78. Refreshing Recollection and Impeachment, with John Farrell

In this episode, veteran trial lawyer John Farrell distinguishes between refreshing recollection and impeachment, two essential but sometimes conflated courtroom skills. Learn how to help your own witness recall facts on direct examination through refreshing recollection and how to effectively challenge an opposing witness on cross with a structured, high-impact impeachment technique. Packed with practical language and strategy (and a few demos along the way), this conversation offers clear guidance on when and how to deploy these important skills that every trial lawyer needs to master.Topics3:13    Difference between refreshing recollection and impeachment 4:54    What’s wrong with “I don’t know” during examination6:19    Using documents to refresh recollection7:24    What’s wrong with “would” during refreshing recollection8:41   Refreshing recollection demo10:13 A crucial step to remember13:21 The point of impeachment14:37 Step 1 of impeaching by prior inconsistent statement15:35 Demo17:52 Why you should sound disappointed18:50 Demo19:20 Steps 2–623:21 Demo27:21 Why impeachment better be worth the effort30:05 Your tone through impeachment33:16 Impeachment by omission40:49 Consequences of a bad impeachment41:56 Again, make impeachment worth your while44:16 Signoff questions Quote“The reason [impeachment] is so important is that if you decide to impeach and you don’t do it correctly or successfully, the witness has just been told they can lie all the time on the stand. You’ve lost control. If you do it really well the first time, and the next time they go off message, they say something else different, and [the witness goes], “Well, no, that’s not right. It was Fact C.” And [you] go, “I don’t think so. Let's go to your depo transcript.” [The witness will] go, “Okay, fine, fine, it was C,” because they don’t want to go through that again. So I think it’s an important tool.” John FarrellResourcesJohn Farrell (bio)Refreshing Recollection and Impeachment (article)Eight Steps for Handling Deposition Exhibits (podcast)Deposition articles (1, 2, 3)