You are now sitting down to organize your Discovery Plan and determining what discovery you need to evaluate your case, prepare for mediation, file a motion for motion for summary judgment/summary adjudication and/or get it ready for trial. But where do you start? My suggestion is to litigate like an Egyptian and build a pyramid (pdf).
The final installment from George Ellard of The Veen Firm on how to cross-examine a witness to impair their credibility.
***************
You are within fifty days of trial and you are in receipt of defendant’s expert witness disclosure. She has three experts and you have three experts. All six of them need to be deposed in less than 35 days and you haven’t yet sent out a deposition notice. You pick up the phone and meet and confer with opposing counsel to select dates. During the conversation the attorney for the defendant states very adamantly
My expert will not be ready to testify until your expert testifies. Besides you are the plaintiff and you have to go first!
Heard this before? I have and there are some significant problems with defense counsel’s position.
Over the years friends and colleagues have called me up asking for a quick answer on a discovery question that they have. The phone call usually went like this “I want to get plaintiff’s phone records, how do I do that?” or “I forgot to disclose experts, am I too late?” or “They want to send my client to a psychiatrist. Can I object?” I know the answers to these questions which are “Yes,” “No” and “Yes.” However, to get the statutory authority, I rely on the charts I have prepared and published over the last 18 years. The California Civil Discovery--Charts for the Everyday Litigator " (pdf) was recently updated and now available to you for download.
Hope it helps!!
Katherine Gallo is a renowned expert in complex discovery issues, having developed a reputation with her extensive discovery seminars, in-house discovery...
More