At virtually every trial, in addition to calling witnesses to testify, you’ll need to offer physical evidence—emails, letters, text messages, screen shots, guns, drugs, etc. To get that evidence past the gatekeeper—the trial ...
In the past, I’ve written about so-called “propensity” evidence—evidence that tends to show that, because a criminal defendant did some unrelated/uncharged bad thing, he must have committed the charged crime. ...
Many civil cases never make it to trial, instead getting resolved at an earlier stage, including the summary judgment stage. But, still, the Federal Rules of Evidence—which govern the admissibility of ...
In many criminal trials, defendants don’t put on an affirmative case. In other words, they don’t call their own witnesses or offer their own exhibits. But, in two recent federal district court ...
Most lawyers are very familiar with the attorney-client and work product privileges, including when they apply and how they might be waived. But there are a number of other privileges that ...
Judge Bruce Selya—a federal appellate judge who sits on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit—is fond of writing that “nly rarely—and in extraordinarily compelling circumstances—will , from ...
In federal criminal cases, the government can’t offer so-called “propensity” evidence—evidence that tends to show that, because the defendant also did some unrelated bad thing, he must have committed the ...
In product liability cases, expert testimony is key. A recent decision from the Eleventh Circuit—Crawford v. ITW Food Equip. Grp., LLC, No. 19-10964, 2020 WL 6154207, at *12 (11th Cir. Oct. ...
In many cases, a party needs to offer expert testimony to prove its case. Before such testimony can be presented to a jury, however, it must get past the “gatekeeper”: the judge. But ...
Eighth Circuit Case: United States v. Conner, No. 18-1032, 2019 WL 2039858, at *2 (8th Cir. May 9, 2019) Type of Case: Criminal Charges/Counts: 18 U.S.C. § 1951 (Hobbs Act robbery); 18 U.S.C. ...
