Showing posts with label emotions in court. Show all posts
Showing posts with label emotions in court. Show all posts

Tuesday, August 1, 2017

Higher Cause Themes Lead to Greater Success




There’s a reason why case themes of “greed” – be they launched at corporate defendants or over-reaching plaintiffs – work so well with juries. Fundamentally, jurors prefer the moral high road, and as such, they don’t want to reward “greed.”

But you don’t always have such a convenient case theme handed to you. Often, you need to ferret out the theme from the facts of the case. You will be best served, in terms of convincing your jury, when you look for themes that elevate the case to a higher cause. It is rare to engage a jury emotionally, for example, by simply arguing the specifics of whose vehicle rammed into whose in a personal injury case. You increase your chances of winning a large award for your client, or conversely, of defending your client, if you raise the theme to a moral issue: for example, irresponsible drivers or the state of automobile safety.

These are concerns that virtually all jurors have, and with which they can connect emotionally. That emotional connectivity is what sways their minds and hearts--and thus their verdicts.

Presenting jurors with the opportunity to make their community safer for drivers and pedestrians alike, or to prevent needless deaths, gives them the opportunity to right a clear-cut wrong. It’s a morally rewarding choice.

Common sense dictates that you can’t simply pluck an emotionally compelling theme out of thin air. It must emerge from the facts of your case. But you certainly can be on the lookout for a theme which promotes a higher, and thus more persuasive, cause as you examine the facts and evidence in your case.

Thursday, January 31, 2013

How Touchy-Feely Can Help Win Your Case!



The question of whether to trust our logic or trust our emotions is rarely brought up in the context of legal matters, at least not from the lawyer point of view. Certainly, we discuss endlessly how this or that prospective juror’s mind-set (highly emotional versus highly rational) might impact our case, but not usually how the lawyer’s emotion would.

However, recent research by M. Pham, L. Lee and A. Stephen provides interesting insights into the positive impact lawyer emotions might have in winning cases.

In brief, their study showed that people who were more likely to trust their feelings were also more likely to accurately predict the outcome of a particular event. The researchers call this phenomenon the “emotional oracle effect.”

How does this apply to winning your case? Tune in to your emotions. If, when preparing a witness, you sense that something is “off,” don’t dismiss that because your logic tells you all is well. Trust your emotions enough to say something like “I notice that . . .” or “I’m wondering if. . .” which is a non-threatening way to probe further and take a look at whether or not what you sense with this witness has some basis in reality.

Similarly, you can review the demographics of your prospective jurors all you want and weed out the obvious “bad apples,” but when it comes down to “keep Juror A versus Juror B” – tune in to your emotions. Listen inside yourself for that intuitive  hit and go with it.

Your mind is bigger than your analytic prowess. Use all of it, rational and emotive, in the service of your success.