Article in Cincinnati Enquirer addresses 'mock juries'.
Thanks to one of our readers (Derek Humfleet, Edgewood, Ky) for sending us this link.
Click here for the article at the Cincinnati Enquire on line.
Mock trials help lawyers evaluate their arguments
By John Eckberg
Enquirer staff writerFormer Hamilton County Common Pleas Judge Thomas Crush stayed retired for all of five months before returning to the bench.
But this time around, his chambers are nowhere near a courthouse.
Instead, Crush has an office on the 35th floor of the Carew Tower, where he is a principal with Dispute Resolution Forum, a team of lawyers, mediators and arbitrators he put together with attorney Pierce Cunningham that offers attorneys and corporations insight into how to hone legal arguments.
The company's strategy of convening mock trials for a legal road map - with or without mock juries - is not necessarily new.
But Dispute Resolution Forum has taken the approach one step further by hiring three former jurists to act as a mock appellate court and creating a roster of forum members that is thick with veteran trial lawyers.
Lawyers and companies that are headed to court hire it to figure out which approach works best or whether a proposed legal argument might resonate with jurors.
"Our service is not necessarily for small disputes," Crush said. "But when testimony of a typical medical expert costs $10,000 to $20,000 - and that's for one expert on one side of the case - it makes sense to first present a case to a judge or focus jury."
The forum offers arbitration and mediation, mock juries known as jury focus sessions, a mock judge called a judicial tutorial, and even a mock appellate court, known as an appellate tutorial.
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Among the advantages: It allows companies to get outside the public light of a court-handled arbitration, to protect trade secrets and to maintain business relationships on other fronts with a company they are having a dispute with, and it keeps them out of the media.
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Frederick, author of "Mastering Voir Dire and Jury Selection" (American Bar Association; 2005), said trial simulations bring lawyers insight they can't get any other way.
"They give you an idea of what you might do to improve the case. You can find successful themes so when you go to trial this way, you get a chance to develop better footing," he said.
"I know I've seen cases where the lawyer thought he was really going to knock over the jury with an argument, and it didn't happen."
Unvarnished opinion
Founded in June, Dispute Resolution already has opened affiliate offices in Chicago and New York City. Services start at $2,000 for the first day.
Plaintiff's lawyer Christian A. Jenkins, partner in the law firm Mezibov & Jenkins, has convened focus group juries three times in five years. He predicted that the Dispute Resolution Forum could become popular, particularly among defense lawyers, who tend to have deeper pockets that plaintiff lawyers.
"You can lose sight of the forest for the trees when you're lawyering a case, and it helps bring it back into focus," he said.
In Milwaukee, at a firm he was formerly associated with, Jenkins said the partnership built a state-of-the-art mock federal courtroom in its offices for mock trials. "You can see how people hearing the case cold will react to elements that we think are important," he said. "Others may not think those theories are all that important."
The appeal of a mock jury or judge is that attorneys can have the benefit of watching jurors deliberate. Also, a judge will offer an unvarnished opinion about a case.
Crush and Cunningham find mock jurors by asking real people who have been called to jury duty but dismissed whether they would like to be paid to participate in a mock jury.
High stakes value
Glenn Whitaker, a partner at Vorys Sater Seymour & Pease, said that while it can cost clients $25,000 to $150,000 for a mock jury, many lawyers will opt for one when their client can afford it.
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In one recent case, Crush said, prospective litigants made their points to a mock jury, and both sides got a shocker.
"One side greatly reduced their demand. The other side came up a little bit, and they settled the case," Crush said.
"The argument that the lawyers thought was so wonderful didn't go over so well. It's the hardest thing in the world for attorneys to evaluate their cases objectively."
Here is the Roster Posted on Line
The team at Dispute Resolution Forum reads like a Who's Who of Cincinnati law:
Retired judge Thomas H. Crush served as a trial judge for more than 31 years in Hamilton County.
Retired judge Raymond E. Shannon served on the Ohio First District Court of Appeals for 34 years and is administrator of the Hamilton County Court of Common Pleas, Domestic Relations Division.
Retired judge Ralph Winkler Sr. was elected to the First District Court of Appeals in 1998. Previously, Winkler served 22 years as a trial judge, including four years in the Hamilton County Common Pleas Court.
Forum co-founder Pierce Cunningham has tried more than 150 jury cases in a 40-year career as a lawyer.
Other members include arbitrators Edmund J. Adams, Thomas A. Brennan, Randolph A. Freking, Thomas A. Leubbers, William G. Kohlhepp and Richard G. Wendel, M.D.
More information: www.crushforum.com or (513) 421-3800.
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