Press l 11.11.20 - ABA Journal
Episode Notes:
You’re a plaintiffs attorney with a promising tort case, but getting the narrative evidence you need from a particular witness is like squeezing blood from a stone. How can you get through to them and help ensure that your client gets the damages needed for long-term care? The real problem might be that your communication styles are fundamentally different, says author and trial consultant Katherine James.
Properly preparing one’s witness is key to a successful outcome, but lawyers can’t assume that every witness has the same learning style that they do, James says. She provides tools for figuring out communication and learning styles in her book, Harvesting Witnesses’ Stories: How to Get your Client the Second Best Life in the World by Maximizing Human Damages.
With insight gained from a background in theatre and from working closely with lawyers and witnesses, James has developed a method of finding and communicating the stories that convey what she calls human damages. Injured clients may never be able to regain the life they once had—the first-best life in the world, as one client put it—but maximizing these noneconomic damages is the only way to get them the second-best life in the world. In this book, James shows how to get even the most difficult witness to share the stories that matter and that convey the human damages at the heart of the case.
You do not need to be an AAJ member to purchase this book. Non-members will need to create an account with shipping and contact information to purchase.
Paperback Version E-book Version Audio Version