CNAs May Be Your Most Important Witness
When defense teams map out a long-term care trial, the witness list usually starts at the top: the administrator, the director of nursing, the medical director, the retained expert. The certified nursing assistant who was on the floor that night often gets a short prep session and a reminder to "just tell the truth."
“Understaffed” Isn’t the Same as “Negligent”
In almost every long-term care case, plaintiff's counsel reaches for the same theme: the facility was understaffed. It's simple. It's emotional. And it invites jurors to picture a corporation cutting corners while residents waited. But staffing is an input. Care is the outcome.
Why the Defense Bar Should Stop Reinventing the Wheel on Experts
An expert's testimony follows them everywhere. Our knowledge should too. Plaintiff experts don't start over with each case. Their opinions, methods, and talking points travel from courtroom to courtroom, state to state. The defense's knowledge about those experts often doesn't. It stays in one lawyer's file, in one firm's storage room, in one jurisdiction. Then another defense lawyer, facing the same expert, starts from scratch.