| Getting
Your Experts And Witnesses To Trial
In
an automobile accident case, the plaintiff has the burden of
proving his case by a preponderance of the evidence. In order
to meet his burden of proof, the plaintiff must present evidence
in the form of testimony to the judge or jury.
Although the method of presentation of the evidence can be
challenging, the real challenge is to make sure that all of
the witnesses needed to prove the case appear at the designated
time and place for their testimony. Often, this requires that
the plaintiff issue subpoenas which require the appearance
of the person who will testify.
Subpoenas generally must be issued many weeks before trial.
The rules usually require that the subpoena be served on the
witness in person or at his home or place of employment. The
courts usually charge filing or service fees to process and
issue the subpoenas with the court's signature or seal.
Out of state witnesses present an even greater challenge.
The courts will not usually allow the issuance of a subpoena
to an out of state witness to compel his appearance at the
trial. The rules do allow for the taking of an out of state
witness' testimony by deposition, but the deposition is used
in lieu of the live testimony.
Expert witnesses are also difficult to get to trial. Top
experts lead extraordinarily busy schedules. To come to trial,
the expert will likely have to cancel or postpone many scheduled
activities of his profession. This will cost him a lot of
money. Also, there is no guarantee that he will be able to
fly in and fly out in one day to render his testimony.
During trial, the amount of time it takes to pick a jury
and examine all of the witnesses which need to testify before
your expert takes the stand cannot be predicted accurately.
Thus, you may tell your expert to clear his schedule for a
Wednesday, and then you may not be ready for him to testify
until Friday. Most experts know this and will not commit to
appear for more than one day because of the lost time and
money involved.
The procedural rules also allow a party to present evidence
from the expert by deposition or video taped testimony, thereby
allieviating this problem, but this is much less effective
to present to a jury than a live person. Jurors quickly get
bored with depositions that are read to them and video testimony
precludes the effective use of drawings and charts to illustrate
the testimony.
The problems in getting the medical expert witness to trial
require the expenditure of tremendous sums of money to compensate
the witness for the substantial lost time. They also present
challenges to even the most experienced automobile accident
lawyer to manage the timing of the testimony so its impact
on the jury can be maximized.
This is why it is important to choose a lawyer who has trial
experience with automobile accident cases. Knowing what to
do when a witness is delayed or when a witness goes missing
just before trial can very well mean the difference in winning
and losing the case. | 
