Lawyers & Technology

Search opinions from specific courts - Google Scholar Blog

2011-01-13T14:52:00.000-05:00

From the Google Scholar Blog: Google Scholar search now can limit searches to specific courts and jurisdictions.
Search opinions from specific courts - Google Scholar Blog

What kind of dash do I use?

2010-12-19T15:29:00.001-05:00

There are three kinds of dashes in modern computer word processing: the hyphen, the en-dash, and the em-dash. Here's a brief catalog of when and how to use each:

The hyphen ( - ) is the smallest of these marks. It is also the only one with its own key: next to the 0. It has three uses.

It serves to break a word across two lines by syllables.(To maximize the readability of your text, it is recommended that you auto-hyphenate, particularly if you are using full justification. To auto-hyphenate in Microsoft Word 2007, click on the Page Setup Tab, and then the Hyphenation button.)
Some multipart words are spelled with a hyphen (topsy-turvy, cost-effective, bric-a-brac). But a prefix is not typically followed with a hyphen (nonprofit, not non-profit).
A hyphen is used in phrasal adjectives (commercial-speech restriction, estate-planning attorney, law-school grades) to ensure clarity.

Dashes come in two sizes — the en dash and the em dash. Just as the letter "m" is about twice as wide as the letter "n," the "em" dash ( — ) is about twice as wide as the en dash ( – ). Like the hyphen, they each have different purposes, and should not be used interchangeably.
.
The en dash has two uses.

It indicates a range of values, e.g., 1800–1912, 383 So. 2d at 452–455, Exh. A–E. Note: If you begin with "from," don't use an en dash, but use "to" instead, e.g., "from 1800 to 1912."
It denotes a contrast between pairs of words, and is often used in place of "versus," e.g., conservative–liberal split, Fischer–Spassky match.
It is also used for joint authorship, e.g., Prosser–Keaton textbook.

Be careful when citing a source like Local Rule 7-3. That gets a hyphen, not an en dash, because it’s the multipart name of a single rule, not a range of rules.

There are several ways to create an en dash:

With num lock on, type ALT + 0150 on the number keypad.
In Microsoft Word, you can also type any word, then type "space, hyphen, space (" - "), then type another word (or any character) and then press space. The hyphen will elongate into an en dash.

The em dash is used for the following:

To mark an interruption of a thought. E.g., "The last time I saw him—or so I thought—he was in England."
It can replace the colon, e.g., "The company was awarded the largest contract ever for a prison—a 2048-bed facility."

There are several ways to create an em dash:

Hold down the alt key and type 0151 on the number pad (make sure num lock is on)
In Microsoft Word , you can also type two hyphens (minus signs) directly after a word, type another word (or any character) and then press space. The hyphen will elongate into an em dash.

How Facebook Can Make or Break Your Case

2010-11-01T18:34:00.000-04:00

How Facebook Can Make or Break Your Case is a nice article outlining how to use Facebook in litigation.

FLORIDA JURORS: NO TWEETING ALLOWED!

2010-11-01T15:10:00.000-04:00

On October 21, the Florida Supreme Court approved various changes to the Standard Civil Jury Instructions. All of the changes bear on the use of technology—such as twitter—by jurors. The entire opinion, with all of the amendments appended, can be obtained here.

IMPORTANT: THESE NEW AMENDMENTS ARE NOT YET REFLECTED IN THE COMPLETE SET OF INSTRUCTIONS, WHICH CAN BE FOUND HERE.

In addition to changes to existing instructions, the amendments include a brand new unnumbered instruction, to be read at the conclusion of the instructions to be read to prospective jurors. That new instruction reads as follows:

QUALIFICATIONS INSTRUCTION

Many of you have cell phones, computers, and other electronic devices. Even though you have not yet been selected as a juror, there are some strict rules that you must follow about using your cell phones, electronic devices and computers. You must not use any device to search the Internet or to find out anything related to any cases in the courthouse. Between now and when you have been discharged from jury duty by the judge, you must not provide or receive any information about your jury service to anyone, including friends, co-workers, and family members. You may tell those who need to know where you are that you have been called for jury duty. If you are picked for a jury, you may tell people that you have been picked for a jury and how long the case may take. However, you must not give anyone any information about the case itself or the people involved in the case. You must also warn people not to try to say anything to you or write to you about your jury service or the case. This includes face-to-face, phone or computer communications. In this age of electronic communication, I want to stress that you must not use electronic devices or computers to talk about this case, including tweeting, texting, blogging, e-mailing, posting information on a website or chat room, or any other means at all. Do not send or accept any messages, including e-mail and text messages, about your jury service. You must not disclose your thoughts about your jury service or ask for advice on how to decide any case. After you are called to the courtroom, the judge will give you specific instructions about these matters. A judge will tell you when you are released from this instruction. All of us are depending on you to follow these rules, so that there will be a fair and lawful resolution of every case.

NOTE ON USE

This instruction should be given in addition to and at the conclusion of the instructions normally given to the prospective jurors. The portion of this instruction dealing with communication with others and outside research may need to be modified to include other specified means of communication or research as technology develops.

Video: RSS in Plain English

2010-08-27T09:18:00.000-04:00

IMHO, it is impossible to survive in today's world of ever-increasing information without a rss aggregator, or a reader, as they are commonly called.
What's a reader? This video from Commoncraft says it better than anyone, even though it's over three years old.

Making Photos the Right Size and Proportion in Powerpoint

2010-04-06T23:10:00.000-04:00

Here's a great tutorial on full-sizing photos in PowerPoint without stretching or other distortions.

How to Scan Photos

2010-04-06T23:03:00.000-04:00

Found this great collection of guidelines for scanning photos.

Strikethrough hotkey

2010-04-06T15:41:00.002-04:00

A number of attorneys in my office work with amending legislation, which means they need to use the strikethrough font a LOT! One of them asked me, "Isn't there an easy way to do this using a shortcut or something?" As it turns out, there is--and here's how (courtesy WordTips):

Press Ctrl+D or choose Font from the Format menu. (If you are using Word 2007, press Ctrl+D or click the Home tab of the ribbon, then click the small control at the bottom-right of the Font group.) Word displays the Font tab of the Font dialog box. (Click here to see a related figure.)
Hold down Alt+Ctrl and, at the same time, press the plus sign on the numeric keypad. The mouse pointer turns into a clover symbol.
Click on the Strikethrough check box in the Font dialog box. (As you move the mouse pointer to get ready to click, the mouse pointer may change back to an arrow instead of a clover; this is OK.) When you click, Word displays the Customize Keyboard dialog box with the insertion point blinking in the Press new Shortcut Key box. (Click here to see a related figure.)
Type whatever shortcut key you want to use for the strikethrough format. Just hold down whatever combination of the Alt, Ctrl, and Shift keys you want, and then press the desired key to go with that combination. If the combination is already taken, that information shows just below the Customize Keyboard dialog box, and you can then change to a different shortcut key. (A good combination to consider is Alt+Shift+S or Ctrl+Alt+S, neither of which are used in a default installation of Word.)
Click the Assign button. The shortcut key is now assigned to apply strikethrough formatting.
Click Close to dismiss the Customize Keyboard dialog box.
Click Cancel to dismiss the Font dialog box.

Good Summary Series on Legal Holds

2010-03-09T22:44:00.001-05:00

Law.com just published an overview of a solid legal hold based on Seven Steps for Legal Holds of ESI and Other Documents by John Isaza and John Jablonski. Read it and save it.

Knocking a photo down to size

2010-03-01T22:08:00.003-05:00

Here's a great online tool to downsize a photo!

Pancake Your PDF!

2010-02-24T23:08:00.001-05:00

No, we're not talking about a defensive lineman smashing a quarterback into the ground! Actually, the term is "flatten" a pdf, but pancake is so much more vivid, don't you think? Flattening a PDF prevents modification of items that you add, like, say, a signature. Here's a great article on why it's important, and how it's done.

How to REALLY redact a pdf

2010-01-23T22:17:00.001-05:00

Here's an excellent article explaining how to redact a pdf the right way.

Fourth Amendment in the Clouds

2010-01-17T18:35:00.001-05:00

There's no clearer intersection of law and technology than the Fourth Amendment and data stored on the Internet, a/k/a "the cloud." Here's an article in the Minnesota Law Review that's does a very nice job of laying out the issues.

Great Microsoft Office Site

2009-11-16T13:09:00.003-05:00

This is almost all technology and no law, but I just came across a GREAT site to help Microsoft Office users at all levels: microsoft at work. In particular, the article 12 tips for creating better documents is chock-full of great suggestions, and links for more detailed help. Bookmark this site!

Very Cool Tool on Findaw

2009-11-04T13:56:00.003-05:00

Findlaw has designed a cool tool for electronic discovery rules. Select a rule, and then read either the Rule, a summary of the rule, a checklist, or articles which discuss that rule.

The Internet: Outside the Record, or Not?

2009-10-17T17:26:00.003-04:00

Oken et. al. v. Williams, 1D08-3398 is important both for what it holds, and how the court gets there. The court issued a writ of certiorari in this medical malpractice action because the Plaintiff's purported expert was not qualified to submit the presuit affidavit required by section 766.202(6).

How the court got there is even more interesting. It explored the issue of whether it is appropriate for the court to consult internet sources not cited by a party. In a three-page footnote, the majority explained:

No one can argue that indiscriminate, independent internet research by a judge involving subjective facts, non-legal opinions and studies, or the use of unknown or unverified websites not presented by the parties would create significant concerns. The use of generally-known knowledge, however, which is capable of accurate and ready determination from sources whose accuracy cannot reasonably be questioned, does not present the same concerns.

In a 12-page dissent, Judge Browning disagreed:

Because the majority opinion transgresses binding precedent of this Court and ignores persuasive non-binding, out-of-state precedent by relying on Internet information not contained in the case record and unknown to the parties; fails to follow relevant procedural precedent of substantial persuasive value; and injects the judiciary into adversarial territory heretofore untraveled, I am compelled to dissent.

Getting Facebook Info

2009-09-03T19:36:00.003-04:00

It is becoming more and more common for parties and witnesses to be online on social sites such as Facebook. Getting the info from those sites (without "friending" the person, of course!) is not easy. The Lawyerist has the goods.

Time Keeping in the Cloud

2009-08-29T10:37:00.004-04:00

Even though I am a government attorney, and don't bill my clients, I still have occasion and need to keep track of my time. Why? Because as a general rule, I submit a proposal for settlement a/k/a offer of judgment in each of my tort and civil rights cases. Without getting into the specifics of the Florida rule, if we do better than the offer at trial, my client is entitled to recover fees and costs from the time of the offer.

I use toggl.com to keep track of my time, and I've been very happy with it. It's easy to use, it's got a widget to use outside of a browser, and it's free!

What do you use for your timekeeping?

What Should Lawyers Know, and When Should They Know It?

2009-08-24T17:02:00.008-04:00

Ralph Losey recently posted a wonderful essay on his e-Discovery Team blog comparing the state of attorney knowledge about ESI to the famous Plato's Cave allegory.

As usual with Ralph's pieces, you must read the whole thing.

Among the comments there, you'll find a couple of mine, sandwiching a response by Ralph, all of which I reprint here:

Jim: Great rant, as usual. I wish I were as optimistic about the current and future generations of attorneys. Many of the young lawyers I know see the computer as little more than a typewriter on which one can also play games and communicate socially. This is not necessarily their fault, for they have never been required to learn anything more. The same is true of undergraduate and even high school students–they are asked and expected to use the computer superficially (”Present your report using PowerPoint.”) without being given any training whatsover as to what they are creating, or how to create it effectively. Thus, I’m afraid merely modifying the mode of delivery of CLE is no more effective than painting the cave wall upon which the shadows are cast. What needs to change is the substance of education to require students to learn how electronic data is created, stored, and communicated. That needs to begin far earlier than post-professionally. The main reason it hasn’t, as you note, is that as limited as the knowledge of the youngsters is, the “elders” doing the teaching know far less, and have neither incentive nor inclination to learn more.

Ralph Losey: First thanks for the comments. I need to clarify two things I said.

I didn’t say all children, I said all children of protodigital parents. Big difference. I see it in law school classes and in my grown children’s friends. I will edit the blog to make that clearer because I don’t disagree with your comments, predicated as they are on the assumption that I meant postdigitals to be an age group. I do not. There are plenty of paper people and protodigitals of all ages, even teenagers. But until just recently there were no children of protodigitals. They are just starting to come out now so look out. They are, however, still pretty rare, just as the first protodigials were pretty rare. You will know them when you meet them. Of course, they still need training. But they learn very, very fast.

Second, regarding the objections to online education as the answer. Remember that the medium is the message. Of course, just because an education is online does not mean it is good. In my view, for online education to work, to turn people around in the Socratic sense, it needs to be interactive, hands on, creative, and include dialogues and community. That is why your comments are so appreciated. Please keep them coming. Perhaps you have other specific suggestions as to what an ideal education would include, online or otherwise?

Jim: Thanks for the kind reception you gave my comments. Your concluding question is huge in scope, so my response necessarily only scratches the surface.

I first take the liberty of rephrasing the question slightly: How should education change to prepare more fully attorneys to deal with modern technological issues? To be sure, attorneys like you, Craig, and others have been leaders in opening the profession’s collective eyes to the issues that technological change continues to bring. That effort has recently made great strides particularly at the law school curriculum level. But I sense that your article reflects a certain frustration that we are not only swimming upstream, but also that the current’s speed is increasing.

Thus the question remains. I focus on three aspects: a) what should lawyers (or potential lawyers) be taught? b) when should it be taught? and c) how should it be taught?

WHAT. I firmly believe that it is essential for attorneys (and yes, judges, too) to have a basic understanding of the science of technology as it pertains to ESI. ESI is already the predominant method of communication by both clients and attorneys, and becoming more prevalent every day. To be able to deal intelligently with the legal issues surrounding ESI, an attorney should know, at a minimum, the functioning of basic email/calendar (e.g., Outlook) and word processing software; their online equivalents (e.g., gmail, Google Docs), and the relationship between the electronic data used (and metadata created) by those programs and the pixels we see on a display or cause to be printed on a piece of paper.

WHEN. Perhaps the time has come to acknowledge that admission to law school should require this basic level of knowledge. I realize this will be sacrilege to some who extol the fact that the LSAT tests “reasoning ability” and not knowledge, and that an undergraduate’s choice of major does not matter. But the truth is that one cannot “reason” one’s way to understanding metadata and hash values. If admission to medical school requires a basic understanding of biology, why shouldn’t admission to law school require the same of ESI? The issues extend across most if not all fields of law–not just civil and criminal litigation.

As a corollary, I also contend that law school is too late to teach this knowledge. Rather, law school should be the place where students learn the procedures for putting that knowledge to use, such as the “meet and confer” conference. In that sense, this issue is analogous to legal writing. The purpose of legal writing class in law school is to teach legal writing mechanics–the memo, the brief, case exposition, analysis, etc. It does not, and cannot, or at least should not be expected to, teach rhetoric and grammar. That knowledge is (often unjustifiably) assumed, but it is at least tested for in the LSAT.

Of course, even if the LSAT could be instantly changed, we would still need to address the needs of practicing lawyers (and judges). To do that, I suggest that more is needed than attending a CLE seminar where all the recent ESI orders and opinions are solemnly discussed. That is simply not how ESI is learned. Attorneys who wish to practice in federal court should be required to demonstrate a minimum competency in ESI, just as they must do in evidence and procedure.

HOW. As I indicated in my initial response, I don’t think it’s terribly important whether this learning takes place using computers or paper. Regardless, and as I indicated above, I think that passively sitting listening to a panel of attorneys swap ESI war stories is NOT the way to go. As a slight aside, I do think it’s great that technology now allows for a much greater selection of online CLE courses, but it never ceases to amaze me how many of those courses make zero use of technology (other than recording them of course) to enhance learning–no graphics, no interaction, nothing.

Those are my thoughts–and as unlikely as their implementation may be, I firmly believe that the ever-accelerating pace of our technological revolution requires us to think about preparing people to be competent lawyers in very new ways.

To Text, or Not to Text?

2009-08-17T16:45:00.002-04:00

On Sharon Nelson's blog Ride the Lightning, a tale of texting too bizarre to make up:

HOW TO SCREW UP YOUR OWN CASE: TEXT A TESTIFYING WITNESS
On August 11th, Miami-Dade Circuit Judge Scott Silverman, after earlier declaring a mistrial, dismissed with prejudice a civil fraud lawsuit involving the sale of a condo tower. What made this decision interesting is his reason: a boss sent text messages to his employee, who was then testifying on the witness stand. This was done surreptitiously as the judge and lawyers conferred in a sidebar conference.

Sky chief executive officer Yizhak Toledano sent the messages to the company's chief financial officer, Gavin Sussman. In May, the judge ordered a mistrial when a spectator alerted him to the misconduct. Clearly incensed, the judge questioned Toledano and Sussman, who admitted to the texting. The judge then ordered the messages to be read aloud and into the record.

Toledano's texting "was underhanded and calculated to undermine the integrity of this court and the legal process," the judge wrote in his dismissal order. "Regretfully, plaintiff through its unacceptable conduct has reached into the court's quiver of sanctions, drawn the bowstring taut and aimed the arrow at the heart of its own case. This court has justifiably released the string."

He also wrote "Plaintiff waited until the court and the attorneys were preoccupied so that its conduct would go undetected," the dismissal order said. "Plaintiff took what scant few moments it had to try to secretly sway the witness' testimony."

Silverman awarded attorney fees and costs to the defense and referred the financial issue to a general magistrate.

Curiously enough, Sussman appears to be a guy who just doesn’t learn. Two months before the trial, he improperly texted a witness during a deposition and was reprimanded by the magistrate.

Silverman said he took the previous conduct into account. No doubt.

With a nod of thanks to Sir Walter Scott, “Oh what a tangled web we weave when first we practice to deceive.”

IMHO, Lady Justice was well served here.

Macro for Paste Special

2009-08-13T21:10:00.002-04:00

SOMETIMES you want to paste text in Word, but you don't want it to retain its current formatting. Instead, you want it to adopt the formatting in your document. There's a slow way to do it; a better way; and the best way

The slow way is just to paste in the new text, say "oh, well" to whatever format changes occur, and manually repair the changes.

The better way is to use the Paste Special option, either through the Edit menu or by Ctrl+Shift+V hotkey combination, but even that requires each time you do it that you to select "unformatted text."

The best, as published recently on Lifehacker, and before that on Screened by Slimm, is create a macro and assign it that hotkey. Here's how:

From the View tab, create a new macro named PasteSpecial.
Replace the contents of the code editor with the following text:

Sub PasteSpecial() Selection.PasteSpecial DataType:=wdPasteText End Sub
From the Microsoft Office button in the upper left-hand corner, choose Word Options -> Customize, and then click the Customize button next to Keyboard shortcuts at the bottom to bring up the Customize Keyboard dialog.
Choose Macros from the categories list on the left, and then your macro in the Commands box on the right-hand side. Now you can enter in a shortcut key (Ctrl+Shift+V or your own), and click the Assign button.

Production of Hold Letters

2009-08-12T20:26:00.001-04:00

Here's a good post on the question of when a litigation hold letter must itself be produced in discovery.

What to do when the jury wants to view the electronic evidence

2009-08-12T20:08:00.002-04:00

The Federal Evidence Review has the answer in this post, at least according to the few courts that have addressed the question. There's sure to be more.

Need an Electronic Signature? Here's How to Create One

2009-08-12T20:04:00.002-04:00

Armi Agarwal has a thorough, easy-to-follow post on how to create a digital signature.

Awesome Collection of PowerPoint resources

2009-06-19T22:25:00.001-04:00

Paul Gibler (a/k/a the Web Chief) has assembled an awesome collection of PowerPoint resources here.

New Sedona Conference Report Now Available for Download

2009-05-31T18:06:00.004-04:00

The Sedona Conference has released The Sedona Conference® Commentary on Achieving Quality in the E-Discovery Process. It is well worth reading.

Ralph Losey Nails It!

2009-03-15T20:54:00.005-04:00

Of course, you should be reading Ralph Losey's e-Discovery Team blog directly, but for those who inexplicably aren't, don't miss his latest broadside against the Elders of the American Trial Lawyers Association.

Automate Your References!

2009-03-14T23:16:00.003-04:00

I write a lot of briefs, edit still more, and most of them contain multiple cross-references. A cross-reference might be to a page (supra at 13); a section (as discussed more fully in Point II) or a combination thereof.

Yet, the vast majority of attorneys and their word processors manually type these cross-references. This means that with every editing change, each such reference needs to be reviewed to make sure that it is still accurate.

These attorneys seem unaware or afraid of Microsoft Word's ability to automate that process, so that no matter how much editing occurs, your cross-references will stay accurate. A great and thorough explanation of that ability is in the current article, Cross Referencing in Word, at the Office Watch site.

Mark Lanier at Harvard

2009-02-28T12:04:00.004-05:00

Mark Lanier recently gave an excellent "war stories" lecture to a Harvard Law Torts Class. Although the subject was how to be a great litigation lawyer generally, there's plenty of great examples and discussion on the use of PowerPoint at trial. Watch and learn.

PS--The professor also provides a great example of how not to introduce a guest speaker: First, read a long introduction so your audience knows you really don't know anything about this guy. Second, read it fast so everybody knows the actual practice of law is far beneath you.

Animation in PowerPoint

2009-02-21T23:06:00.004-05:00

Ellen Finkelstein has a great tutorial on animation in PowerPoint.

Where's Waldo?

2009-02-16T08:26:00.006-05:00

As hard as it is to find Waldo, it's often harder and always more important to locate that critical witness for your case. There are a number of free internet sites that can help you do that. Here are five of the best:

1. ZabaSearch

This one has a very large database, which is good, but if you are searching for someone armed only with a common name, you’ll get an unwieldy result. ZabaSearch also provides historical address information, home address, birth date, phone number, and the ability to contact the person by email.

2. Spock

Spock's best feature is information about a person’s footprint on the Internet, rather than basic details like phone numbers and addresses. Spock draws info from blogs, Wikipedia articles, photo sharing sites, social networking sites (Facebook, MySpace, LinkedIn), social bookmarking sites, and more.

3. Yasni

Like Spock, Yasni gives you a picture of the person on the Internet. Unlike Spock, however, Yasni will email you if your search name is mentioned on the Internet. (Of course, you can also use Google Alerts for this.)

4. Pipl

Pipl does a “deep web search” to find all kinds of information about someone, from their address and contact info to any publications they have ever posted to the Internet.

5. 123People

123people shows pictures of people, so you can quickly filter out all the wrong people. It also lists out all the email addresses it can find.

Hat tip: Online Tech Tips

Good E-discovery List

2009-02-12T22:39:00.004-05:00

The September 2008 issue of BullsEye Newsletter has an thorough, annotated collection of e-discovery resources.

White Space on the Web

2009-02-08T23:19:00.002-05:00

Good tips on white space from Set in Style:

The pro uses white space to separate elements, and — if you want to look good — so will you, and it’s so easy to do.

When you insert an image in a post, specify white space like so:

style=”margin 10px;”

Then, before you publish the post, preview it and make sure there’s sufficient (but not excessive) white space around the image.

Also note that the pro sets copy in narrower columns than the novice. As a general rule, never set copy so there are more than 80 characters per line.

Information about the role of white space:

Reading Online Text: A Comparison of Four White Space Layouts
Finding Information on the Web: Does the Amount of Whitespace Really Matter?
Use Whitespace to Indicate Relationships Between Content Elements
The Effects of Contrast and Density on Visual Web Search

Sky Writing

2009-01-29T21:04:00.001-05:00

Writeboard is a very cool application that allows joint work on documents.

The Audacity of Presenting Recorded Statements at Trial

2009-01-28T17:05:00.002-05:00

I recently read about a program that dramatically improves the ease of presenting recorded statements: Audacity (available for both Mac and PC at http://audacity.sourceforge.net/). All you need is a digital recording of the witness's original statement and some basic knowledge about how to cut and paste on a computer. Once you install the program, you'll see a screen that looks something like this:

The program is pretty easy to use, and they've got full documentation on their site. Once you learn how to use it, you can do some amazing things with audio statements. For example, here are some of the different ways you can use this program:

Redacting an audio statement to remove irrelevant sections. No longer do you have to worry about the jury hearing irrelevant, suppressed, or improper comments. Simply highlight the improper comment and click . Presto! The statement will be removed, and you can now save the file as a new audio recording.

Extracting admissions from longer statements. Let's say you don't want to replay the entire witness statement, but only want to replay a small snippet. Audacity makes it easy to extract those admissions from extended audio recordings. Here's all you'd need to do:

Go to and click .
Choose the audio recording you want to import.
Use the selection tool to highlight the audio segment you want to export. (It's almost the same as highlighting a paragraph in Word and clicking "Copy")
Click and scroll down to
Choose a filename for your recording. (It's easier to retrieve the correct statement during trial if you use descriptive titles for each file, such as "The Light was Red" or "The Light was Green").
Click "SAVE"

That's it! Now you have a standalone .WAV file of the admission that you can play on any computer. Be creative and think of how you could use those admissions. Could you use them during settlement negotiations by burning a "Greatest Hits" CD for your opponent? ("Here are the six times during depositions where C.E.O. admits to liability.") Or import the statements to your iTunes playlist, so you can quickly click on the correct statement to impeach witnesses during cross-examination?

Maybe you want to use the statements during closing to compare and contrast what different witnesses said about the same events: "What was their understanding of the performance metrics for promotions? Let's hear what the CEO, Jon Smith, had to say [PLAY CLIP #1]. But the CFO, Jane Smith, said something entirely different [PLAY CLIP #2]."

Statements of party opponents, especially recorded ones, can be some of the most powerful evidence you'll ever admit. But just as with every other exhibit or testimony that you'll ever offer into evidence, it's not enough to simply understand what you should show to the jury. To get the most out of your evidence, you'll also need to master knowing when you should admit it and how you should publish it. Learn how to use an audio editing program like Audacity to extract your admissions, and you'll be able to play them to maximum effect for your jury.

E-Discovery and Special Masters

2009-01-24T21:28:00.006-05:00

If you want to see the future of e-discovery, read Special Masters and E-Discovery: The Intersection of Two Recent Revisions to the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, by the Honorable Shira A. Scheindlin & Jonathan M. Redgrave in 30 Cardozo L. R. 347 (2008).

More on Employee Expectation of Electronic Privacy

2008-12-30T11:01:00.003-05:00

Adam Losey expands the exploration of employee expectations of electronic privacy in Clicking Away Confidentiality: Workplace Waiver of Attorney-Client Privilege, 60 Fla. L.R. 1179 (Dec. 2008).

Digital Signatures

2008-12-28T21:35:00.002-05:00

Ernest Svensen has everything you need to know about digital signatures and how to create them.

Spoliation Sanctions: Gutman v. Klein

2008-12-14T12:39:00.003-05:00

Gutman v. Klein, Case No. 03-Civ. 1570 (BMC), 2008 WL 5084182 (E.D.N.Y.) (Dec. 2, 2008) approving Report & Recommendation, 2008 WL 4682208 (Oct. 15, 2008) provides an excellent discussion of spoliation and consequent sanctions in the context of electronic discovery.

The defendant searched for and downloaded software to wipe his hard drive of evidence relevant to the case. Instead of using the data wiping software, the defendant manually deleted files. Then he reinstalled Windows XP, presumably to cover his tracks. Stroz Friedberg did a forensic examination of the laptop. Much of the spoliation evidence was identified through Stroz Friedberg’s analysis of file system meta data, file meta data, and system logs.

Based on this spoliation, the magistrate judge recommended a sanction of default judgment against the defendant and a sanction of attorneys fees related to the discovery.

An excellent resource.

Hat tip: Electronic Discovery

Florida Bar Journal Articles

2008-10-09T11:20:00.005-04:00

This month's Florida Bar Journal contains two good basic articles on law and technology: What Every Attorney Needs to Know About Electronic Technology, by D. Patricia Wallace; and Metadata: The Ghosts Haunting e-Documents, by David Hricik and Chase Edward Scott.

Computer "Basics"

2008-10-07T22:13:00.011-04:00

David Pogue's blog in the New York Times recently had a great "compendium of the essential tech bits that you just assume everyone knows–but you’re wrong." That's why I put "basics" in quotes; as basic as some of these tips may seem, there are many who don't know them.

Since David invited readers to "Clip, save and pass along," I'm doing just that. In the next couple days, I'll extract from the column and the over 1100 comments (at this writing) my favorites and link to them in three categories: General Tips, Internet Tips, and Microsoft Office Tips. Here's a sample:

You can open the Start menu by tapping the key with the Windows logo on it.

You can tap the Space bar to scroll down a page one screenful. Add the Shift key to scroll back up.

Authenticating ESI

2008-10-06T20:49:00.004-04:00

A few months ago, Judge Grimm of the Maryland U.S. District Court has authored a magnum opus on the issues associated with authentication and admissibility of ESI. Read it on the court's website here, or on Westlaw at Lorraine v. Markel American Ins. Co., 241 F.R.D. 534 (D. Md. 2007).

Email Tips

2008-08-03T18:05:00.003-04:00

Came across a couple good posts on email today. This one by Raymond Ward on The New Legal Writer (an excellent legal writing blog, by the way), led me to Lynn Gaetner-Johnson's Business Writer blog, and this summary of email do's and don'ts .

Autocorrect

2008-08-03T15:23:00.004-04:00

Here's a good post on creative ways to use autocorrect in MS Word. To summarize the list:

judgement=judgment
dd=Δ
pp=Π
ss=§
court=your mom (Alright, this last one is only as a practical joke to put on someone else's computer (and to make sure you're paying attention).)

Personally, I prefer hotkeys for the section and paragraph symbols (Ctrl+s and ctrl+p, respectively), and use autocorrect not only for spelling mistakes, but also for phrases (e.g., vty = very truly yours; mdc = Miami-Dade County, etc.) What does autocorrect do for you?

Good Technology Intro

2008-07-15T23:25:00.004-04:00

Larry Cohan of the Legal Intellingencer has a good article entitled, "Using Technology at Trial, or Not." Particularly useful to me is his focus on medical malpractice litigation.

Colorado Joins Metadata Ethics Ruling Parade

2008-06-18T23:40:00.003-04:00

The Colorado Bar Association has ruled that a lawyer may ethically review a document for metadata. Legal Blog Watch has a summary of how the Colorado opinion fits in with the other ethics opinions on the subject to date.

Another Good Article on Qualcom

2008-06-10T14:44:00.003-04:00

This article by Leonard Deutchman in Pennsylvania Law Weekly is a good take on how the lawyers got to be in the Qualcom mess, and how to keep your firm out

Shading alternate lines in Excel

2008-06-02T13:24:00.002-04:00

Just added a link to a long overdue article explaining how to shade every other line in Excel. I can't count the number of times I've tried to do it manually, only to have to add or delete a line and then start over. Thank you, Office Watch!

Qualcomm Reverberations

2008-05-04T08:27:00.003-04:00

The e-Discovery Team has a very nice summary and critique of a recent article on e-discovery by the Litigation Section of the American Bar Association.

Daylights Savings Time Blues

2008-03-27T00:34:00.002-04:00

If your all-day appointments are now two-day appointments thanks to the daylight saving time shift, read this post in Office Watch.

Word's Hidden Calculator

2008-03-27T00:30:00.002-04:00

Very informative piece on Office Watch on how to use the hidden calculator in Word.

Help Jurors Remember Your Witnesses

2008-03-22T09:06:00.002-04:00

Trial Tips has a incredibly simple and useful suggestion for closing arguments: Take pictures of your witnesses, and use them to help the jury remember them. Brilliant!

Adverse inference granted where key employee of producer deletes e-mail when she should have anticipated its use in litigation

2008-03-15T23:22:00.004-04:00

Larry Wescott of the Electronic Discovery Blog has a nice explanation of Connor v. Sun Trust Bank, 2008 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 16917 (N.D. Ga. Mar. 5, 2008) here.

Microsoft Photo Info enables easy editing of "metadata" for digital photographs from inside Windows Explorer

2008-03-13T23:53:00.003-04:00

Microsoft Photo Info is a software add-in for Microsoft Windows that allows photographers to add, change and delete common "metadata" properties for digital photographs from inside Windows Explorer. It also provides enhanced "hover tips" and additional sort properties for digital photographs in Explorer (in Details view).

Thorough Review of Qualcomm Sanction Saga

2008-03-12T00:27:00.002-04:00

Here is Alan Cohen's excellent Corporate Counsel magazine article, "Qualcomm's Hard-Learned Lessons."

Email to Attorney NOT Privileged

2008-03-03T00:13:00.004-05:00

In Scott v. Beth Israel Medical Center Inc., No. 602736/06, 2007 N.Y. Misc. LEXIS 7114 (N.Y. Sup. Ct. N.Y. Cty Oct. 17, 2007), the court held that an employee's emails to his attorney, using the employer’s e-mail system, were not protected by attorney-client privilege or the work product doctrine under New York state law. The court concluded that the employer had an e-mail policy banning personal use, and that the employee had constructive notice that the employer had the right to monitor e-mails sent over its network.

Gmail Tips and Tricks - 35 Cool Gmail Hacks

2008-03-01T23:10:00.004-05:00

More great Gmail Tips and Tricks here.

Federal Civil Practice Bulletin: Senate Judiciary Committee Passes Evidence Rule 502

2008-02-13T11:23:00.001-05:00

Federal Civil Practice Bulletin: Senate Judiciary Committee Passes Evidence Rule 502

E-Discovery: Who's on the Team?

2008-02-11T00:42:00.002-05:00

Ralph Losey has an excellent post on When and Why You Should Start an E-Discovery Team.

Gmail Power tips

2008-02-10T14:21:00.001-05:00

Although I don't use G-mail for work, I do use it regularly for everything else, on my Blackberry and my PCs. Here's a great set of power tips.

101 New Year's Resolutions

2007-12-28T22:03:00.001-05:00

Love this list of Law Hacks in the July ABA Journal.

Lawyers & Technology

Search opinions from specific courts - Google Scholar Blog

More Than 100 PowerPoint Tutorials & a Free Template » The Rapid eLearning Blog

What kind of dash do I use?

How Facebook Can Make or Break Your Case

FLORIDA JURORS: NO TWEETING ALLOWED!

Video: RSS in Plain English

Making Photos the Right Size and Proportion in Powerpoint

How to Scan Photos

Strikethrough hotkey

Good Summary Series on Legal Holds

Knocking a photo down to size

Pancake Your PDF!

How to REALLY redact a pdf

Fourth Amendment in the Clouds

Great Microsoft Office Site

Very Cool Tool on Findaw

The Internet: Outside the Record, or Not?

Getting Facebook Info

Time Keeping in the Cloud

What Should Lawyers Know, and When Should They Know It?

To Text, or Not to Text?

On Sharon Nelson's blog Ride the Lightning, a tale of texting too bizarre to make up:

Macro for Paste Special

Production of Hold Letters

What to do when the jury wants to view the electronic evidence

Need an Electronic Signature? Here's How to Create One

Awesome Collection of PowerPoint resources

New Sedona Conference Report Now Available for Download

Ralph Losey Nails It!

Automate Your References!

Mark Lanier at Harvard

Animation in PowerPoint

Where's Waldo?

Good E-discovery List

White Space on the Web

Sky Writing

The Audacity of Presenting Recorded Statements at Trial

E-Discovery and Special Masters

More on Employee Expectation of Electronic Privacy

Digital Signatures

Spoliation Sanctions: Gutman v. Klein

Florida Bar Journal Articles

Computer "Basics"

Authenticating ESI

Email Tips

Autocorrect

Good Technology Intro

Colorado Joins Metadata Ethics Ruling Parade

Another Good Article on Qualcom

Shading alternate lines in Excel

Qualcomm Reverberations

Daylights Savings Time Blues

Word's Hidden Calculator

Help Jurors Remember Your Witnesses

Adverse inference granted where key employee of producer deletes e-mail when she should have anticipated its use in litigation

Microsoft Photo Info enables easy editing of "metadata" for digital photographs from inside Windows Explorer

Thorough Review of Qualcomm Sanction Saga

Email to Attorney NOT Privileged

Gmail Tips and Tricks - 35 Cool Gmail Hacks

Federal Civil Practice Bulletin: Senate Judiciary Committee Passes Evidence Rule 502

E-Discovery: Who's on the Team?

Gmail Power tips

101 New Year's Resolutions