A disturbing comment I hear repeatedly in jury debriefings and focus groups is that the attorneys do not connect their points or evidence to the specifics of the complaint.
Furthermore, attorneys rarely fully explain the jury instructions to the jury, and worse – fail to tie in those instructions to the attorney’s interpretation of the case.
This leaves jurors in the lurch. They start deliberations with no anchor, nothing to help ground them. They hardly know how to start. They are confused, perturbed, and unable to think in a reasonable manner about the case.
Be good to your jurors. Always make the connection for them, in obvious, preferably visual ways, between the evidence and testimony, and the complaint/cross-complaint. Do the same with the jury instructions.
Experience shows time and again, that the attorney who
presents his or her case the most clearly, all else being roughly equal, is the
most likely to succeed.
