Mock Trial
A Mock Trial is a formal process, involving attorney participation, with presentations for each side. Panels of jury-eligible individuals will be recruited and carefully pre-screened from your trial venue. The surrogate jurors will watch live (or in limited cases pre-screened) case presentations from each party. Counsel will make an opening/closing statement, and can also present exhibits and demonstrative aids, as well as witness testimony for the surrogate jurors’ use in their deliberations. Jurors will provide written feedback about argument persuasiveness, witness testimony, exhibits, and other issue-specific aspects of the case. We can also add a voir dire practice component to the research.
Following the case presentations, the surrogate jurors will be given jury instructions and verdict forms, and will be divided into groups and engage in mock jury deliberations. After reaching their verdicts, the jurors may also be debriefed and interviewed by an FLC consultant to draw additional information from the jurors, explore the reasoning behind and the issues that affected their verdict, as well as gain any other insights pertinent to counsel. Counsel will watch the juror deliberations and any post-verdict interviews, obtaining firsthand insight into the thought process behind the verdict.
Following the mock trial research, we will make recommendations regarding theme development, demonstrative aids and case presentation, as well as strategies and recommendations to address the problems and weaknesses revealed through the research. Additionally, we will suggest analogies and metaphors to use at trial, and we will provide you with recommended voir dire questions to ferret out those jurors who lack the appropriate value beliefs to decide the case in your favor.
Although the scope of the mock trial depends on the specific facts of your case, we can tailor the research to your specifications and needs. We generally recommend that a mock trial be held late in discovery, and can conduct the mock trial months, weeks, or even the weekend before trial.
The mock trial was extremely helpful, not only in anticipating how jurors would react to the presentation of certain evidence, but also in helping us prepare our defense presentation for trial…I should also state that your report was very detailed, with specific suggestions on defense themes which might resonate with the jurors. In fact, you know from attending my opening that I adopted most suggested themes, which we continued to emphasize throughout the trial. I believe that the jurors reacted very favorably to the themes…the result was a complete defense verdict.William Martin, Ft. Lauderdale, FL