By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: If you’ve seen the Pixar animations feature Monsters, Inc., you might remember the slogan of the company in the title: “We scare, because we care.” Plaintiffs’ attorneys, particularly those who are followers of the Reptile approach to persuasion, may well have the same slogan. Since the perspective focuses on the idea that […]
By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: There is a body lying on the pavement. It is still twitching a bit, but fading fast. “This was no accident,” says the hard-boiled detective, “this was an attempt at premeditated murder…and it just might succeed.” If instead of “body” we’re referring to the American civil jury, and instead of
Don’t Pull the Plug on the American Civil Jury Just Yet Read More »
By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: If you’ve been following the country’s current gun control debate, then you may know about the stormy encounter between CNN commentator Piers Morgan and radio host Alex Jones, including the red-faced and shouted charge from Jones, “1776 will commence again if you try to take our firearms.” All caps would
Defuse Your Angry Witness Read More »
By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: Let me start differently in this post, with a ‘Tale of Two Tales.’ Here is tale number one: First, From the Plaintiff’s Perspective: It is January, 2010. Brian Starr, a computer storage engineer on contract for GiganTech Industries has come up with a rough design for the UltraDrive, a radical
Overlap Your Stories Read More »
By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: I try not to be too self-referential in this blog, but this time around I have an illustration that’s a fitting parallel to the challenges of trial messaging. In the two years since we ramped up this blog and moved to our current twice-weekly schedule of posting on Monday and
Incubate in Order to Innovate Read More »
By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: A classic case of pretrial publicity is currently playing out in Steubenville, Ohio. After members of the hacker’s group called “Anonymous,” posted a photo and video linking two high school football players to the rape of a teenage girl and pointing toward an official effort to limit the scope of
Account for the Media’s Effect (Even in Civil Cases) Read More »
By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: It is common experience that jurors will often set aside expert testimony. Part of it, of course, is a “hired gun” effect that in some cases leads jurors to distrust experts based on the knowledge that they’ve been paid for their opinions by one side or the other. But over
First Expert Rule: Keep It Concrete Read More »
By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: As the year winds to an end, all the attention is on the “fiscal cliff” and whether there will be a last-minute save or whether, when we “Ring in the New” on January 1st, we will be ringing in large tax increases and drastic cuts to Federal programs. As of
Don’t Create Your Own Cliff Read More »
By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: Who leads and who follows? That question can be critical to understanding and adapting to your jury. The individual who sets the agenda, guides the discussion, and leads uncommitted or wavering jurors to a conclusion is obviously worth a closer look than those who take their cues from others. A
Spot Your Jury Leader Read More »
By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: If you aren’t on Facebook, you may not have seen this before (and if you are, then you might see it, with different words, just about every day). The image and text above is called a “meme,” the “Condescending Wonka Meme” in this case. It’s a joke, of course, but