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Summary: A trial lawyer faces many difficult challenges in working with clients, criminals, judges and juries. Get career information for trial lawyers with tips from an experienced lawyer and law professor in this free career information video.
John Kitch is a graduate of the Vanderbilt University Law School and has been practicing law since 1976. He principally practices in the areas of educational and probate law at both...read more
"The biggest thing is always be prepared. You have to know the facts which means you have to spend a lot of time interviewing people and going out to wherever something might have happened. And you have to know the law and you have to know the current state of the law which means always staying updated. You have to be prepared in the context of attending to every detail in your case, coming up with ways to address problems, coming up with ways to advance your position. Sometimes your client are not always completely truthful with you because they're afraid that you won't work for them and one big challenge is making them comfortable enough to tell you everything, the good the bad and the ugly, so that you know it in advance because surprises are awful for a trial lawyer. So that's one big thing. And the way you overcome that is just continually work with people and build a confidence level with them such that they'll tell you everything. All of our clients are not the most nice people you've ever seen. And sometimes it is hard for a jury to look at your client and feel empathetic toward that person. And so one of the things you have to try to do is humanize the situation. If you represent a huge corporation, juries are not always favorable toward them and so you have to try and humanize it by talking about the individuals who work for the corporation people who were involved. Sometimes judges have it in their head what the law is and what it should be and so one challenge sometimes is trying to explain to them why they may not have it exactly right or why they may want to step a little bit beyond what they thing they believe."
eHow Article: Trial Lawyer Career Information