Wednesday, December 21, 2016

How Should You Limit the Information You Give to Your Expert Witness?



When you work with an expert witness for your financial law case before the case goes to trial or before you start negotiating a settlement, you gain an expert’s insight into the best strategies to weigh the case in your client’s favor. You’ll even get a better idea of what to expect from the opposition and how to minimize any items potentially damaging to your client. It may seem strange, then, to limit the information you provide your witness, but it’s recommended solely to expedite the case.

Start With the Basics

The point of limiting information you hand over to your expert witness services is simply to keep the focus where it should be — on helping your client win the case. Wading through too much information takes up time. Give your witness an overview of the most important facts to start and follow his lead when it comes to handing over more information as he requests.

Pull Repetitive Information

Don’t leave it to your witness to sort through repeated information; it’s a waste of the time you’re paying him to work. Put aside anything that simply reinforces previously established information. If your witness wants access to more documentation, he’ll let you know.

Provide Everything Potentially Unfavorable

Withholding some information from your expert witness is about expediency, not about “hiding” facts from your witness. He’s your witness — hired to make the case for your side. When you hire him before going to trial, he needn’t even present his findings to the opposing side. Provide all potentially unfavorable information and he can actually help you strategize how to combat it.
Arrange an appointment with the office of Michael F. Richards as early as possible into your case. If facts change as you progress through the matter, you can arrange another appointment later on so we can adjust our recommendations appropriately. However, you needn’t provide every new bout of information unless you think our expertise will come in handy in light of the new facts.

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