[00:00:00] Scott Benton: Hey everyone, Scott Benton here. I am the host of the Classroom 2 Courtroom podcast. How are you? We are here to help you easily transition from law school’s law school student into your professional career as an attorney. And where we even make the practice of law fun. That’s the whole point of this podcast.
[00:00:25] Scott Benton: And today, we’re going to answer the question of, how do you get something introduced into evidence?
[00:00:35] Scott Benton: Now, as you may know, when it comes to trials, you better have solid evidence that not only meets the clear and convincing standard as closely as you can, which by the way is difficult, if not impossible to do. But you need to shoot for that anyway, that you have layer upon layer of different types of evidence and many versions of these different types of evidence, in case one fails or [00:01:00] is less convincing, in order for you to win the case.
[00:01:03] Scott Benton: In short, you need to have a lot of evidence. And you need to know that you never stop collecting new evidence, new layers to add to the layers that you already have, until the trial is over.
[00:01:17] Scott Benton: But that gets us to the question of, is having all of this evidence, this literal mountain of evidence, all that you need to have for a trial?
[00:01:27] Scott Benton: The answer would be, definitely not. It doesn’t matter if you have all the evidence in the world, or more than you need to prove your case from multiple angles, over and over again. What’s important is that you know how to introduce something into evidence, so that evidence can be officially recognized as a tangible component of the case that you’re working on.
[00:01:49] Scott Benton: This is actually not always easy or apparent. It’s not always something that you can just figure out. You want to know, that’s a thing. You [00:02:00] want to know that getting evidence introduced into a case can be a difficult process. You want to essentially be forewarned that this might take a little bit of thought, thinking, planning and strategizing.
[00:02:14] Scott Benton: Now, one way that you’re going to be able to get something entered into evidence is going to be through an expert witness. So, let’s say that you have a case where there’s a will. And you’re arguing that the signature on the will was forged. And in this case, you’re probably going to want to get a lot of different writing samples, as many as you can of the named signer, so that you can have the handwriting expert, look at those and match them, and determine whether or not, that named person did sign that will, that document.
[00:02:52] Scott Benton: So, you might want to get signatures from like the DMV, for instance, or maybe you want to go see if there are Christmas [00:03:00] cards, or other messages that the name signer had written down somewhere, so that you have a collection of their handwriting.
[00:03:08] Scott Benton: And you’re also going to want to find anything you can to verify that document came from that person, whose signature is said to be on the will. And you’re trying to disprove this. You’re trying to prove that the will is fraudulent. And so, this could also include signatures like from bank documents, if there are any, or medical documents, or some other kind of document, anywhere that the name signer had written, especially their name, since you’re looking for a signature. But also, it helps if there are messages that they’ve written, because a lot of times that handwriting can have consistencies that will appear on the signature block, or maybe the will has other words written on it that you’ll want to compare.
[00:03:52] Scott Benton: Now, once you have all these writing samples collected, and you bring them to a handwriting expert, they’re going to base their own [00:04:00] conclusions on the copy of the signed will against the writing samples that you’ve brought them. And assuming that you’ve been able to verify their authenticity.
[00:04:11] Scott Benton: Now the handwriting expert is going to be able to determine the relative consistency of the authentic signatures, with the signature on the will. And then, the handwriting expert is going to be able to present those documents as evidence into the case to prove his conclusions or her conclusions.
[00:04:31] Scott Benton: Now, while the introduction of evidence into a trial, through an expert witness, that’s one way of getting evidence entered into a case, but it’s certainly not the only way to get evidence, entered into a case. There’s actually many ways to do it. But It doesn’t always become easy, in order to accomplish that. This is okay.
[00:04:51] Scott Benton: So this is why you need to pay attention to the subject. And you need to make sure that you’re aware that getting evidence into a case, it’s not easy. Certainly not as easy. [00:05:00] It might appear in movies, or television shows, where an attorney will just show up with a document, and I’d stand up and I’d like to enter this in the evidence, your honor, and the honor says, bailiff, get that piece of paper and hand it to me. And this is exhibit 25-A, or whatever it is.
[00:05:15] Scott Benton: So, if you don’t have a lot of experience, and if you’re a new attorney, you’re listening to this podcast, because you’re trying to learn how to function as an attorney in your first job, in the legal environment, and as law schools, they’re really not going to teach you how to practice as an attorney. They are going to teach you how to graduate law school. But learning how to practice as an attorney is something that you’re going to learn really, once you’re in your job.
[00:05:38] Scott Benton: And so, the whole point of listening to this podcast is, for you to get a head start, before you get that first job, so that you go into that firm and you have a better understanding and idea of what it means to practice law.
[00:05:52] Scott Benton: And if you do get into a trial, even if it’s early on a lot, sometimes you’re not going to see a trial, right away. [00:06:00] There could be examples of where that does happen. But if you don’t have a lot of trial experience, and as a newer attorney in this job, by the time you get to a trial, chances are, that you really haven’t spent much time in a courtroom to understand this process of introducing evidence in the cases that you are working on, you’re going to want to talk to your legal team, or your colleagues. Maybe they’re not in your firm, but they’re friends of yours that you trust and you’re going to want to talk to colleagues, about how to get evidence introduced into a case. Or go to your senior attorney. Senior attorneys often have a lot of courtroom experience. And they will have many ideas of how to get evidence introduced.
[00:06:43] Scott Benton: For instance, you’re probably want to go talk to your paralegals. Your paralegals are already know that you need more evidence. They’re going to want to talk about getting your evidence, entered into the case. They’re going to have a lot of ideas about how to go about doing that, and accomplishing that [00:07:00] end.
[00:07:00] Scott Benton: You’re going to want to talk to your senior attorney who’s likely done multiple cases, as I’ve mentioned. You want to ask them to suggest ways for you to get something entered into the trial, as evidence. They’re going to have all that experience to draw from. There’s certainly going to be a wealth of information for you. Very valuable information. So, you want to make sure that any time you’re bumping up against something, you’re not quite sure how to move forward on, that you can go to your senior attorney, and talk through that issue with them. And you don’t want to spend too much time trying to figure it out, because you’re really trying to bill for your hours. And if you’re going to spend an hour and a half, trying to figure out how to get evidence, introduced into a case, it really just becomes a waste of time, when you could just go to a senior attorney and ask them instead, and they’re going to give you some ideas right away, of how to do that. You’re going to save just an enormous amount of time.
[00:07:56] Scott Benton: Because the last thing that you want to happen is that, you show up [00:08:00] at a trial and you have a bank record at the last minute. And you now want to include this bank record into evidence. I know, it works in the movies and television, but really, in real life, that’s going to be near impossible to do, which is another reason, you want to be crystal clear on how you’re going to get that document and others into evidence, in the first place. And that you’re working on doing that early on, in the process, when you’re doing trial prep, and when you’re putting together your strategy, you want to make sure that you’re entering this evidence early on.
[00:08:37] Scott Benton: So you’re not sitting in that courtroom with a document, like a bank record that you want to introduce into the record. Now, it’s just gonna be incredibly difficult, if not impossible to do that. So you don’t want to get stuck in that situation, where you end up having a key piece of evidence that you want to introduce into this case. Because you didn’t talk to anybody at your firm, or you didn’t talk to your [00:09:00] colleagues, or you don’t learn how to do that.
[00:09:02] Scott Benton: Now, all you can do is sit in that courtroom with this key piece of evidence and just look at it, knowing that you can’t enter it into the record, which you do not want to do. That’s not going to help you, and it’s not going to help your client prove much of anything. And in fact, it might actually be the difference between winning the case, and losing the case.
[00:09:23] Scott Benton: So I hope that’s been helpful, in answering the question of how do you get something introduced into evidence. I know that we didn’t cover everything, but there are many ways to do it. There’s no one right way to do this, and maybe somewhat different on a case by case basis.
[00:09:40] Scott Benton: So as a new attorney, again, you’re going to want to make sure that you’re consulting with your team, early on. That’s the key to figure out how to get your evidence, introduced through proper channels.
[00:09:51] Scott Benton: I’m Scott Betten. I’m the host to the Classroom 2 Courtroom podcast. Thank you so much for listening to this episode.
[00:09:56] Scott Benton: Now, if you do like this podcast, and you’re learning from the [00:10:00] material that we’re putting together, and you’d like to get notified, whenever we put together a new episode of this podcast, you can go to our website. Our website is Classroom2Courtroom.com. That’s classroom, the number two, courtroom.com.
[00:10:12] Scott Benton: You can leave us your contact information, and we will send you an alert that we’ve posted a new episode of our podcast. And if this is information that you’re enjoying, don’t forget to share, like, and subscribe. And that way, you can stay on top of all of the episodes. And until next time, we hope you’ll join us in making the world a better place, one client at a time.
[00:10:32] Scott Benton: Thank you so much for listening.
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