By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: Recognizing and reducing bias is obviously essential in a litigation context. But when it comes to “de-biasing,” it helps to see instructions as one tool in the toolbox, but not a tool that’s guaranteed to fix everything. In a recent post, I wrote about a pre-instruction on hindsight that shows some […]
Be Cautious About Instructing Your Way Out of Bias Read More »
By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: How likely is it that a corporation’s competitor could come up with a parallel product without infringing a patent? How common is it for someone to get injured on an amusement park ride? How normal would it be for someone who gets regular physical exams to have an undiagnosed stage
Use Jurors’ Availability Bias Read More »
By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: Every jury selection involves a variety of issues relating to how potential jurors could feel about the specific case. But there is one issue that is relevant in every current jury selection for an in-person trial: What is the person’s comfort level in sharing relatively close quarters indoors for long
Understanding the COVID-Gamblers in Your Jury Pool Read More »
By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: At the voir dire stage of a jury trial, the word “bias” gets used a lot. But do we really know what it means? The courts, in practice at least, hew to a simple meaning: If a potential juror admits to bias, that means they know they can’t be fair
See the Social Roots of Bias Read More »
By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm Traditionally, we might think about what happens in the jury room as a kind of “Black box,” an unknown process with jurors keeping their secrets on how they got to their verdicts. In practice, however, we know a fair amount about what’s in that “box.” Based on both scholarly research
Better Instructions: Make Your Jurors Accountable Devil’s Advocates Read More »
By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: For many defense attorneys, there is a routine to the way that they’ll ask jurors to be fair at the start of their opening statement: There are two sides, you haven’t heard the whole story, please keep an open mind. It almost takes on the quality of a ritual incantation, done as much
Defense Opening: Give Jurors a Reason for an Open Mind, Not Just a Request for One Read More »
By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: A ‘Golden Rule’ argument is one that encourages jurors to put themselves in a party’s shoes and think about what they would or wouldn’t have done. It leads to an objection because it encourages the juror to embrace a personal conclusion that isn’t necessarily drawn from the facts. The Golden
Expect Jurors to Project Themselves into the Situation Read More »
By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: Juneteenth is now a federal holiday, and even as many would prefer action on voting rights protection, equal access to education and healthcare, and police reform, the symbol is still important. It highlights both the progress and the work to be done on race in this country. In our courtrooms,
Voir Dire: Select on Attitudes, not Race Read More »
By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: Wyoming Representative Liz Cheney has just been stripped of her leadership role as the number three Republican in the House. The precipitating incident seems to be that she would not silence her claim that the 2020 Presidential election was not stolen and continuing to criticize the former President for leading
By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: How bad would it be if, after making it through a year of the pandemic with your health intact, you came down with the virus at the end: You almost got to the point of vaccination, only to become infected at the last moment. That would be pretty bad. In
Account for ‘Close Counterfactuals’ in Your Trial Stories: The Loser that Almost Won Read More »