Legal Professionals Share Moments That Instantly Ended a Case
Most of the time, months and months of meticulous preparation go into a legal case to ensure that nothing goes wrong. Other times, not so much.
As seriously as most people who wind up in court take their setting, there are always some who just don’t seem to grasp the magnitude of appearing before the law—and it usually doesn’t end well for them.
Whether it was a stupid comment, a lack of preparation, or just an epically brilliant move or blunder by someone involved, there are some cases where the entire verdict can basically be decided in a single moment.
Here are 43 stories about some of the most memorable examples of such cases.
1. Just a Hunka Hunka Burnin’ Judge
I once attended oral arguments for US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. It's pretty much the big time as far as lawyers are concerned. I watched a lawyer argue that his client had received what's known as "ineffective assistance of counsel"
at the trial from which she was appealing. The attorney, however, was not doing a very good job during oral arguments. So, at one point, one of the judges on the panel actually leans forward and asks him "
Counselor, are you currently providing ineffective assistance of counsel?"
2. A Matter of Seasoning
A lawyer was verbally running through the evidence against the guy he was defending, trying to claim that there wasn't enough of it to even justify calling a trial. All totally fine, except for when he said, "
I believe a more seasoned judge wouldn't have let this trial move forward in the first place." He apparently hadn’t known that the judge he was speaking to had given the okay to move the trial to this court. He was immediately given a hard "
motion denied."
3. Keeping Up Appearances
My brother was on a jury back in the days of MySpace. A woman had been hit by a big rig during some foggy weather and she was suing for a back injury.
On the last day of the trial, they asked her if she had a MySpace account and then brought up her site for the jury to see, as I think all profiles were open to the public back then.
There was a picture of her dancing on the hood of a car, and right next to it was a text exchange of her saying that she shouldn’t go out too much because her lawyer says that she has to look injured. Needless to say, she lost that case.
4. Start With the Man in Your Mirror, Sir!
I once observed a case where the plaintiff attorney simply played Michael Jackson’s “Man in the Mirror” as his closing argument, hoping to evoke an emotional response in the jury. He lost the case.
