emotional core of the case.