Trial Advocacy: Planning, Analysis, and Strategy, Fifth Edition

John B. Mitchell

John B. Mitchell‑‑Raised in the Midwest, Professor Mitchell moved to the West Coast to attend Stanford Law School, where he was a member of the Moot Court Board and Editor of the Law Review. He earned his J.D. at Stanford in 1970.

Professor Mitchell’s wide ranging career has included: private practice in his own law firm in San Francisco, where he specialized in criminal litigation (1970-75); consultant to public and private defense attorneys concerning trial, motions and appellate strategies (1973-1981); and Director of Training for a large Seattle law firm (1988-1990) where, while on leave from the law school, he developed a two-year training curriculum for new associates in business and litigation (1988-90).

Professor Mitchell is co-author (with Professor Marilyn Berger and Practitioner in Residence Ronald Clark) of three advocacy textbooks published by Wolters Kluwer: Trial Advocacy: Planning Analysis, and Strategy (4th ed., 2014); Pretrial Advocacy: Planning, Analysis, and Strategy (4th ed., 2014); Evidence: Skills, Strategies, and Assignments for Pretrial and Trial (2012), as well as having published several evidence workbooks. He also has written extensively for professional journals on such topics as professional responsibility, learning and educational theory, training of lawyers, constitutional law, and criminal procedure, besides publishing Assisted Suicide – Nine Issues to Consider (U. Michigan Press, 2007).

Over the past three decades, Professor Mitchell has taught courses in Evidence, Evidence Lab, Advanced Evidence, Expert Witnesses, Criminal Procedure and Advocacy. He also was a member of the Law Practice Clinic for six years, the last two as Director. In 2010, he was named the William C. Oltman Professor of Teaching Excellence.

Marilyn J. Berger

Marilyn Berger founded the Films for Justice Institute at the Seattle University School of Law in 1995. As a Professor at the Law School, she produced, wrote and directed educational documentaries with social justice themes. She is now Professor Emeritus.

She directed the three-film series Lessons from Woburn, a documentary chronicling the Anderson v. W.R. Grace lawsuit, which was inspired by the book and film A Civil Action.

She is the Director of the Trial Advocacy Program at the Law School. Professor Berger is the co-author with Professor John Mitchell and Ronald Clark, Distinguished Practioner in Residence at Seattle University of four advocacy textbooks, published by Wolters Kluwer—Trial Advocacy: Planning, Analysis and Strategy, (4th Ed. 2015); Pretrial Advocacy: Planning, Analysis and Strategy, (4th Ed. 2013); Trial Advocacy: Assignments and Case Files (2nd edition, 2011; and Evidence Advocacy: Assignments and Case Files. http://www.aspenadvocacybooks.com Three films on DVD accompany the advocacy books supplementing the texts.

Professor Berger lectures and writes in the areas of gender, film and the law, and advocacy, exploring issues about the relationship of storytelling and its intersection with law. A recent publication, Opening and closing argument, with co-author Ronald Clark, was published by BNA, 2014.

She is the co-director, writer, and executive producer of Out of the Ashes: 9/11. www.outoftheashes911.com a documentary, about 9/11 families and their experiences with the Victim a Compensation Fund and litigation. The Victim Compensation Fund distributed seven billion dollars to over 5,500 families. Out of the Ashes: 9/11 highlights the stories of seven families and provides an unprecedented window into the psychology of harm and justice. The documentary explores key legal and societal issues? Did the Fund undermine our legal system, or did it offer 9-11 families justice by avoiding lawsuits?

Professor Berger has a B.S. from Cornell University and a J.D. from the University of California at Berkeley. She was a Visiting Professor of Law at Washington University School of Law, St. Louis, Missouri (1995, 1998); Kyoto University, (1988 – 1989); Kyoto Comparative Law Center, Kyoto, Japan (1988-1989); University of London, Kings College (1982).

Ronald H. Clark

Professor Clark is a nationally known lecturer, author and Distinguished Practitioner in Residence at Seattle University Law School. Mr. Clark has lectured at over 40 national courses and for numerous bar associations and prosecutor associations across the country. At Seattle University Law School, he currently teaches Pretrial Advocacy, Trial Advocacy, Essential Lawyering Skills, and Advanced Trial Advocacy Institute (a week-long continuing legal education course founded in 2014).

He conducted international training for the Department of Justice in Bosnia and Kosovo and a train-the-trainers course (Proyecto Diamante) for Department of Justice lawyers who would in turn teach trial advocacy in Mexico.

The Washington Association of Prosecuting Attorneys awarded Clark the President’s Award of Merit. He has been awarded both the Distinguished Faculty Award and a Lecturer of Merit Award by the National College of District Attorneys as well as the Dean’s Award of Honor.

For 27 years, Mr. Clark was in the King County Prosecutor’s office in Seattle, Washington, where he served as a deputy prosecutor (including member of the special trial team prosecuting Seattle payoff and public corruption cases), senior deputy prosecutor, head of the juvenile court and filing units, Assistant Chief in charge of the trial teams and, for ten years, as Chief Deputy of the Criminal Division leading over 115 attorneys.

Next, he was the Senior Training Counsel at the then newly built National Advocacy Center in Columbia, South Carolina. Clark pioneered the first courses conducted at the NAC when it opened its doors to state and local prosecutors and for the following six years. He also directed other national courses around the country, including the Executive Prosecutor Course and Successful Trial Strategies.

Professor Clark has co-authored five publications, including three with Professors Mitchell and Berger including, Trial Advocacy, 4th edition; Pretrial Advocacy, 4th edition; Evidence Skills. ; and Cross-Examination Handbook, 2nd edition (Bill Bailey and Bob Dekle – The book’s website is www.crossexambook.com and the three authors write a Cross-Examination Blog found at http://wwwcrossx.blogspot.com) and Opening Statement and Closing Argument. He also wrote Making and Meeting Objections: Handbook for Washington Trial Attorneys, and he was the Chief Author for the Criminal Trial Practice and Techniques chapter of the Washington Practice Manual.

He has written and lectured frequently on professional responsibility. He was a member of the blue ribbon American Bar Association Task Force that formulated the Prosecution and Defense Function Standards. Also, he was on the Public Law and Ethics Committee for the Washington State Association of Municipal Attorneys that produced a Public Law Ethics Primer. He was also the editor of the professional responsibility book, Doing Justice, a Prosecutor’s Guide to Ethics and Civil Liability.