Succeeding as a trial lawyer: a personal account

• Author: Stewart Edelstein
• Pages: 291-306

291

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

SUCCEEDING AS A

TRIAL LAWYER: A

PERSONAL ACCOUNT

The insights in this book are from my own professional and personal

experience, although, as I make clear in my “But For” acknowledg-

ments, many other people made this book possible. Even so, I intention-

ally omitted from other chapters of this book any account of my own

journey as a trial law yer.

In this chapter, I tell you my own story, not out of shameless self-

indulgence, but rather in the hope that you will learn something valu-

able, enabling you to assimilate everything else in this book in the

context of one trial lawyer’s experience. I certainly don’t hold myself

up as a model of the quintessential trial lawyer, but I have learned a few

things worth sharing over nearly 40 years in practice. We’ll start with

my disastrous first court appearance. . . .

I join Cohen and Wolf PC in Bridgeport, Connecticut, as an as soci-

ate, right out of law school, doing legal research and writing. The firm

has a tradition—a r ite of passage, really—t hat as soon as a new associate

passes the bar, off to court to argue a motion. Diligently, I prepare for

my first oral argument of a pretrial motion as I did when I was on Cor-

nell Law School’s moot court team. I learn t he issues, the facts, the law,

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and the procedural r ules; prepare what I will say; and am eager to argue.

I enter the large courtroom, for the weekly call of pretrial motions. It

seems that the entire Bridgeport litigation bar is present.

My case is one of the first called. I stride confidently to the front

of the courtroom, secure in the knowledge that my thorough prepara-

tion, and the rightness of my position, will trump opposing counsel’s

far greater experience as a trial lawyer. As I am about to launch into

my argument, Judge Irving Levine, who looks like a wizened, curmud-

geonly judge straight out of typecasting, peers down at me, and this

colloquy ensues:

“New to the bar, are you?”

“Yes, your honor.”

“Welcome to the bar, son. Have you read the most recent revisions to

the rules of pract ice, which went into effect last month?”

“I believe so, your honor, but you may be referring to a rule change I

am not aware of.”

“You’re right about that. I’m denying your motion. Go back to your

office and read the updated r ules.”

“Thank you, your honor.”

“What are you thanking me for? I just denied your motion!”

Laughter fills the courtroom. With my tail between my legs, embar-

rassed that my first court appearance is such a disaster, I return to the

office, immediately explain what happened to the partner who assigned

this simple but ill-fated task to me. He responds with great understand-

ing and support, without castigation. Whenever associates at my firm

wonder why I stress so much keeping abreast of the latest rules change s,

I tell them that story.

And now for some context, let’s venture back to my college days.

It’s my senior year at Oberlin College, where I am an English

major. For many reasons, Oberlin is the ideal college for me. I develop

a facility for critical thinking across a range of disciplines in the liberal

arts curriculum, and the ability to write cogent, analytical prose. As

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