Courtroom Connect, with offices in Atlanta, New Jersey, New York and Washington D.C., is a leader in advanced communications for the legal market. Their WarRoom Connect offering provides support for Internet, computer networking, video conferencing, phones, and office equipment in the litigation war room. Further, the company has the ability, with the permission of the presiding Judge, to provide wireless Internet connectivity in the court house. This sort of one stop shop can certainly help streamline all that is needed to organize an out of town trial.
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Some firms simply do not have the know how or resources to manage a war room during a trial. The Data Company, with offices in Memphis and San Francisco, provides war room management services. A law firm without the resources or time to be concerned with the design, implementation, operation and furnishing of an off site war room can call a company such as The Data Company to design, implement and operate war rooms all over the county. The Data Company can set up presentation equipment to match that used in the court room and production equipment that allows their staff to revise or create rebuttal exhibits, video clips, new demonstratives, animations, and any other exhibits such as documentary, video, photographic or demonstrative. Further, The Data Company has a graphics department that can work onsite in the war room with the trial team to prepare the best possible presentation of the adversary’s arguments. For firms without the resources and know how, this seems like a great option.
Scott Allen is director of trial support and technology for Doar Litigation Support & Trial Services, based in Lynbrook, NY. He has outlined (in a June 2004 Law Technology News piece) quick tips to deal with potential problems before they arise:
1 – Locate your war room close the court (preferably within blocks)
2 – Determine the location of the nearest 24 hour copy center and supplies store by conducting a general survey of area.
3 – Retain a caterer for the war room.
4 – Arrange a car service.
5 – Make reservations at the best restaurant in town for the victory dinner.
Employ technical staff in your war room to assist at the end of a trial day. A graphic designer can help you prepare the next days presentation based on what occurred today. The technical staff can create power point slides, animations, exhibit boards, interactive timelines, and other multimedia presentation that act as aides during opening, closing or the questioning phase. Further, the ability to scan documents and edit video presentations can help during trial when your adversary takes you by surprise with a piece of evidence or testimony from a hostile witness.
One of the great benefits that a war room can provide is that it can act as a rehearsal stage before going into court. Therefore, it would seem to make sense to practice more than just the opening, closing and questioning of witnesses. A smooth court room delivery may also depend on effective use of the equipment in the court room. Therefore, a war room should be equipped with the same technology as in the court room. Some pieces of equipment to consider: A document camera, touch screen annotation unit, monitors and lcd projectors with screen. Experience using these pieces of equipment will, no doubt, enhance the presentation of your big case.
Every firm should have a project management template, or protocol for setting up a mobile war room. With a protocol in place, a mobile war room can be set up quickly and with all of the technology that the litigation team needs at their disposal. Here is a plan, as outlined in a June 2004 Law Technology News article written by Eric Anderson, director of technical services at Sonnenschein Nath & Rosenthal in Chicago:
Site Visit – a member of the firm’s technology team and litigation team (perhaps a paralegal) should visit the site. They will need to know how many people the space has to accommodate. This team should meet with hotel management and address some important issues, including; space layout, hard wire v wireless networking, power and coolers for the extra equipment and phone lines.
Infrastructure – Determine how the litigation team will communicate with the office. If it is a large team, private connections from local telco’s or ISP’s will probably work best. This includes T-1 internet connections or private lines connected back to the office. Having worked for Telco’s and ISP’s in the past, I can tell you that you should provide atleast 4-6 weeks for installation. At the same time, telco’s can install circuits very quickly if you are an important client and are willing to pay for it. Also, call up the chain. Talk to the manager, the manager’s manager and that persons manager to ensure timely and proper installation of all circuits. Smaller litigation teams may be able to work through the hotel’s circuits. Make sure to describe your needs to hotel management to ensure that the hotel can support your requirements. Back up is vital. ALWAYS have a back and redundancy. Large teams that bring in their own circuits can use the hotel’s circuits as back up. Smaller teams can choose to use dial up internet as back up. Dial up is not great, but it is better than nothing.
Equipment – phones, fax and copiers. Again, need to check with the hotel management to make sure that your equipment is compatible with the hotel’s equipment. Issues of compatibility arise where the phone system is digital but the hotel’s equipment is analog. The use of fax machines can be spared if the litigation team members are set up with Efax. With Efax, each person gets their own fax number and incoming faxes are routed to an individual’s email. A fax machine is still required for outgoing faxes.
Support - Things go wrong. Problems arise. Equipment and circuits falter. To make sure that the consequences of a what could be only a mini crisis does not become a monster crisis, it is a good idea to have a technology staff member at the site for the duration of the trial or atleast for the first couple of weeks.
A big trial is taking place in another jurisidiction. Your litigation team is being forced to stay at a hotel. You need to make sure that all of the technological services you have the disposal of in your office are available in the hotel or court room. What is important? What do you need to consider? Here is a checklist from Dean Boland as outlined in a February 2004 article in Law Technology News.
1) Computers – most lawyers now have lap tops. Make sure to bring extra power cords and batteries.
2) Phones – the hotel will have, but they are expensive. Cell phone plans with no roaming charges are a good bet.
3) Internet – The hotel should have access. Some hotels also have wireless access. This is a great feature. Make sure the hotel provides the service and that your computer is compatible.
4) E-mail – can be set up to access firm’s server remotely or a web mail application that does not require access into the firms facilities.
5) Scanning – make sure that all necessary documents are scanned into the computers. Ibinder, the database product provided by Real Legal, can especially help with this application.
Increasingly, war rooms are mobile. A company, Real Legal provides a service called iBinder. The company can host (or allow the firm to host) a database which allows attorneys or other firm personnel remote access. The litigation team can access transcripts, documents or exhibits, audio/video footage, and any other software through a standard internet browser. These types of services, many of which will be reported later, move the typical war room into the computer and internet super highway.
As described in the “About & Contact” link, a war room is a Location in a law office, hotel or court room. Locations, as real estate, cost money. It seems to make sense, in this first posting, to briefly mention costs savings incurred by the use of war rooms, as real estate. In a July 2003 article in The Wall Street Journal’s, Real Estate Journal, Ms. Sheila Muto reported that some firms benefit from a 20% reduction in their overall occupancy cost as the result of war room utilization. The law firm of Sedgwick, Detert, Moran & Arnold LLP was able to reduce space otherwise dedicated to libraries and computer servers by building war rooms. In their Chicago Office, every fifth office space is set up as a war room, or “teaming area.” These spaces were designed with flexibility. Not only can files be housed in the war room for the duration of a trial, but the rooms can be expanded or reduced in size by moving wall panels and furniture. The savings have proven to be so great, that, as of July 2003, the firm was considering paying a $2.5 million termination fee in it’s Los Angeles office to move to a more flexible location. The Law and Technology Center will make an attempt to follow up with Sedgwick, Detert, Moran & Arnold and report back as to the path they chose and how it worked out for them.