Rethink the 20-Minute Opening
By Dr. Ken Broad Bahm: I have heard from many attorneys who believe that there is a correct amount of time for an opening statement, and that time is about twenty minutes. “If it’s much longer than that, you’ve lost the jury’s attention,” some will add. At times, that limit is imposed or “preferred” by a judge, but more often, I believe that a short opening is self-imposed by lawyers who believe that an opening needs to be brief in order to adapt to the jury’s short attention span. In a way the notion that it needs to be pretty quick has