Home

FreeQuick bite 06.01.01 · Library 06 · Jury Selection

What voir dire is actually for

Two objectives, and one myth

Picked to Win, chs. 1–2

Selection happens before any evidence. It cannot forecast a verdict. It can show you how a juror reasons, and how the twelve will work.

DRIVES THE VERDICT Moral shorthand The quiet rules about blame, harm and desert. Never announced. Reasoning patterns How fast meaning arrives. Whether elaboration refines or reinforces. Stated opinions Views on lawsuits, companies, experts. Outputs, not foundations. Biographics Age, occupation, zip code. Easy to collect, easy to compare. EASY TO COLLECT Most voir dire spends its time on the bottom rungs and its verdict on the top.

Scroll the diagram sideways →

Plate 06.01.01 The ladder runs the wrong way. What is cheapest to collect predicts least, and what decides deliberations is never volunteered — because jurors do not experience it as a belief. They experience it as common sense.
§ Objectives and the questions that miss them
What you are afterWhat it looks likeThe question that misses it
How this juror reasonsObjective one. Cognition.
What it looks like
Process
Where the search for an explanation starts, and how fast it ends
The question that misses it
“Can you be fair?”
Everyone knows the acceptable answer
How the twelve functionObjective two. The room.
What it looks like
Influence
Who frames an issue, who defers, who tolerates friction
The question that misses it
“Leader or follower?”
Jurors report the role they admire
Which way they will voteNot an objective.
What it looks like
—
Selection precedes evidence, instructions and the jury room
The question that misses it
Any of them
Prediction manufactures certainty
In the courtroom
Objective oneCognitionHow each juror reasons — the process, not the position.
Objective twoDynamicsHow the twelve will function once the referee leaves the room.
Not objectivesPredicting the verdict, extracting promises, advocating. Each belongs to a later phase.
Application

Ask most trial lawyers what they are doing in voir dire and the answer comes fast: get rid of the bad jurors. The trouble with an elimination objective is not that it is unkind. It is that it needs very little information. Once a juror says something concerning, the inquiry stops and the label is written.

The alternative is not cultivation. Patience and curiosity are a posture, not an aim. State the two objectives and technique follows. Understand how each juror reasons, because deliberations are built from individual thinking. Anticipate how the group will function, because a juror who explains clearly carries more weight than one who feels strongly.

What each objective sounds like

Objective one“When something goes wrong, where do you usually start looking for an explanation?” The answer is a process, and there is no right one.

Objective two“When you’re in a group where people disagree, how do you usually find yourself responding?” Watch the speed of the answer.

Three traps
  • Treating an answer as a vote.The guess crowds out the observation that would have been useful.
  • Asking for assurances.A promise made before any evidence constrains nothing, and asking teaches the panel what to say.
  • Confusing a posture with an objective.Warmth is the condition for good information, not the point of it.
Where to go deeper
NextResearching the panel

What you get before anyone speaks.

BookPicked to Win

Chapters 1 and 2.

Quick bite 06.02.02Questions that make jurors talk

How objectives become questions.

This is one of two hundred and fifty-seven. The sheet prints on a single page, front and back, and fits a trial binder.

Download the sheet (PDF)

You just read one. The membership opens the other two hundred and fifty-six.

All four courses, sixteen hours of MCLE, the Trial War Room, and every video as it goes up. Thirty-day money-back guarantee.

See the membership
Download the sheet (PDF)