Good Writing = Organized Thought

 

Good writing is good writing. It doesn’t matter if you’re writing the Great American Novel, a non-fiction work you’re sure will be the next best-seller, or an opening statement.

Good writing is good writing, and it starts from a simple premise. Organize your thoughts before you put pen to paper, or fingers to keyboard.

A solid opening statement should have no more than three key points you absolutely want to convey to your jurors. Each key point should be easily captured in one short sentence. You can elaborate to your heart’s content following that key point, but in order for your jurors to comprehend your elaborations, you must provide that point. It is called a “key” point for a reason. It provides the key to your ensuing arguments.

Why three key points, tops? Because three points is the number of points most easily retained by the human mind. You need the jurors to retain your points! The sequence of said points is simple. The most critical should be stated first, and the second most important stated last. Whatever is in the middle (unfortunately) may end up forgotten.

Take A Page From Oscar Winning Actors: Read Your Openings/Closings Out Loud Before The Trial!

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 read, can come across as just so much nonsense when heard.

The best example I know of is the classic “Eats, shoots and leaves.” A comma is all that distinguishes a murderer from a friendly Koala bear (“Eats shoots and leaves”)! Yet when spoken, the listener has little way of knowing which is which, unless of course, they are attending to the context.

If you want to make sure your opening will be heard as you want to be, read it out loud.

Step one is to read your opening out loud to yourself, because I guarantee you will pick up all sorts of issues with your written version that need to be addressed. You may even wish to record yourself speaking your opening, since it can be difficult to spot problems at the same time as you are speaking. Things to watch out for, for example; run-on sentences. Or the use of “they” “he” “she” or “it” without a referencing noun close enough to the pronoun. Or sentences that have so many conditional clauses, the meaning is lost long before the end of the sentence.

Step two is to read it out loud to a friend or family member who is NOT intimately acquainted with the material, and from whom you are willing to hear constructive criticism. In addition to whatever comments your friend makes, ask: “Is there enough emotion in this to grab your attention? Is my language clear enough so you never went “huh?” as you listened? Are my sentences short enough? Am I using repetition in a way that helps or hurts? Does the way my opening unfolded appeal to your common sense, or is it too complex?” and so on.

Do the same with your closing argument. Any actor worth his/her salt always rehearses out loud. A courtroom is, in many ways, a theatre.

The small amount of extra effort required to speak your words out loud may make all the difference between convincing the jurors of your case, or watching their eyes glaze over as your case peters out.

How Texting and Twitter Impact Your Openings

You may never have tweeted in your life, nor do you ever want to, or you may tweet your every move. You may think texting was invented purely to bless your life with constant communication, or curse it. Either way, love it or hate it, the different ways in which people are communicating impact the effectiveness of your trial work, in particular, how you express yourself in your opening statements.

Opening statements are the roadmap, that which helps the jurors make sense of the evidence as it unfolds, this you know. However, how you create and present that roadmap needs to take into account how today’s jurors communicate, not how those of yesteryear did.

What that means is:
- Use short sentences. Express just one thought per sentence. Texting, twitter, even IMing all rely on short bursts of information. These are easier for jurors to absorb than the long often convoluted sentences typical of lawyer briefs.
- Get to the point. People who text and tweet find ways to say what they have to say in immediate, no frills fashion. Convince jurors of your case by speaking a “language” they understand.
- Title your points. A short burst of information is followed by another, related, short burst, in most texting and Twitter. When you give a title to your point (or make it a bullet-point), you can then go on to elaborate, because you have a title you can refer to repeatedly to help jurors stay on track.