Top 10 Objections in Court (MUST KNOW)

Today, we're talking about objections in the courtroom. And I'll be giving you the top-10 most common trial objections that you may or may not have heard of... "Objection. Sustained. No the witness can't object. Overruled! Sidebar! Guilty! speculation! Hearsay! bailiff! briefcase! Disregard! In my chambers! Stop beavering the witness! I rest. We could totally be lawyers" The courtroom really isn't like that. Well it kind is you'll see what I mean. Keep watching! Welcome to law venture my name is Jarrett Stone. if you're watching this video about trial objections then I highly recommend that you download this cheat sheet with the 21 most common trial objections there's a breakdown of what you need to be saying whenever you're objecting there's a breakdown of how you need to respond in case somebody's objecting to you and it all gets boiled down into one simple cheat sheet that you can take to the courtroom so you're prepared on game day if you want it it's free and it's instant just go in the description click on the link it'll take you to my website you just type in your email address click Submit and boom you got it so you're probably asking yourself why are we only talking about ten objections if there's twenty one laid out in this cheat sheet well it's a fair question the reason why we're going to narrow the scope down a little bit is because these ten are the top and most commonly used objections and they're the most commonly used in front of the jury so they're super super important the other eleven they're either not as common or you're going to bring them up outside the presence of the jury typically during emotional limine perfect example is character evidence now I do want to address a fun fact which is I don't know if you can tell I had to get on my toes there I'm wearing my Ironman shirt in support of Avengers in game we recently saw Avengers in game we loved it it was fantastic and truthfully the ten years it's been ten years wow I'm getting old the decade basically leading up to this final movie has been absolutely fantastic it's been a heck of a ride and and I've been trying to nerd out basically by incorporating Marvel into one of these law venture videos some say couldn't be done but I'm doing it here now objections are a lot like your sword and your shield let's take the sword out and let's use a hammer because it's always awesome with objections they're a great way to keep improper evidence out and basically prevent the jury from hearing things they shouldn't be hearing in the first place that's where the shield comes in and they're also a great way to go on the offensive because sometimes the other side gets in a rhythm when they're asking questions or sometimes the other side just they're not very good with evidence so you can throw them off and throw a wrench in their plan by objecting at certain points but my caveat is you need to use your judgment whether or not you're using it as the hammer or the shield because sometimes if you object too much or the way you're objecting may annoy the jury or they may think you're trying to keep evidence out that they should be hearing in the first place so use your judgement and let's go ahead and dive into number one on this top ten most common trial objections now the first objection is objection leading and you typically want to make this objection during direct examination if opposing counsel is asking leading questions during that time so their own witness and so the reason why you want to prevent these types of leading questions is because they assume the answers in the question for example if I were to ask you're watching a YouTube video correct the answer is yes or should be yes and if you're not paying attention hey focus up and all the witness would have to do and that type of direct examination would be to say yes yes yes yes yes that's why it's not allowed on cross-examination you can ask all the leading questions you want well within reason and please please don't make an objection to leading if somebody's on cross-examination now here's where things kind of get a little bit tricky there's an exception to ask them leading questions on direct examination the exception is if somebody's asking a question that's relatively foundational and not super important so if somebody's trying to get an exhibit admitted for example and they ask the leading question you recognize this document correct you probably don't want to stand up and object sometimes certain leading questions on direct examination are allowed or the judge lets it slide just to speed up the process a little bit more when it comes to the non important stuff but if the attorney is asking very important questions and those questions are leading then yes you do want to object now before you object you need to make a judgment call not only with leading objections but you need to make a judgment call with all objections on whether or not your judge will allow for speaking objections now speaking objections are basically the justification or indirect explanation to the jury about why you're objecting so you're gonna stand up look at the judge and provide your explanation right after you make the objection and the judge typically and is 99.9% gonna know exactly why you're objecting and exactly what the objection means and that's not just for leading us for all the objections across the board the reason why you want to provide that type of justification typically the judge knows this as well is because the jury is still listening and if the jury is listening they need to know exactly why you're preventing a question testimony or answer or just certain evidence you don't want the jury to be confused and you don't want to have the appearance that you're hiding evidence from them just because you think there's going to be harmful to your case if you explain to the jury in a very short sentence that follows the objection why this evidence is improper or why this evidence is unreliable and the jury will be on the exact same page as you and you'll maintain that credibility so if you stand up make the objection leading provide that simple justification say something along the lines of your honor opposing counsels feeding the answer to the witness I just asked the witness be able to testify something like that and the jury typically understands that the witness needs to be the one testifying not the lawyer and let's flip the script a little bit if the other side actually objects to you asking leading questions then first you need to determine whether or not you actually did if you didn't then explain that to the judge if you did then you may just want to own up to it and explain to the judge that you'll open up your questions from this point on or third if you did ask leading question but it was just foundational if it falls under that exception just explain to the judge and appeal to judicial economy that you're trying to just get through some boring parts as quickly as possible so you can get to the meat of the case and whenever you get to the meat of the case you'll open up the questions the judge typically understands that aspect of it and will give you a little bit of flexibility not but a little bit of flexibility ok so let's move on to the second objection this second objection is super-important objection speculation you never ever ever want an on expert witness to make a guess or to speculate about a fact that is the job of the jury and so if you haven't heard any type of foundational testimony or something that establishes that the witness has personal knowledge about what they're talking about and the witness is just kind of guessing or trying to put the puzzle pieces together for the jury then you need to object right away that's absolutely improper because those those guesses are one only going to be relevant when it comes to an expert testimony but that's mainly the job of the jury so stand-up object explain to the judge which is gonna be your indirect explanation to the jury that this witness has not laid down the foundation and is guessing now you may want to instruct if the answer has already come out and then you stand up and object may want to ask the judge to instruct the jury to disregard that testimony are to disregard that fact and that's gonna have to be a judgment call that you make it may or may not be necessary but if you want to be hyper-technical that may be something you want to do let's say you're on the flip side to where an attorney objects of speculation to your witness well first determine whether or not it's speculation if it isn't and then explain to the judge why it isn't if it is speculation and you realize that okay I do still a little bit and I skipped some foundational questions and we weren't able to establish that testimony explain to the judge that you'd be happy to ask those one or two extra questions and that way you can have that type of foundation and then you can go ahead and ask that question again that the attorney was objecting to and because at that point it shouldn't be speculative finally maybe it is speculation at that point you may just apologize to the judge ask you know to tell your witness I'm not asking to speculate or guess if you don't know just let me know you don't know but let's move on to this question and then ask that question all right moving on to number three so number two we talked about speculation when it comes from the witness but with number three we're talking about objection calls for speculation you want to make this objection if you can tell just by the question that's being asked that the witness has no other choice but to guess or to speculate and so you can basically head off any answer that the witness is going to make because the issue is and you know the saying you can't unring the bell if the witness speculates and even if the judge instructs the jury to disregard the fact the jury still still heard it and the fact is still kind of out there so you don't know with certainty whether or not the judge are the juries actually considering that particular fact for that particular gas for that particular speculation so if you hear the question being asked and you can tell from the get-go that foundation hasn't been laid that establishes the witness has this personal knowledge stand-up object calls for speculation and then simply explain that this question is going to lead to an answer that is going to be a guest basically and tell the judge that foundation hasn't been laid that establishes this personal knowledge now let's flip the script a little bit let's say that that objection is made to you again you have to determine whether or not it's gonna be proper whether or not you're asking the witness to speculate or if the foundation has been laid and if you ended up making a mistake or you try to get you know sneaked that one past the end the lawyer caught you then you may just say judge I can move on and then just ask the following question sometimes you can get away with it sometimes you can't and if the lawyer calls you out it's just best to go ahead and move on speaking of which let's move on to number four objection hearsay number four might be the shortest objection to say but when it comes to the details behind a hearsay objection it's an absolute monster there one is a question whether or not this hearsay is non hearsay and there are exceptions out the wazoo I don't know if people still say wazoo anymore but there are a ton of exceptions and so my recommendation is if you hear the witness talk about what somebody else said you need to object to hearsay and you need to put basically the pressure on the opposing counsel to be able to prove one of the millions exceptions or whether or not it's non hearsay also if a document is trying to be introduced by the other side and it has writing from somebody else or out of court statements are being made in that document and I again I recommend that you object to hearsay and you let the other side go ahead and prove why it should be admissible truthfully not a lot of lawyers are very confident in their hearsay knowledge when it comes to the rule of evidence and in particular hearsay they shudder at the idea of having to make a responsive argument to why something is not hearsay or to why it's an exception now I plan on releasing a video at some point down the road that's gonna break down hearsay a little bit better than I think a lot of people understand it but as of right now to keep this video as short as possible go ahead look at the hearsay rules look at the exceptions and just know that you can actually use the hearsay exception as the Thor hammer offensively by if waiting until you hear an out-of-court statement being brought in and putting the pressure on opposing counsel now again flipping the script if somebody makes the hearsay exception or the hearsay objection not exception in the pressures on you need to be able to determine okay is this non hearsay or is there an exception and then explain that to the judge the best way to prepare for this is to one talk to your witnesses and have a good idea about what your witnesses are going to talk about and if they're going to incorporate an out-of-court statement then you need to have in your back pocket a response if hearsay gets brought up as an objection also do the exact same thing with all the documents that you're going to get introduced into evidence in fact you should try and get the documents introduced before the trial even begins and see if you get any stipulations with that as well but overall if you're the one who's having to respond to hearsay you need to open up your Rules of Evidence book you need to get your rules of evidence and notes out from law school and you need to just basically have a refresher course and make sure your super sound and super comfortable because if they're just objecting hearsay and they don't really understand hearsay and you have a good response and then the judge turns back to the people who are objecting and the attorneys like it's all I got I can only object I don't really have a response and guess what you're looking real good at that point alright enough of that let's go ahead and move on to the next objection the fifth objection is objection asked an answer this is actually a really common objection that is used mainly whenever your witness is on the stand and opposing counsel is on cross-examination and is floundering or struggling with their cross-examination if opposing counsel is trying and this is normally when it happens if opposing counsel is trying to pin your witness down on a word on a particular answer or on a theme and your witness is just basically using synonymous words synonymous answers synonymous themes like your witness the same book but the opposing counsel wants that your witness to say novel and opposing counsel keeps asking in a hundred different ways and keeps getting the same exact answer and it's a legitimate answer and you may want to stand up you may want to object and you may want to explain that opposing counsel has asked the same question repeatedly different ways and keeps getting the same exact answer and that you ask that this court basically instruct opposing counsel to move move on and move along the judge is all about judicial economy the jury is all about judicial economy and typically that will get sustained now if your witness is dodging the answer and doesn't really have a good answer and you may want to actually make the objection knowing that you're going to lose the objection because while you make the objection and maybe have that little bit of a speaking objection that'll take the attention and that'll take your witness off the hot seat for a brief second and but that brief second can be all the witness needs to come up with a better answer and whenever you basically lose the objection and you sit down the witness has time to become more calm and collected the question gets asked again the witness has the answer boom you're moving on anyways alternatively if somebody makes that objection to you one you need to determine whether or not you got caught but - if the witness actually hasn't given a legitimate answer then you need to explain that to the to the judge and directly explain it to the jury that you're just trying to get the truth to a certain fact and the jury you know deserves to hear this truth and so you you know say you'll ask it one more time and then you ask that question and if the if the witness dodges it the witness isn't going to look very good in front the jury so let let the let the jury you know skulls the witness by determining the witness is incredible later on you don't have to always get the answer so get asked the question get the answer or don't get the answer either way if the witness is dodging that's going to be a win-win for you okay let's move on to the next objection objection number six is objection relevance and you need to keep in mind that facts are being introduced don't have to prove the whole case don't have to prove us a substantial amount of the case a relevant fact just needs to be one brick that's being laid and after all the relevant facts are laid out hopefully build a wall but the issue and the trickiness when it comes to relevance putting rule 403 and unfairly prejudicial aspects aside the issue is when you want to object to relevance because if you have a hair-trigger with the objection relevance you can come off as a jerk let's say opposing counsel on direct examination but to witness on the stand and it's just trying to introduce the witness to the jury and the witness's explaining that she's a teacher that's her job it's how she makes a living and even if that has nothing to do with the case you don't really want to object to early on by saying that the fact that she's a teacher is absolutely irrelevant instead wait a little bit and if opposing counsel sticks on some irrelevant issue for too long then stand up but I recommend be a little bit reluctant in your objection it's a little bit of theater to where you stand up you know you look at the judge say your honor I'm sorry but I have to object to relevance I was giving opposing counsel some leeway by asking questions about X Y & Z unfortunately I feel like we're getting hung up on this issue I just ask that you know we move on for the sake of judicial economy and then sit back down and then typically the judge is gonna you know agree with you but if the judge doesn't then I would just stay seated and wait for opposing counsel to go ahead and move on to the next issue because they're getting hung up on a certain issue that is it relevant and most likely the jury is tuning out they're not paying attention their eyes may or may not be closed who knows but if they're not paying attention whenever the opposing counsel does start talking about relevant facts they hopefully still aren't paying attention and that can be a good thing as well now on the flip side if opposing counsel objects to maybe your question or maybe to your witness saying that certain things are not relevant then explain to the judge that this is just one brick that's being late or just explain to the judge that this is just you know some type of introductory type of facts so the witness or the jury can get to know the witness or maybe you know bring the theatrics again but you know honestly having this reluctant apology if I say Your Honor I apologize I was just wanting the jury to understand that you know this witness is a teacher and you know really cares for X Y & Z and maybe kind of have a little bit of a mini closing argument that explains why this maybe not be relevant but at the same time opposing counsels being a jerk I don't know that's a little bit of rant it's a little bit of a tangent but hopefully that makes sense I think it makes sense anyways moving on to the next objection objection 7 is an objection argumentative now you're typically going to be using this objection when opposing counsel is crossing your witness and opposing counsel is floundering or isn't basically struggling because he or she is no longer asking leading questions but is almost testifying to where there is no question at the end of each statement that the lawyer is making they're just statements and I would maybe wait and hold back on making this objection because lawyers are giving a lot are given a lot of leeway during cross-examination a judge isn't quick to sustain a bad question on cross-examination but they will be quick to sustain bad question on direct examination so wait until it's obvious or wait until it's clear that your witness is basically being kind of beat up on the stand and then come to the defense of your witness Avengers Assemble sorry I couldn't resist that one they just came to me in the moment but that is a great opportunity if it gets to that much of an egregious nature to basically paint the picture that opposing counsels beating up on your witness juries don't like that at the same time if you stand up and make that objection and maybe it's not a super valid objection at the time or maybe it is either way that will give your witness some time to you know become more I guess you know cool and calm collected and think about exactly what they're gonna say whenever the spotlight goes back on them on the flip side if opposing counsel objects argumentative then you can either explain why or why it's not argumentative or just explain to the judge that you'll ask a follow-up question and then basically make the statement and just add a correct at the end of it or add a right at the end of it and you should be kosher and be be able to move on basically speaking of which let's move on to objection number eight so thus far we've talked about a lot of objections that you want to make to protect your witness whenever your witness is being cross-examined by a lawyer but this objection objection number eight which is objection non-responsive is most likely going to be used whenever you're cross-examining a witness and the witness is refusing to give an answer but you got to keep in mind since this is cross-examination this would be the one objection that comes to mind that the judge isn't going to give you a lot of leeway on because with cross-examination you have an advantage over the witness because one you're a trained lawyer but two you get to ask leading questions and so if you're not getting a particular answer from the witness that you're wanting and you need to use your judgment to where you need to determine so I just need to ask better questions don't do I need to ask more pointed questions or is the witness just absolutely dodging this question and refusing to answer this question now there's a little bit of a way to make the witness really you know shady and dodgy but that's gonna that's another video that'll take a little bit too much time for the sake of this video but at some point if the if you get the sense that this witness is just flat-out refusing to answer the question and then you need to stand up and say objection this witness is being non-responsive Your Honor I ask that you instruct the witness to answer the question typically the witness is always like what's the question and then be sure to have that question in your back pocket ask it the exact same way and then once you ask it hopefully at that point the witness is going to answer the question if not then the witness is gonna look real real bad in front of the jury and that's that's a win-win situation all right Ellen super-short let's go ahead and move on to the next objection objection number nine is objection compound again this is one that you're gonna typically make when opposing counsel is cross-examining you over witness and you especially want to make this when the question assumes basically two facts in the delivery of the question here's an example that makes that a little bit clearer if I were to ask you if I were to be cross-examining you you're watching a YouTube video correct that's one question that's one fact if I were to ask you're watching a YouTube video while sitting down correct now that's two facts within the same question and those two facts have yet to be established and so the issue and the confusion is okay if you answer yes are you answering yes to the fact that you're watching YouTube video or are you answering yes to the fact that you're sitting down or are you answering yes to both it's a little confusing for the jury and you want to make sure all the answers and all the facts are super clear to the jury so you always always always want to make that objection that way the record is super clear now if opposing counsel makes that objection to your question then you typically are gonna want to own up to it because honestly it's pretty obvious when compound questions are being asked and then just tell the judge that you'd be happy to break up the question into two parts you ask the first question okay you're watching a YouTube video correct and you follow up you're sitting down correct boom you have both facts you move on that's not really one you want to haggle out so let's go ahead and move on to the next objection we're on the last objection objection ten objection narrative and how many times that I just say objection way too many so this objection is most commonly used when opposing counsel is direct examining their own witness now this is a little bit of a tricky objection to make because it's one of those you know it when you see it or you know it when you hear it and it's also tricky because like relevance you don't want to have a hair-trigger and pull the you know the objection on this one too often or too quickly because you run the risk of coming off like a jerk so my recommendation is if you hear the witness go on a rant or tirade or is no longer answering the question that was asked then at that point you you may want to go ahead and make an objection simply stand up say Your Honor I hate to do this but I'm gonna have to object to narrative the witness is no longer answering the question that was asked so I just asked that opposing counsel be allowed to maybe follow up with another question at that point in time the judge you're appealing to his judicial economy he's all about that the jury understands exactly why you're objecting because if you were to stand up and pull you know the hair trigger a little bit too quickly or maybe a minute in or maybe you know just only one or two facts and to the witness's testimony the jury may find that very often they may think that you're trying to keep facts or the full story from them and they may not like that so my recommendation go ahead stand up and you know be kind of reluctant to make the objection overall these are the top 10 and most common trial objections that you need to have in your back pocket use it as Thor's hammer use it as the shield and you know that way you can go on the offensive and you go on the defensive and you'll be absolutely set for your next trial and don't forget to download the freebie which there we go got it working the 21 most common trial objections it's everything you need the link is down below don't forget to give this video a thumbs up and if you have any questions leave those in the comments don't forget to subscribe I think that's over here I'm still trying to get oriented with this whole YouTube thing again my name is Jared stone I'll see y'all in the next video you

Channel: Law Venture

Views: 32,572

Rating: 4.8463092 out of 5

Keywords: objections in court, hearsay objection, argumentative objections, court objections, objections in mock trial, trial objections and responses, objections in court examples, objections in court cheat sheet, deposition objections, mock trial objections, trial objections, trial objections cheat sheet, federal rules of evidence, FRE, FRE 401, responding to objections, objections, trial advocacy

Id: xU9g7XuCdGU

Length: 27min 2sec (1622 seconds)

Published: Thu May 09 2019