By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: Harvey Weinstein goes to trial this week. Out of approximately eighty women accusing the former Hollywood mogul of sexual misconduct over the past few decades, two assault cases will be heard by a jury this week in Manhattan. Jury selection for the case (set to take place on Tuesday) is […]
De-Stealth Your Potential Juror Read More »
By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: The trial consulting field seems to fly mostly under the radar. As a part of the attorney’s confidential work product, our role in conducting research, preparing witnesses, and helping to advise on jury selection is not generally in the public’s view. But with some regularity, the topic comes up, with
See Trial Consulting as a Proper Part of the Adversarial System Read More »
By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: Here’s the situation. A large number of strangers are gathered in a formal courtroom — a hushed atmosphere, dark-wood paneling, flags for the state and the U.S., a raised bench with a stern-looking judge. Nothing about that situation says, “Get ready to candidly share your personal beliefs and attitudes!” In
In Voir Dire, Create a Context for Candor Read More »
By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: Thanks to Batson and associated cases, we now have an uneasy working rule on voir dire in U.S. courtrooms: In exercising peremptory strikes, you can pick and choose on any basis…other than discriminatory ones. Basing strikes on race, ethnicity, gender, nationality and some other demographic categories is not allowed. That prohibition, however, is widely considered
Think Carefully About Disparate Impact in Voir Dire Read More »
By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: A newly-published study about the effects of voir dire in capital cases suggests that social scientists and the courts may need to reconsider a long-held tenet. For at least the past 35 years, the belief has been that jurors exposed to the process of jury selection in capital cases, known as
Voir Dire: Account for Both Presumptions and Expectations Read More »
By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: Our ability to understand and to talk to each other is increasingly determined by our political leanings. When we all sit down for family Thanksgiving in a couple of months, politics is likely to be off limits at many tables. But is it also off limits in the courtroom during voir
Don’t Shy Away from Politics (in Jury Selection) Read More »
By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: Canada has an odd system for determining juror bias in some cases. Referred to as a “trier’s process,” it involves the section of two jurors, who do not otherwise go on to become jurors in the case, but are instead charged with determining if the grounds for a challenge for
Discovering Bias: Dig, Don’t Bury Read More »
By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: Several years ago, I sat in a courtroom in Pennsylvania, assisting the defense in a capital murder jury selection. The process was involved, and potential jurors were interviewed one at a time after completing a comprehensive questionnaire. Naturally, we had scored all the questionnaires, so we had a very good
Avoid Juror Self-Sabotage Read More »
By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: You’ve heard the expression: “Familiarity breeds contempt.” Maybe there is a relationship between the two, but in the courtroom, and in the practical task of assessing experience and attitudes during voir dire, they are two different things. First, there is the question of how much knowledge and experience jurors will
The Oil and Gas Juror: Look for Both Familiarity and Contempt Read More »
By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: What a potential juror thinks is, of course, critical to the decision to keep or to strike. But that notion of “what she thinks” means, not just her opinions, but also the broader attitudes and dispositions that lie beneath the surface. That’s why the gold standard in voir dire is to
Consider the Complacent: Belief in a Favorable Future (BFF) Isn’t Always Your Friend Read More »