Regardless of whether liability is an issue, visually explaining to the jury precisely how an injury occurred is a crucial part of a plaintiff’s case presentation. Often, plaintiff’s attorneys [...]

The key to success in data-heavy litigation is developing a method to show the data in a way that effectively tells your story, ideally in a format that is interactive so the attorney can pick [...]

Trials are never, ever easy. They rarely go as planned, and they require the most amazing dexterity of knowing when to hold tight to your positions, and when to completely drop Plan A and go [...]

A central case database where litigators track issues, witnesses, events, documents, to-do items and more is a vital tool for making e-discovery and litigation more efficient. While [...]

Change is always exciting, and we have an announcement to make as we transition to 2014. The big news for the start of the year is the formation of Cogent Legal, LLC as a partnership between [...]

“Luddite Lawyers Are Ethical Violations Waiting to Happen.” That’s the alarming headline on a great post earlier this week in Lawyerist.com by attorney Megan Zavieh, who [...]

In oral argument, a litigator has very limited time—she needs to hit the high points and move on. She must communicate enough information to convince the judge or jury of her argument, yet must [...]

Great graphics make difficult concepts understandable, and such graphics are what we aspire to each day at Cogent Legal. Today’s blog entry will dissect a graphic from the New York Times [...]

“I need a timeline.” This is how litigators often start in asking for legal graphics. This start to the graphics conversation makes sense because timelines are perhaps the most common [...]

For your next trial or important hearing, you should seriously consider using an e-brief to help the judge (and the judge's clerk) navigate and understand your argument. Cogent Legal recently [...]

Last night I attended the Trial Lawyer of the Year Gala hosted by the San Francisco Trial Lawyers Association (SFTLA), and as always, it was fun to reconnect with so many great attorneys. I [...]

In my continuing effort to point out effective presentations that attorneys can learn lessons from for case presentations, I came across one that teaches on two different fronts. I saw a [...]

The Association of Business Trial Lawyers asked Cogent Legal to prepare the graphics for a presentation last night on mock trials. The panel consisted of some of the best jury consultants in the [...]

I always like to share examples of what I consider powerful graphics to give attorneys ideas on what’s possible to create for use in litigation. This morning, I was struck by a video going [...]

This post is written by Michael Kelleher, Esq. Before I recently joined as a litigation consultant here at Cogent Legal, “Words” was my nickname at a previous job. Ironic, isn’t [...]

Yesterday was one of those days that reminded me of the value of visiting a site for a construction-related case to see and feel firsthand what is involved. Couldn’t I simply hire a [...]

Apple’s recent victory over Samsung in their patent infringement case had to be one of the most closely watched intellectual property cases ever, and trial graphics played a decisive role [...]

At the American Society of Trial Consultants annual conference in New Orleans last week, I had the opportunity to be on a panel discussion about social media and blogging for the legal [...]

The following post is by Dave Nugent, Cogent Legal’s Senior Producer At Cogent Legal, real estate and land use cases are among our favorite to support. They can offer up rich and tangible [...]

This post is written by Dave Nugent, Cogent Legal’s Senior Producer. Remember those childhood days of grade school innocence and the excitement generated when it was “Show & Tell” day? [...]

In litigation, almost every case will benefit from a timeline that lays out key facts and circumstances in a chronological order. The process of making a timeline can help you, the attorney, [...]

I recently looked utterly ridiculous on stage in front of an audience of several dozen people. In the midst of an improv exercise called “Yes, let’s!” someone shouted, [...]

Recently, while creating graphic timelines for clients, I explored new ways to use Adobe InDesign to produce interactive PDFs for these timelines. By “interactive PDF,” I mean a [...]

Judges really do get to see it all when it comes to the good, the bad and the just plain ugly of attorneys trying cases. Yesterday, I attended The Recorder Roundtable: “From the Bench [...]

Attorneys sometimes act in trial or mediation as if they’re little more than an evidence machine collecting all the right evidence, excluding all the improper evidence, applying the law and [...]