Facts with Feeling

“Then where Should I start?”

“Start what, for Christ’s sake?”

“Researching the history of the area. Of Derry Township.”

‘”Oh. Well. Start with the Fricke and the Michaud. They’re supposed to be the best.”

“And after I read those-“

Read them? Christ, no! Throw em in the wastebasket! That’s your first step. Then read Buddinger. Branson Buddinger was a damned sloppy researcher…but when it came to Derry his heart was in the right place. He got most of the facts wrong but he got them wrong with feeling.”

Stephen King, It (1986).

 Although facts are important what matters to the jury is feeling. We must feel the case so the facts are felt.  To relate to the jury with feeling we begin by discovering the story of our client. To do this we emotionally connect with what our client has gone through and how this feels. Once we accomplish this and accomplishing this takes immersion into our client’s life we arrive at the emotional level of the case.

This allows us to draw on our emotional experience and connect with the feelings of our client. When we feel with our client we have emotional honesty and convey this feeling to the jury. Through emotional connection we do this naturally without trying to sell the jury.We connect with the jury in a straight forward common sense manner, avoiding legalese and complexity. 

The feeling of our client which we mirror flows into the courtroom. The jury relates to this feeling because it is honest and true to life. The facts become subservient to the feeling of the case. Our client has this feeling, we have this feeling and our feeling is given to the jury. When the jury accepts our feeling as its own the facts merge into our feeling.

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