Construction Owners & Builders Law Blog

Want a demographic snapshot of the potential jury pool or compare the panel you drew to the relevant population base to see if its skewed? Want to see what kind of housing predominates around a prospective juror's address--without a drive by?

Marc Mayer over at Insurance Scrawl discusses focus group research suggesting the lowering of expectations of jurors as to appropriate insurance company conduct.

Arnie Herz over at Legal Sanity points to a new "must read" book by negotiation gurus Roger Fisher and Daniel Shapiro entitled, Beyond Reason: Using Emotions as You Negotiate.

"Mississippi Burning" Trial

Here's a list of standard deposition topics and questions compiled by Evan Schaeffer at his The Illinois Trial Practice Weblog.

If your goal is to defeat a construction claim, you want the judge or jury to picture the claimant's burden like this:

Here's a checklist of basics courtesy of the Tennessee Business Litigation Blog.

The Delaware Corporate and Commercial Litigation Blog points to the excellent discussion of the duty of good faith and fair dealing in Dunlap v State Farm Casualty Co., a Delaware Supreme Court decision.

When exhibits are numbered in advance of trial, exhibit 1 should be the documents or items you most want the jury to see, exhibit 2 the second most important document and, so on, recommends The Illinois Trial Practice Weblog.

Public awareness of the importance of the jury system is hampered by many lawyers and judges ignorance of the history, purpose of the jury and social science research done on the jury system, according to Jurygeek.

There are useful links to material on retrieving and using archived information from companies' web sites as evidence over at Be Specific.

Declarations and Exclusions gives a real life example of how lawyers' manufacture of discovery disputes can make discovery needlessly more expensive for their own clients as well as the other parties.

Electronic Discovery and Evidence points out this excellent LA Times article on the battle between computer forensic experts and designers of programs to erase computer data.

The importance of helping jurors understand the burden of proof is underlined by a recent New York ruling reported by Law.com throwing out a verdict because the jurors consulted a dictionary to try to figure out what the word "preponderance" meant. The trial judge had instructed the jury the plaintiff had to prove her case by a "preponderance of the evidence."

The principles were formulated by the American Bar Association (ABA); there's an excellent summary of the debate over some of the principles in this Virginia Lawyers Weekly Article. Thanks to Point of Law for pointing us to this article.

Construction defect experts' affidavits were held sufficient to create a fact issue over whether construction defects in numerous homes were the result of "willful misconduct" by the contractor by a California Court of Appeals in Acosta v. Glenfed Development Corp.

"I Don't Speak Latin, and Neither Do You" complains Evan Schaeffer over at the Illinois Trial Practice Weblog. My thought--Amen, Brother!

The South Carolina Trial Law Blog describes the approach suggested by David Ball, a most excellent trial consultant.

Read a comment and click to the article, all at the Inhouse Blog.

When a claimant seeks attorneys fees under a contract clause providing for attorneys fees for breach of contract the claimant must prove both entitlement and the amount of the fees as part of his substantive claim the Fourth Circuit ruled earlier this week in Carolina Power v Dynergy Marketing.

Last week the first circuit detailed the accounting standards applicable to long term construction projects in In re Stone & Webster, Inc., Securities Litigation. Download file

A recent post over at Point of Law by Jonathan Wilson unwittingly proves the existence of blind spot bias.

The Tennessee Business Litigation Law Blog points to an outstanding article on how a trial court's instruction may encourage candor in voir dire..

Trying to avoid pre-trial disclosure rules and Daubert challenges by project professionals' testimony as "lay opinion" or "eyewitness" testimony is likely to backfire.

I am a disciple of the negotiating approach explained in Fisher and Ury, Getting to Yes: Negotiating Agreement Without Giving In. One key to getting to yes in any negotiation is knowing and appreciating your "best alternative to a negotiated agreement" (BATNA).

A reminder everyone in business needs to heed from over at BizzBangBuzz Blog.

Dennis Kennedy's post on electronic discovery resources is a great place to start for those ready to finally dip their big toe into this important legal subject.

Thanks to the Tennessee Business Litigation Blog for summarizing this Corporate Counsel article on the advantages to businesses of retaining attorneys on a contingent fee basis. The article also discusses hybrid arrangements involving a reduced hourly rate plus a contingent bonus.

I see blogging as a new way to share knowledge and ideas with others interested in construction law and the construction industry. I've written my share of articles, spoken at many seminars and attended many more in the two decades I've been practicing. But these forms of communication flow one way, involve complicated logistics and cost too much for too little. Bloggers share knowledge and ideas on their schedule at modest expense.

Political bloggers are revolutionizing how elections are fought and changing the way many of us get the news. I'm with those who think blogging will change how we practice law too. Denise Howell at Between Lawyers sums it up this way: "Blogging will make more relevant, quality legal information more readily available, which will put its own pressures on the practice. It will serve to make clients and members of the profession increasingly better informed about resources and options." For a collection of comments on legal blogs check out the recent posts collected by Kevin O'Keefe, my blogging sensei, at Real Lawyers Have Blogs.