Customer Reviews

Examining Witnesses: Direct, Cross, and Expert Examinations

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This is book 3 of "The Trial Advocacy Series," a 5 book series covering the whole art of trial advocacy. Chapter 1 covers direct and redirect. Chapter 2 covers cross, and Chapter 3 is devoted to expert testimony.

Each chapter is divided into sections and subsections, and the authors walk the fledgling advocate through all aspects of the examination of witnesses. The advice is succinct, to the point, and usually good. The book would be most useful to the rookie. Competent, experienced trial lawyers will learn little from it, but it will probably remind them of a few things they've learned and almost forgotten.

Harold Stern's series "Trying Cases to Win," covers trial advocacy in greater depth, and the experienced attorny will find it more useful. The attorney will also find it much more expensive, as a single volume of that series will cost almost as much as all 5 volumes of the "Trial Advocacy Series."

I liked the section on "myths of cross examination." Although reasonable advocates could differ on the wisdom of some of the "myths," they were thought-provoking.

One thing I didn't like: The transcripts were composed pieces. The authors should have gone to the trouble to search out real examples from real trials. Reading real transcripts is drudge work. Reading fake transcripts is downright painful.