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Free NITA Webcast: Building Rapport with a Jury: Lessons in Picking the Jury That’s Right for Your Case

Presented by: Richard Schoenberger – It can be easily argued that jury selection is the most important part of the trial. After all, they are the folks who will be making the decision that affects your client’s future. Get the wrong mix, and you may have yourselves a problem. And getting people to be brutally honest and speak openly in front of a room full of strangers on topics they never before considered can be, to put it mildly, a tad difficult. How do you make jurors feel comfortable enough to talk and really open up? How do you bounce from juror to juror? How do you reveal and “de-select” those jurors who are wrong for your case? How do you convert your questions to establish the all-important challenges for cause? Let’s talk about it!

Register Here

Also: Free NITA Webcast August 18: The Opening Gambit: Learn Opening Statements through Actual Courtroom Video

Presented by: Reuben Guttman, Judge Gertner, Judge Noble, and Phillip Freidin – Cases can be won or lost at the opening statement. No opening is the same, and strategies differ depending on the case and the jurisdiction. In this first-ever collaborative webcast between NITA and Courtroom View Network (CVN), retired federal judge Nancy Gertner, Missouri circuit court judge Michael Noble, and Miami trial lawyer Philip Freidin will join NITA faculty Reuben Guttman in this 90-minute webcast, for a spirited analysis of what makes a commanding opening statement.

The panel will show CVN video clips of actual opening statements from a variety of civil jury trials, then examine not only the lawyers’ performances but also the demonstratives that can play such a critical role in visually conveying the details in these extremely complex, high-stakes cases to jurors.

Among the clips under analysis are a first-in-the-nation bellwether products liability trial involving metal hip implants that ended in an $8.3 million verdict, a landmark opening statement from trial attorney Mark Lanier that helped secure a $47.5 million Vioxx verdict, and the opening statements from a trial in Texas involving a large explosion at a BP refinery.

Register Here.

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CLE: False Claims Act Litigation

On demand: Over the last several years Americans have had a crash course in the role that whistleblowers play in compliance enforcement. No statute gives whistleblowers a greater role than federal and state false claims acts. These statutes not only allow the government to bring suit to address fraud on the government, but they allow private citizens to step into the shoes of the government to bring suit. Now, particularly in a Covid19 era – with trillions of taxpayer dollars poured into the economy – the false claims acts are taking on even greater importance. This seminar will cover:

• what you need to know about these laws
• who can bring suit?
• what bounty provisions exist?
• what are the cases that will arise in the Covid19 era?
• what are the pleading and evidentiary issues you need to know?

Reuben Guttman of Guttman, Buschner & Brooks, PLLC is a leading whistleblower lawyer and coauthor of a soon to be published text on pre-trial litigation; Adam Hoffinger is co-chair of the white collar defense and government litigation group at Schulte, Roth & Zabel, PLLC and is one of the nation’s leading defense lawyers.

Click here for more information.

Source: https://www.celesq.com/programs/view/false-claims-act-litigation

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Best Practices for Remote Hearings

with Judge Amy Hanley and Reuben Guttman | May the Record Reflect Podcast, June 3, 2020. Click here to listen.

The disruptions caused by the covid pandemic have suddenly moved the courtroom into your dining room, and our guests are sharing their best do’s and don’ts from their respective positions on and before the bench. The Honorable Amy Hanley is based in Lawrence, Kansas, and presides over a civil, domestic, and criminal docket for the Seventh Judicial District of Douglas County. In his class action and complex civil litigation practice, Reuben Guttman has become one of the most prominent whistleblower lawyers in the world. 

Source: https://www.buzzsprout.com/441178/4017065-episode-8-best-practices-for-remote-hearings-with-judge-amy-hanley-and-reuben-guttman

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CLE: Mastering Covid-19 Stimulus Funds Whistleblower, Qui Tam and False Claims Actions

On Demand: Over the past two decades, nearly $30 billion has been recovered through Qui Tam cases under the False Claims Act. The demand for attorneys in this surging area has become even stronger as the federal government has spent a record $2.7 trillion in response to the rapid spread of the Coronavirus, or Covid-19. As it becomes apparent that some recipients of the funds are not adhering to requisite protocols, there is an immediate need for attorneys to represent clients in this lucrative area of law. In particular, attorneys must be fluent on complaints, defenses, litigation strategies, discovery and government incentives, among others. The faculty for this seminar features three of the nation’s leading authorities in this practice, who will share the latest legal developments, regulations, compliance, and requirements for government, in-house, & private practitioners alike. Registration includes online access to course and reference materials that serve as a helpful guide to the numerous topics and techniques discussed in the program.

Learn more here.

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NITA Publishes Remote Advocacy Primer for Trial Lawyers, Litigators

The National Institute for Trial Advocacy (NITA), the world’s leader in advocacy skills training and publications, is pleased to announce the release of its new eBook, Remote Advocacy: A Guide to Survive and Thrive. It is a collection of thirteen essays that helps trial lawyers and litigators adapt to the whiplash changes, caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, in their practices and the justice system. The digital primer is well-priced at $30 and is available in WebPDF, Kindle, and Apple iOS versions.

With topics ranging from video-conferencing etiquette, attorney-client interviewing and relationship building, ethics, and discovery, to mediation and arbitration, pro se litigants, and hearings from a judge’s perspective, Remote Advocacy provides practical guidance for lawyering in a time of extraordinary change. NITA’s Director of Publications Eric Sorensen explains its conception:

When the COVID-19 shutdowns began to hit and schools, businesses, and lawyers were being forced to move online to conduct their everyday activities, those of us who were already working remotely took note, but didn’t necessarily grasp the monumental change that was taking place. It wasn’t until I sat in on a 100-person call for advocacy professors who were trying to figure out how, on a moment’s notice, to start conducting classes online that it hit home: working remotely was a foreign concept for many in the legal profession and the number and variety of challenges could be overwhelming for many. With our team of editors, we began kicking around ideas on how to help, and thus the survival guide was set in motion. We turned to NITA faculty and authors who had done it, and who were doing it, to get their best advice on how to not only survive this leap into a new world but to thrive . . . and they delivered, in the form of this eBook.

Contributing author and NITA faculty member Christian Hendrickson of Sherman & Howard in Denver states, “This concise manual is not only an interesting read, but provides a real head start and practical tool for the new world in which we lawyers will be presenting our cases. It also reminds counsel to focus on effective advocacy and civility, no matter the forum in which and circumstances under which they are representing their clients. We’ll all be better for reading Remote Advocacy.”

“Remote Advocacy is about adapting the rule of law to the world of isolation, while prying open the door to a glimpse of a future tempered by the COVID-19 era,” states fellow contributor and NITA faculty member and author Reuben Guttman of Guttman Buschner & Brooks in D.C. “It’s classic NITA: teaching skills to cope with the present while anticipating the future.”

Additional information about NITA’s Remote Advocacy eBook can be found here and through Wolters Kluwer, NITA’s publishing partner. The National Institute for Trial Advocacy is the world’s leader in advocacy skills training and publications. A 501(c)(3) not-for-profit organization based in Boulder, Colorado, NITA is a service organization made up of a volunteer network of lawyers, judges, and esteemed advocates across the globe whose mission is to train and mentor lawyers to be competent and ethical advocates in the pursuit of justice. To learn more, visit nita.org, or call us at (303) 953-6828