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During my career handling civil appeals, I would guess that about half of them involved motions for summary judgment.  Why?  While the rules lean towards denial—to preserve the right to trial—in practice many Superior Court judges lean towards granting them, in order to cut down on time-consuming jury trials.  So I’ve learned a lot about…

You’ve just begun your oral argument to an appellate panel, and the Justices quickly go on the attack.  They launch a series of questions at you that strongly suggest one thing: they’ve read your briefs, and they aren’t buying your arguments.  They are about to rule against you.  What to do?  If you want to…

When you write a brief—to a trial judge or an appellate Justice—you are trying to persuade your target to rule in your favor.  So you’d like that person to like you.  How? When the judge gets home from work, he or she might well enjoy reading a good book.  Maybe a novel, or poetry—something that…

No, this is not another tome on why and how lawyers should meditate.  I’ve tried that off and on, with little success.  I guess I’m just not cut out for enlightenment.    But I do realize that practicing law can be quite stressful. And with the holidays coming up, it’s not going to get any easier. …

A while back, I wrote a short series of columns setting out my gripes about our appellate courts.  I called the series Biting the Hand that Feeds Me, because I earn my bread by winning cases in those courts.  According to my business manager (a.k.a. wife), incurring their wrath might cost me some slices.  But…

I love good movies.  My favorite feature film is The Nuremberg Trial.  It’s about the first Nuremberg trial, the prosecution of almost all the top Nazis––Goering, Hess, Speer, etc.––22 of these jerks.  (Not to be confused with Judgment at Nuremberg, a flick about the later trial of Nazi judges.) The first trial was the big…

She: You’re meeting my parents tomorrow night, so wear a suit. He: A suit?  I lead a rock band.  I don’t have a suit. She: Borrow one.  My parents are old school.  They want me to marry a banker or insurance executive.  So wear a suit. He:  I’ll just tell them I’m a banker.  OK?…

 There are plenty of books on the art of persuasion, going back to Aristotle.  In this column, I’ll discuss one aspect of this.  For want of a better term, I’ll call it The Art of Deep Persuasion.  Here’s the core of this concept.  Most lawyers cite authority for their arguments and leave it at that. …

Besides handling appeals, I also consult with trial lawyers before and during trial – about how to set things up for a potential appeal, either to protect a trial victory or to overturn a trial loss. Things like how to draft a special verdict form that helps lay people produce clear findings that are not inconsistent…

Most lawyers think you win appeals with erudite dissertations on the law. Not me. The law matters, but the facts matter more. When I was a kid, I used to watch a TV show called Dragnet. L.A. homicide detective Joe Friday (who never smiled) would interview a befuddled witness with this reassurance: “Just the facts,…