Cost concerns fuel trial research innovations

By Nora Tooher Dolan Media Newswires BOSTON, MA--Facing a clampdown on litigation spending, jury consultants are offering a broad range of new, low-cost, online trial research and graphics tools. ''We are seeing with the tighter economic times that people are relying more on online surveys, which tend to be more cost-effective about gathering information than traditional focus groups/mock trials,'' said Daniel Wolfe, director of jury consulting for Kroll Ontrack/TrialGraphix in Chicago. Some elaborate online mock trials display demonstrative evidence and include videos of the attorneys' opening and closing statements. Others are more pared-down affairs that relate issues in text. Mock jurors in some online focus groups discuss cases in real time via chat room setups. In other cases, they may give their reactions over the Internet or leave a telephone message. The online mock trials and focus groups cost about half of the expense of similar research exercises conducted in person, according to several industry experts. ''You pay less for recruiting; you don't have to rent a facility; you don't have to feed people. So there are cost savings there,'' Wolfe said. Wolfe said online focus groups are most effective for personal injury trials or for zeroing in on specific issues in a case, rather than complex cases such as an intellectual property dispute. ''With the explosion of the Internet, these [online focus groups] have become a staple and replaced some of the traditional focus group exercises you might have done in smaller cases because of a tighter budget,'' he said. Wolfe added, however, that Internet focus groups have limitations. For example, he said, ''It's hard to verify the identity of people participating.'' Also, people without access to computers are automatically excluded, which limits the demographics of a mock jury. Partly because of its limitations, Philip Anthony, chief executive of DecisionQuest, a Washington, D.C.-based trial consulting firm, said he's not concerned about Internet focus groups replacing in-person focus groups and mock trials. ''The bottom line is that [trial lawyers] like to get into a room and put their case on and see and feel the reaction from surrogate jurors. To some degree, there's really no substitute for that,'' Anthony said. Still, both DecisionQuest and TrialGraphix offer web-based jury research options. Wolfe said cost concerns, coupled with technological advances, are driving other web-based innovations, such as ''virtual shadow juries.'' Thanks to streaming web broadcasts from many courtrooms, mock jurors located off-site can watch a trial in real-time and give their reactions to help lawyers tweak their trial strategy, Wolfe said. ''The whole thing is about efficiency,'' Anthony noted. ''The bottom line is that trials have not historically been very efficient. As the economy gets tighter and people get more concerned about the costs associated with litigation, there's a pressure from the top down ... to make trials more efficient.'' ''The online [jury research] tool is a good recession-oriented tool, but it's also a good efficiency tool for what is coming in the world of litigation,'' he said. According to Wolfe and Anthony, other recession-related trial consulting trends include: Scaled-down research exercises-- Trial lawyers and corporate legal departments are controlling costs by reducing the length of research exercises, going from three days to one or cutting down on the number of mock jurors. Bids-- Attorneys who work with corporate clients are asking trial consultants to bid competitively for work. Fixed fees-- ''Within our industry, folks are asking for more definite and circumscribed types of budgets, meaning a fixed budget,'' Wolfe said. ''We're seeing that occurring more frequently regarding demonstratives.'' Do it yourself graphics-- Kroll Ontrack/Trial Graphix recently launched an online graphics option that allows attorneys and paralegals to create their own timelines, call-out charts and other graphics for a fixed price. ''We've realized there are certain demonstratives folks needed that you can do from templates,'' Wolfe said. Misty Murray, a paralegal at Chittenden, Murday & Novotny in Chicago, used the program recently to create a timeline and a graphic illustration of an office layout that was used as a demonstrative at trial. ''It's a really good way for the law firm to become hands-on with the ... exhibits they're presenting to the jury,'' she said. While the timeline was relatively simple to create, the office layout was more involved because it had to replicate an actual office. ''They have some icons that allow you to circle a portion of the graphic you want changed,'' Murray explained. ''So, I would say, I don't want this desk here, I want it there. I want the color changed ... add a sign on the door. ...'' Also, she was able to access the program from her home computer on the weekend and make changes online. ''The jury really responded to our graphics,'' she said, and ''we really enjoyed kind of being more involved.'' Entire contents copyrighted © 2010 by Dolan Media Company. All rights reserved. Reproduction in whole or in part without written permission is expressly forbidden. Published: Thu, Jul 29, 2010

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