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by Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: So you are sizing up that potential juror, wondering what she is probably thinking about you, your client, and your case. You think, “African-American woman, lives in the city, works for the government…I’ll bet she considers my client to be just one more rich and out-of-touch corporation, abusing the people […]

By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: At the end of a two-week trial last Spring, in the case of Montone v. City of Jersey City, a federal jury awarded nine former city police officers $2.17 million in a dispute over promotions. Three weeks later, counsel for the city’s former police chief receives a letter from one of the jurors:

By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: There is often something distinctive about the person bringing a case. Whether they are the victim in a discrimination or harassment case, a whistle-blower in an employment case, or a number of other case types, their act of coming forward has marked the individual as outside the social circle of

By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: Legal persuaders who want to know their venue are interested in polls. They keep a finger on the national pulse, and especially on the way that pulse is registering at the local level. In addition to helping you know your potential jurors, that data on public opinion can also serve

By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: When in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for a citizen to report to the district courthouse and sit in judgment on the disputes of strangers, it becomes vital for that citizen to remain independent of the passions, sympathies, persuasive techniques, and attorneys that the parties in dispute

By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: Conventional thinking about the two sides of the political spectrum in the United States has always held that both sides, liberals and conservatives alike, basically respect the democratic institutions of government, they just have different ideas about the policies that government should enact. In other words, both support the vehicle

By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: When your trial-bound case faces complexity, possible juror bias, or potential juror hardships — which is to say, when you have a trial-bound case — you could benefit from a supplemental juror questionnaire, particularly when the questionnaire is customized to the issues of the case and is administered and collected before

By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm:  Lately, the nation has been divided, again, on a critical question of public policy. And, again, that division reveals some stark differences in the ways each side views the facts and understands the values at stake. This time, the issue involves the policy of forced family separation of undocumented immigrants,