What Civil Court Judges Want You to Know

I attended an NBI seminar titled “What Civil Court Judges Want You to Know” on October 23. A panel of six Iowa District Court judges presented on motion practice, judicial preferences, and good trial practice, among other topics. Here are some of the things I took away from the panel’s comments:

-- Attorneys need to be better at finding ways to reduce the paper that ends up in the court file. For example, exhibits to motions should include the relevant parts, not the entire document. The more unnecessary paper in the file, the more difficulty attorneys will have directing judges to what is important.

-- Oral arguments on motions, while often redundant of the written arguments, are nevertheless helpful in at least two respects: (1) addressing the judge’s questions; and (2) the reduction of paper (see above) by avoiding endless reply briefs (e.g., briefs captioned “Plaintiff’s Reply to Defendant’s Response to Plaintiff’s Resistance to Defendant’s Motion”).

-- The discovery rules are so liberal that motions to compel discovery almost always result from a failure on the part of one of the attorneys. They should be unnecessary.

-- During jury trials, attorneys should not argue objections. State the objection. If the judge wants argument on the objection, the judge will call the attorneys to the bench to discuss the matter outside the ears of the jury.

-- Relevance objections will often be overruled simply because the judge does not have the necessary case background information possessed by the attorneys to be able to determine, at the point of the question, whether the evidence is relevant.

-- However, sometimes judges wish they would hear relevance objections during bench trials. Or, “objection: waste of time.” (Wink, wink.)

-- During cross-examinations, lawyers should avoid going back over the direct testimony. Lawyers who do so—usually for background purposes—are reiterating the damaging portion of the witness’s testimony.

-- It is fine to lead witnesses on foundation questions. Lawyers should do so to save time and to keep the flow of the trial going.

-- It is dangerous to not depose the other side’s expert witnesses. Attorneys should explore the “mortar between the bricks” of their opinions or otherwise consider themselves on inquiry notice of their full opinions. The judges will generally allow expert witnesses to go beyond the exact text of their written opinions as long as their testimony is consistent with the scope of those written opinions.