Two Rules for Cross-Examination

Cross-examination has a reputation for cruelty it does not deserve. The examinations that win criminal trials are usually quiet, and the two rules this office follows have nothing to do with aggression. We have published a full page on cross-examination in Massachusetts criminal trials, and this post states the short version.

Rule One: Be Fair to the Witness

Jurors protect witnesses from bullies, and they are right to do it. A lawyer who raises his voice, twists answers, or humiliates a person on the stand loses the room no matter what the transcript says. Fairness keeps the jury, and it also produces better answers. A witness treated with courtesy agrees to true things, and true things, stacked patiently, are what an examination is made of.

Rule Two: Respect the Jury

The jury’s time and intelligence are borrowed, not owned. An examination that wanders, repeats itself, or performs for its own sake spends the jurors’ patience on nothing. The questions should move toward a visible point, and the examination should end when the point is made. Jurors who watch facts accumulate reach the conclusion themselves, and a conclusion a juror reaches on her own outlasts any argument a lawyer can make.

The Conversation and the Close

Attorney Serpa questions without a script, because the examination is a conversation with the witness, and the control comes from listening and preparation rather than paper. The close of a sequence is built in advance: leading questions state one fact at a time, each answer narrows the field, and the final question arrives only after the witness’s own answers have eliminated every alternative. Asked that way, the last question has one available answer, and the witness gives it. How that method dismantles a field sobriety opinion is the subject of our post on cross-examining the field sobriety opinion, and how it serves other cases, from domestic violence to sex assault, is on the main cross-examination page. Call 617.936.0201 for a free, confidential consultation.

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Greater Boston Criminal Law Alerts

Two Rules for Cross-Examination

Two rules govern cross-examination at Serpa Law Office: be fair to the witness and respect the jury. The rest is a controlled conversation that ends where it was designed to end.

Cross-Examining the Field Sobriety Opinion in a Massachusetts OUI Trial

How Serpa Law Office cross-examines the field sobriety opinion in Massachusetts OUI trials: the NHTSA manual, the missing observations, confirmation bias, and innocent explanations.

The Second Chance in Massachusetts OUI Law: How the Cahill Disposition Works

How G.L. c. 90, § 24D and Commonwealth v. Cahill let a driver with one OUI prior ten years or more old resolve a second offense with first-offender treatment, and what the disposition does and does not change.