My First Trial

I rarely, if ever, post anything about my job. Mostly because a lot of things I deal with are confidential. But a trial is public record. I've been 2nd chair on a few different trials--there was always a senior attorney that was 1st chair. 1st chair calls all the shots--they are in charge of how the trial goes and delegates jobs to second chair. Young attorneys are 2nd chair so that they can learn how to be 1st chair. 1st chair is a lot of responsibility. I've always liked being 2nd chair. You get a lot of glory with half of the stress. But last Monday I was 1st chair in my very first trial. And I did a great job. That doesn't mean that I will win--it means that if the judge picks the other guy, there wasn't anything else I could have done to persuade the judge to go my way. The second day of trial is February 8. I'll let you know how it goes.

I learned a lot of what to do next time. Next time will be a 4 day trial in June. And it will be a full-blown, hard-fought trial.