Seven, Eight-Figure Verdicts. Nine Figure Settlement. So Why Attend Trial Skills Boot Camp?

Voice over (: 00:00

The most dangerous place you can be as a trial lawyer is to think you've got it figured out. I'm still trying to get better. I still have the passion for it. I believe in it. Everyone can learn to do what I do. And yet there's a group here that continues to get extraordinary verdict. Trial Lawyers University is revolutionizing, educating lawyers to be better trial lawyers. It's been invaluable to me. Trial Lawyers University, where the Titans come to train. Produced and powered by law pods.

Dan Ambrose (: 00:32

We got Sighi Shaket back here. It's been since mid-February when he was here for the inaugural podcast at the beach house when we had a small flood, but things have gotten back together, gotten things in shape here for his return. But because you did a bootcamp this week, Sigi.

Sagi Shaked (: 00:49

I did.

Dan Ambrose (: 00:49

Yes. And it's only about probably the seventh time that you've been scheduled to attend, but this time you did. So what was different about this reservation as to other six that you made in the past?

Sagi Shaked (: 01:02

This time, what was different? My son Tomer wanted to do the bootcamp with me and that I guess inspired me to want to do it.

Dan Ambrose (: 01:14

All right.

Sagi Shaked (: 01:15

And do it with him and then get to see him and see how motivated he is for this kind of stuff. So that's really what pushed me to do it.

Dan Ambrose (: 01:22

Okay. Because put it in context, your son Tomer just graduated from UCLA. Yes. And now he's going to be starting law school in Georgetown and apparently also would like to become a personal injury lawyer. So a trial lawyer.

Sagi Shaked (: 01:35

That's his plan. Yeah.

Dan Ambrose (: 01:36

That's the plan. All right. So we got a little. And what's our plan for Tomer with this training?

Sagi Shaked (: 01:43

So I'm looking for him to... I'm right now, it's 2026, so I'm a 26 year lawyer and doing the bootcamp for the first time. And obviously it's extremely insightful. I've tried cases, gotten seven finger verdicts, eight figure verdicts, settle case for nine figures. But what I'm trying to say is... Okay, go ahead.

Dan Ambrose (: 02:03

No, to give people the context because you've had a very successful career, obviously. So what are the highlights of that success, the cases and results you're most proud of?

Sagi Shaked (: 02:23

Yeah. So when looking at those results, but looking at what I learned over the week and how I can implement those changes and really put, we'll call it what you like to call it as putting the jury in a trance. I think learning that stuff earlier on and really being intentional about the stuff we learned at bootcamp can really make a difference when you're trying to persuade people. So I wish I had that knowledge when I first started practicing and not waited 26 years to get it. So going back to your question, my son who's getting it even before he's starting law school is huge for him in terms of what an advantage he's going to have compared to everyone else.

Dan Ambrose (: 03:09

And did I hear correctly he did do his 15 minutes of training this morning or yesterday morning?

Sagi Shaked (: 03:14

He did two

Dan Ambrose (: 03:14

Days in a row. Two days in a row because I always challenge people. I say, "Well, you just do 15 minutes a day of practicing the skills you just learned here. You will be legendary before you know it. "

Sagi Shaked (: 03:23

I think he's going to be the first one who is actually going to continue that 15 minutes.

Dan Ambrose (: 03:29

I can't wait because I hope we'd be the first law student to ever run workshops at a... Is it Ivy League school, Georgetown? Correct. Yeah. Ivy league. I mean, cool if it's a regular school, but I run bootcamps, training up and coming trial lawyers in law school. It should be pretty cool and really help him develop his skills. But I've found in the past that generally the bigger success, the higher results people have. A lot of times people are reluctant to train for ego, for, oh, I got this magic stuff. I don't want to mess with it or whatever the reason is. But I'm glad you finally made it here, Sighi. That's all I can say because we've been friends for a long time and trying to help you. Sighi had me watch him present on CVN about four or five years ago. And so we had a good barometer of where his performance skills were and I'm trying to help him ever since then.

(: 04:25

But finally we had our intervention. We had our intervention this week. And so

Sagi Shaked (: 04:30

Prior - I'll tell you, for me, the intervention came because I've known you, what, over 10 years now? Way more than that. 12 years. Yeah. And the intervention came when I was in trial and CVN was recording the trial. And right after my opening, I get a phone call or a text message from Dan and he's like, "Hey, I just saw your opening. Call me. " So we started talking about the opening and he's just giving me some ideas, but he didn't really want to critique me because he says he didn't want to throw me off. Obviously I like, I don't want to call it the criticism, but I like learning at all times. And so you gave me some pointers even at that point that helped me tweak and get better in terms of presenting. So I shouldn't have waited as many years as I did, but it's never too late.

Dan Ambrose (: 05:19

You were just waiting for me to get my skills honed fine tune so you're not coming here. Fed came here four years ago and he just finally came back after four years because four years ago after he did, he was like, "Oh, you got to step up your game before I come back, Dan." Well,

Sagi Shaked (: 05:34

Part of it was waiting for the TLU beach house to happen. Then I would come. Once you had the beach house, I knew I would come.

Dan Ambrose (: 05:41

The idea of being in Vegas in July just not that attractive. So you did a little bit of preparation before you got here. So tell us about your preparation and other people are thinking about coming to bootcamp. What your advice for them would be?

Sagi Shaked (: 05:59

So it requires a lot of preparation if you want to get the most out of it when you come here. Now that I did the bootcamp, you really have to put in your time and just, I know you train with people and you're what, six weeks out you do it before?

Dan Ambrose (: 06:14

Typically about six

Sagi Shaked (: 06:16

Zooms. So if Dan's telling you to do it in terms of the training, let's say one chunk at a time, I really wouldn't wait. I'll tell you what happened to me. I would wait till the night before, and I'm sure other people would also wait till the night before they would record. And sometimes you get tired because obviously we're busy. We have work, family, other things coming up, potentially a trial deposition and you put this on the back burner. But if you really want to get better, what I would say is really take the time about two weeks before you start doing that first Zoom to record yourself, watch yourself, check it against the exemplar so you can really see what you're doing wrong and you really won't know it until you actually attend a bootcamp because no matter how many times Dan corrects you on the Zoom, you're still not going to get it right.

(: 07:06

But eventually you start seeing that the progress you're making and the progress I've made, and I think everyone that attended here the last five days tremendous. I mean, you really see how you've changed or I've changed and they've changed as a speaker. And in terms of presenting and just feeling more confident about being intentional about what we're trying to do.

Dan Ambrose (: 07:28

The day one. So Monday, day one, we start out with cross-examination. And from a training standpoint, we start with cross because I think the cross of the defense medical expert, I think it's one of the greater things that we've developed here at TLU for teaching the skills of cross-examination as opposed to the substance. And so the skills are leading questions only, one new fact per question/looping to cross-examine in the present tense. That forces you the question to visualize it causes a witness to visualize it and more important than us, a jury to actually visualize the story. Dropping the taglines like right, correct, true. Isn't it true? That's a real tough one for a lot of people. And dropping all the filler words because all the excessive baggage words and using a flip chart effectively, which means writing legibly one topic per page. Right. And bringing the jury in, making eye contact with them on a big point.

(: 08:36

Being in control of your voice, slowing down, control it training your breath. For a lot of people it's keeping their voices up. So many lawyers get quiet. It's the most strange thing I've ever seen, but when you're not certain about what you're doing, a lot of times in training you're not, many people tend to get a little quieter. And so those are really the skills of cross. And so on that first day we did it and we do it kind of like a follow the leader. So it's doctor, you're a board certified medical expert. And then the student would do the same thing and I'd correct them on their hand movement, their state, their breathing, their voice and have them do it again. And so what was your takeaway from the first half day of cross training?

Sagi Shaked (: 09:24

So doing the actual training and being the lawyer is helpful, number one, obviously, because we get to do it in practice. But also being the witness where someone else is the lawyer and delivering it, you can start seeing how effective it can be. And then sitting there and watching someone else do it. Now you're getting it from the jury's perspective and you can see how the person connects, meaning the questioner, the lawyer, how that person is connecting. So there's just so many different angles. We get it at the bootcamp that it really helps you understand why. And then the whole setup totally makes sense. And again, I've been doing this for 26 years and across numerous doctors, a bunch of different experts, and you really see how the setup can work for any type of expert really. And it makes sense. It gets people in the right frame.

(: 10:16

This is what's going to happen. So I like that.

Dan Ambrose (: 10:20

Yes. And it draws a line in the sand because you're basically calling the expert dishonest without saying it because you wouldn't be asking the questions in the way that you are if in fact you didn't have the goods on the person. I mean, if you don't have impeachments, you would never do this cross. It'd be crazy. And so the first morning we did cross and we all worked on it and things started to get the rhythm, got more comfortable. When you say as the witness though, because I think as a witness then, because the idea is lock in with the witness. And so as a witness, I think what you're saying is you can feel yourself more locked in or more entranced by the questioner because they make eye contact because their hand is up in front, just below their chin in between the two of you.

(: 11:08

I think that's what you -

Sagi Shaked (: 11:09

Right. What I also mean though is when you're the examiner or the questioner or the lawyer and you start having the witness where you're talking about, boom, we're going to talk about impartial and objective. As a witness, your eyes are just gravitating to where the hand movement is going. It sort of locks you in. Unconsciously, you don't have a choice but to do that, which I think is very powerful because it gets people into that trance we're talking about.

Dan Ambrose (: 11:39

The connection. And then in that afternoon we practiced the opening statement of the truck versus motorcycle wrongful death case. We'd practiced that a bit prior to coming here. So what were your takeaways from your performance skills training?

Sagi Shaked (: 11:56

So the performance skills could always be better when you get the lines better, right? Which means work, work, work. You got to work and really know your lines and it helps. But then really understanding when you're putting the opening statement and creating those visuals or for example, when you use a verb like if I do this, he's driving. No one's going to pay attention. It's not congruent. And one of the things we learned when he's driving and your eyes are moving with the verb or the word you're using, it really, again, has people connecting to that. And they're watching you and they're following what your hand movement is doing. And suddenly they don't even know they're doing it because I saw it from the witness side, I saw it from the examiner side, and then I felt it from the juror side sitting there and listening.

(: 12:47

You start seeing what's happening.

Dan Ambrose (: 12:49

Right. Why, because people always want to come here and work on their own cases right away. And I tell them, look, we got to master the skills of performance, of connection, of cross. And if not master them, get a really good solid working ability with them before we work on your case. Because then you can apply these newfound skills to your case, which is by everybody doing the same cross, everybody doing the same opening statement, that way you're getting repetition and the people that are going before you are modeling for you what you should be doing and the coaching that they're getting, you're seeing the mistakes they're make. And so you're making adjustments in your mind on your own performance. And the people that go after you, you're always engaged because there is a best practices to being a presenter. And now you start to understand what they are.

(: 13:43

You start to look for them and you start to see what and experience what it feels like when they're not fouled. For example, when people are looking past you or looking at the floor instead of making eye contact with you, or if their hands are going all over the place and making fists and doing the weird things people's hands do instead of relaxed and out front between you and them at the appropriate height. I mean, it just makes a difference. And I think when you can experience the difference, it's one thing to talk about it, understand it theoretically. But when you experience it, I think it really drives it home for the learning

Sagi Shaked (: 14:15

Part.

Dan Ambrose (: 14:16

Not

Sagi Shaked (: 14:16

Only that, you have whether it's opening or cross, people tend to speed up and they talk fast. And then when you're in the heat of a courtroom, everything goes faster. Or if the judge is upset and the judge tells you speed it up, now instead of slowing it down, you're flying. And we've got to remember that a lot of our jurors, they can't handle that cognitive load. Or if you speak too fast, they may miss a word or a two and there you go. Now they're not getting exactly what you're trying to communicate. So getting comfortable being uncomfortable, right? Getting comfortable presenting and practicing and again presenting. And then what you do really well is you give us a chance to present whether we're doing the cross or the opening or direct or whatever it is we're doing in trial. And you get to watch it.

(: 15:05

And then you realize and you say, whoa. We get to watch

Dan Ambrose (: 15:08

It because

Sagi Shaked (: 15:08

We

Dan Ambrose (: 15:08

Videotape

Sagi Shaked (: 15:09

It, play it back. You videotape it and then you're watching it on the big screen right there and you're looking at yourself and you're saying, "That's what I did." Can you imagine what a jury's thinking? So even if you are videotaping yourself and you're watching yourself, you may not know what to look for because we're not our own best critic, I guess. When you have a coach, why does everybody have a coach? Tom Brady has a coach. All the greats have coaches because that's how you get better. So Dan is the coach. Coach Dan here.

Dan Ambrose (: 15:40

Teaching

Sagi Shaked (: 15:41

Us to get better.

Dan Ambrose (: 15:42

Dan the trial coach is my Instagram. Dan the trial coach. Is

Sagi Shaked (: 15:45

That interesting? Yeah. I didn't know that.

Dan Ambrose (: 15:47

That is. I know. I'm not too big on social media. I need to work on that game. June 2nd through 5th, 2027. Join all of us back at TLU Beach at the Pacea Hotel. We're going to have more learning and fun than ever before. We're going to have six lecture tracks, eight workshop tracks. We're going to have a golf outing. We're going to have theme parties, dinner parties every night, the Satchel Island Wild West party, the '80s tracksuit dinner party followed by the '80s tracksuit pool party. And finally we're going to fish it all off with the Opreski rooftop party. So if you want new friends, you want great food and you want great learning and change your life, join us at TLU Beach. And then the second day we still continue to work on cross, but we also combined the new skills that we learned in the cross to the truck driver opening to do an example cross-examination of the defendant truck driver.

(: 16:50

Whereas we're simply just retelling the story one leading question at a time, the same story as you did before. So what were your takeaways from that exercise?

Sagi Shaked (: 17:01

So when we talk about the opening, for example, and we're given the opening and it's not just think about it as like you're listening to the radio or you're watching TV. People would rather watch a sports game on TV than listen to it on the radio. You have to get the jury involved with everything, whether it's the cross-examination, the direct or opening or any part of the trial, getting the jury involved is something that I always did, but here after taking the bootcamp, you just become a lot more intentional. I'll give you an example. When initially you're micro-connecting with the jury, even before you're saying good morning. Now, obviously that's not all we're learning here. That's just one little piece of 500 things we learned, right? But it's more than the one

Dan Ambrose (: 17:49

To say good morning properly when you have a warm face

Sagi Shaked (: 17:53

Instead

Dan Ambrose (: 17:53

Of

Sagi Shaked (: 17:55

Some strange

Dan Ambrose (: 17:55

Face.

Sagi Shaked (: 17:56

And practicing that and then going on the video and saying you think you're a warm face, but when you watch it, it's not really a warm face. So you really have to get intentional. And then also when you have, for example, the inquisitive face like, what? If you don't do that at certain times during the cross-examination or the direct examine or even an opening, you want to get the jury feeling the right emotion at the right time. Having a smiley face, I smile all the time, but having a smiley face for something that's not really smiley and should be inquisitive, that's a big problem. So those are things we work on. So it's not just words being a wordsmith. Obviously we have to work on our cadence. And that's important too. You learn that too. Pausing. There's so many things that you can read in a book and it sounds great and you think you can do it.

(: 18:45

Sort of like playing basketball. I think we spoke about this. Go out there. Steph Curry makes it look super easy, right? Everybody can hit a three pointer. 10 in a row, right and then try to hit even one, right?

Dan Ambrose (: 18:56

Yep.

(: 18:58

Need a lot of reps. So on the second day, we continue to work on the performance skills and the set pieces, but also combine the cross-examination with the defendant truck driver cross. And so this way we're learning how to, because I should just backtrack a little bit. In the opening statement, the key skills to master, to become great at presenting openings are of course appropriate eye contact, which when you got 12 or 14 people, be able to microconnect and look at each person's eyes just for a moment so they get comfortable making eye contact with us and training ourselves to make eye contact with somebody before we start talking to them. When we use our hands when we're talking, we've talked to one person to keep our hand in between ourselves and that one person and move our hand with the rhythm of our voice a few inches below that person's chin in line though.

(: 19:49

So that way the hand is also using as a connector to the face and being in control of our emotional state. So as you were saying, somebody say good morning to have a warm face to ask an inquisitive face or whatever it is, because in an opening statement, your emotional state should match the emotional state of the character you're referring to. So in the truck and driving case, we talk about truck or time realizing in fact that he's killed somebody. Well, it's going to be a tone of some probably remorse and fear. And that's the tone somebody would most likely have if they just killed somebody even in an accident. And so we'll start to learn those skills, but then to... Oh, and also to make things become three dimensional because one of the greatest things I think people take away from is the ability to create space, to create the illusion of movement.

(: 20:46

Because when there's a verb, there has to be movement or else it's just the narrative. And if there's movement, you have to create space. You have to create the illusion of movement. And so to take those skills and now apply them because of the defense medical expert, that's an expert cross. That's not a fact-based cross. It's not a substantive cross, like a witness cross. But then by doing the truck driver cross, because in fact, so it'd be like trucker Sigi, now I want to talk to you about the day when you're driving south. And it creates south on US 411. Okay?

Sagi Shaked (: 21:30

Okay.

Dan Ambrose (: 21:32

When you're driving south and there's a map here and you pull out the freeway and you stop right here and you wait. So it's basically doing the same movements and stuff as the opening statement in the cross-examination with the use of visuals and engaging, basically retelling the story through the witness, but to create the illusions of movement, the illusion and the focus of the eyes instead of just most people when you got up and did the cross, most people just in the narrative when they're in the cross. The idea of creating space, creating illusion movements never... I mean, look how experienced you are. And most likely these things never cross your mind. I mean, I see so many great lawyers and the greatest of it never crosses your mind, which is -

Sagi Shaked (: 22:15

And not only that, it didn't cross your mind, but it also is extremely difficult to do no matter how intentional you are if you don't practice. I mean, yes, I got better over the last five days, but it's still really difficult. It's going to require a lot of my time, attention and practice to continuously get better. I want to get better because if I'm not getting better, I'm getting worse. So I constantly want to get better. That's why I did the bootcamp.

Dan Ambrose (: 22:40

But now I think I have the ability to get better exponentially, not incrementally, frankly. I think many people would practice if they had something to practice. But frankly, up to these methodology, because I went to the Trial Lawyers College for 12 years and it was great and I had made a lot of great friends, but there was no methodology, a system to practice. And so just be yourself, just do the psychodrama and just do whatever feels comfortable. Well, you don't learn a skill by doing whatever's comfortable. You learn a skill by forcing yourself to do what that's uncomfortable by doing it enough times that it feels comfortable now. And so now it feels like you don't have to think about doing it. So you got to practice.

Sagi Shaked (: 23:25

And then definitely we, I didn't mean to cut you off, but we definitely practice. I mean, we would start at 8:00 AM and say it in. If we're lucky, we got to end at seven o'clock, sometimes 7:30.

Dan Ambrose (: 23:38

I think 6:30 is more appropriate. Maybe one or two one night, maybe seven. We got a little carried away. We're having fun though. But no, because when you guys are here, people come here, they come here for change. And I think most people's natural state is to relax, especially you're at the beach. I mean, it's pretty nice out there. I mean, we're sitting here doing podcasts right now and the neighbors across the way are having a party and we look out the window and there's multiple volleyball games going on. There's a lot of distractions here. That's why we got to stay focused while we're here. Keep the mind sharp.

Sagi Shaked (: 24:09

We're in the dojo for 10 hours, that's for sure. That's

Dan Ambrose (: 24:12

Right.

Sagi Shaked (: 24:12

Actually, we do take the nice lunch.

Dan Ambrose (: 24:14

Take a nice lunch, go out to the ocean, walk around the ocean, get some great food. So yes, we do take a great lunch. But on the third day, that's when we start working on people's cases and everybody brings a case because this way it's a truly legitimate case expense. I mean, we're talking a little bit about your case because you're working on, you got a trial coming up in a few days. And it's a typical intersection crash case. So what were your big takeaways from that session?

Sagi Shaked (: 24:51

So from the session specifically related to my case, because everybody brought their own case.

Dan Ambrose (: 24:56

But also other people's because you're learning from your case, but I think you learn a lot from other people's cases because that he had a trip and fall and we had other kinds of cases too.

Sagi Shaked (: 25:07

But really it was to create or use the imagination to create the space and create the images while you're presenting. So you being a person that can create the image for the jury to see and really understand. And I think that goes a long way in being persuasive with a jury. That was one of the most important things that I learned that if I can get really good at that, the jury will understand it a lot better. It's not just words. You need to mix in the words with the images, the space, the movements.

Dan Ambrose (: 25:45

Right. But creating the illusion of an intersection, that took a little creativity, but I think we got it pretty solid. And I think that I'm excited to see this next case hopefully be on courtroom network. I'm

Sagi Shaked (: 26:00

Excited to use it. That

Dan Ambrose (: 26:01

Would be great. Some of the crosses that we're going to work. But after we did everybody's opening, I think in the afternoon we started doing the cross-examinations of your defendant driver. Again, applying the same skills that we learned previously. So what takeaways did you have from that?

Sagi Shaked (: 26:24

That one again, space I think is the most important. And then also slowing down. Because sometimes you see people, at least when they're doing cross, they're getting a little aggressive or going too fast. We want to slow down and practice slowing down, practice more control, practice the pausing. Let the power of a pause and that silence, especially for example, if a witness doesn't want to answer and you keep them there for a while before you ask them for that response. There's just so much to learn. And again, I've been doing this for a long time, but you really can get intentional about what you're doing. How using, for example, even with the direct or cross of the driver, using the flip chart and keeping them in anticipation from when you're writing, for example, number one, you write out the word and then you have number two, you just leave it there, that anticipation of what people are going to expect.

(: 27:20

They want to know what's next. They're looking forward to it. So those are kind of things that we never think about. They don't teach you that in law school. And unless you've taken numerous classes on presentation and persuasion and understanding all that, which I don't think there are many classes on that or any - The

Dan Ambrose (: 27:37

Problem is they got judges and prosecutors teaching them and they're not the most persuasive people.

Sagi Shaked (: 27:41

Right. You mean in law school stuff? In law school. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Dan Ambrose (: 27:44

In law

Sagi Shaked (: 27:44

School. So this is different. That's why I wanted Tomer to do it because he's got a head start now on becoming a, we'll call it an assassin in the courtroom.

Dan Ambrose (: 27:55

A head start? Nobody's had a head start like this head start. I mean, it's ridiculous. And he was great because he was, as any young person tend to get a little distracted, like, Tomer, focus. He's like, okay, got

Sagi Shaked (: 28:12

It. Who volunteered first all the time?

Dan Ambrose (: 28:15

No, he's like, "Let me do it. " Because he didn't say it, but I think in his mind he was pretty confident he was better than all the lawyers here, which is great. You got to be confident in this game. There's no, you can't teach confidence. And so I love the confidence. I'm like, "Let's go, buddy. Let's go. " So it was great having him here and I can't wait to see his development over the years and look forward to working with him again next summer because see where he's at. Well, we'll see what those 15 minutes a day looked like, that's for sure. But then on the fourth day we had an actual witness come here because we were working on witness prep and direct. So I'm doing a trial with my buddy Steve King on a civil rights case in Bakersfield for this poor fellow that got to live in shit beat out of him by the Bakersfield PD.

(: 29:02

I know that's shocking. Such a civilized place that they would beat up an innocent Uber driver and it was a mistake. It was just a mistake.

Sagi Shaked (: 29:11

Just mistake to take that baton and smash it into him and bust his face and his legs. Yeah, just a mistake.

Dan Ambrose (: 29:16

Just a mistake. Just a mistake. So what did you learn from witness prep?

Sagi Shaked (: 29:20

So we'll go back. We started the witness prep early in the morning, which I thought was really interesting, before you even addressed the actual case, you wanted to get the witness into a frame of mind of understanding what they're going to do. Not necessarily tell them, "Hey, this is a deposition or this is a trial." Trying to find their, for example, in his case, a happy moment in their life and having them describe that. Relive it. Relive things we don't describe it. And try to get to that point. And while it was very frustrating, I think with, or watching you do it was frustrating... Thing to me. And I think you were frustrated because he was having a hard time trying to find that happy moment in his life. Just for the record

Dan Ambrose (: 30:07

Though, I wasn't frustrated. I was more fascinated, but- But

Sagi Shaked (: 30:13

He didn't have a happy moment in his life. Well,

Dan Ambrose (: 30:15

And people say, "I don't have a happy moment in my life." I'm like, "You have to have some because you'd probably kill yourself by now, but you just have to work with everybody where they're at." And it was challenging. And then him retelling his happy moment, what was his happy moment

Sagi Shaked (: 30:30

Again? Harry

Dan Ambrose (: 30:31

Potter

Sagi Shaked (: 30:32

Ride.

Dan Ambrose (: 30:32

A Harry Potter ride was his happiest moment. I was like, "Okay, well..."

Sagi Shaked (: 30:36

I just think he said whatever because he just wanted to... But watching that and then taking it to the next step, then you're like, "Okay, I'm thinking, what is he doing? When are we going to get to the case?" Eventually after that, going through that exercise. But

Dan Ambrose (: 30:53

Then once I played the video back for him and showed him when he's actually transporting, usually when he's just remembering, because there's things to look for. For example, if there's a verb in any story, there's movement. If a person's really transported, their hands will move simultaneous with the action. Or if there's any emotion, for example, something's frightening or something, we will experience their fright. But if they're just remembering, they'll say it was really scary because they know they're not feeling scared. Or they talk about another character, let's say their child and their six-year-old daughter, and they're teaching them how to do something and their faces don't light up. Well, that's the person who's just remembering because if their little daughter was just right there saying in front of them, six years old, I'm pretty sure

Sagi Shaked (: 31:37

If they're

Dan Ambrose (: 31:38

A normal human being, their face would light up. And so they just look for things where they're not transporting and try to coach him into it and then go to the next story, which was a story of him getting beat. Fortunately, we have some videos and photographs of it, so we can really appreciate what these cops did to this poor man. But I think we saw a noticeable

Sagi Shaked (: 32:02

Improvement. A 180 is an understatement for what he was able to do and how he was able to communicate. Going through that exercise, you put him through the exercise and again, I didn't think it would work at first, but then when you start having him tell the story, you start seeing someone completely different and the story really resonated. One, the story, it's a horrible story, right?

Dan Ambrose (: 32:24

Right.

Sagi Shaked (: 32:24

But the way he tells it really resonates with someone.

Dan Ambrose (: 32:27

Well, because he's transported. He's back to reliving it. And if he's reliving it, we're reliving it with him.

(: 32:34

February 18th through 21st, 2027, it's the Philip Miller Advanced Deposition College. Philip is gathering some of the greatest trialers in the country to teach with him in small group format. It's going to be limited to 90 participants. It's going to be back at the Paseo Hotel in Huntington Beach. So if you want to ramp up your deposition skills, get registered today, trialersuniversity.com. So then after we did his prep and we did his practice and then I changed and took the witness prep and we did a direct examination exercise with him. But then we all took turn, the rest of the day took a lot of practice being both him, the witness and the lawyer. And we'd have people team up, basically one person would be the witness, other people the lawyer, then they switch and go for about 10 minutes at a time or so.

(: 33:31

And so what was your takeaways from that exercise?

Sagi Shaked (: 33:35

For that exercise specifically, just like the other ones, again, creating the space, creating the imagery, the illusions of what was going on because imagine if we didn't have the video. So that's what we were doing without having the video, what happened when he got hit from behind and then goes to the floor and then he sees the boot. So all that stuff, really bringing it to life, but practice bringing it to life because it just doesn't happen automatically or at least not for me and not anyone else in the group automatically. I think after doing it for a while, it becomes a lot better of an image or illusion that we're trying to create.

Dan Ambrose (: 34:17

Yeah. We do the witness prep and the whole goal of the witness prep is to get the witness to transport, to teach them how to transport back in time and space to relive the events that they suffered. And obviously most people when they suffer trauma, bury it. And they don't want to relive it. They don't want to re-experience it, but our goal, let's get them there. But then we have to get them to be able to take that and make it a question and answer format and get them to be able to go there, transport basically on their own command in front of people and to relax, let go. But also how important is as a witness when you're playing the witness to really imagine the story that you just watched. But as a lawyer to be focusing on the witness and imagining the story too, so that way you have the right emotional congruence because so many lawyers are just reading the questions up and not listening.

(: 35:15

If you don't listen, you will never be in rapport with them emotionally. And it just doesn't make any sense if somebody's traumatizing experience, you're like, "Okay, so what happened next?"

Sagi Shaked (: 35:25

And that looping as well and that kind of stuff.

Dan Ambrose (: 35:28

Well, but also to practice the looping and to practice the listening too, because the general stuff that I train people on the direct is basically on chunking. I tell people facts of a case are sort of a piece of a jigsaw puzzle because a lot of times people's answers were too short. We'd videotape and show it. But when the witness answers too short, they never really get into a little piece of a story. Whereas I think the ideal length of an answer is roughly 30 to 45 seconds. And the metaphor is like facts of a case are sort of like pieces of a jigsaw puzzle. And we've all done a jigsaw puzzle. And so we know that one piece by itself has no meaning. It's only in connection with the pieces around it that starts to form somewhat of a picture. And then you put those pictures together, see what they look like in front of a box and you start to get the image, you get the picture.

(: 36:24

And that's what the facts, one fact by itself is meaningless, but in connection with other facts for a chunk of information, those chunks of information combined equal the story of the case. And then sometimes people give too big a chunks. And I also tell them the facts of a case are sort of like me and pizza. I love pizza, but if I shove a whole slice of my mouth at once, I'm going to choke on it. And with little practice,

(: 36:52

I think people got a lot better at the direct and obviously you got to practice it. So hopefully everybody will go home and practice. Hopefully Feddy and Dave, when they're back at home, will be practicing because Dave's got a trial next week and me and King got this trial. We're learning lots. This trial learning is truly live, truly live.

Sagi Shaked (: 37:10

Not only that, we do the debriefs every day.

Dan Ambrose (: 37:12

Oh yeah. The top three things we learned today to really sit back and reflect. Okay, what did we learn today? What did we learn today? Then of course went out great dinners every night here in Hermosa, walking around.

Sagi Shaked (: 37:24

It's a beautiful beach now. It is. And the weather, there's no humidity. I know I'm from Miami, so we have that humidity issue, especially in the summer. And here it's amazing place to be.

Dan Ambrose (: 37:36

We have a Claude Bootcamp coming up on AI with Shimia Fagan and her partner Matthew. I think it looks like August 18th and 9th. I'm really excited about that because I am the most unsophisticated AI person that I think is in the legal profession. And so

Sagi Shaked (: 37:55

If I - We got to get you up to speed then.

Dan Ambrose (: 37:57

Well, they're going to get me up to speed. But if I'm going to be able to learn to use this stuff to hopefully do a lot, I think everybody's going to be able to learn. And so I'm looking forward to that. And then we've got Satch Oliver coming August 24th through 28th with Philip Miller and Stoke because that one's all sold out. So that way we got 10 participants and five jurors coming. So that's going to be fantastic. And then we got - A lot of learning. I know I'm waiting. I'm excited. We got to get your TBI bootcamp on the schedule down in Miami.

Sagi Shaked (: 38:27

We're going to put that on.

Dan Ambrose (: 38:28

We're working on that, working that. But I got Michael Cowan and Eric Oliver in October. Joe Frieden, Joe Kamerlang on booking in December. I think we're also going to do the... Trucking. I think we're also going to go on trucking. I didn't say trucking.

Sagi Shaked (: 38:40

Said booking.

Dan Ambrose (: 38:41

You know what? That was definitely a misspeak. I think everybody understood that booking meant trucking. No I'm sites for all these because it's so great to work with your great lawyers, but then we're doing one September 8th through 12th where it's just me and Georgio and just doing reps like we did here. But we got a lot of reps in it in five days.

Sagi Shaked (: 39:02

We did.

Dan Ambrose (: 39:02

It's just like four or five of us. A lot of reps. We just did our conference in Huntington Beach about a month and a half ago and we taught a lot about TBI there. So what was the highlight of that conference for you? Other than your... Well, your TBI class, that was the second year in a row because it's on TLU On Demand and if you don't have TLU On Demand and you want to try it out for 30 days, shoot me a text or an email and I will send you a code, but go on.

Sagi Shaked (: 39:32

I think the ability to share the knowledge that I've gained over the years because I see it a lot with lawyers where insurance companies will take advantage of lawyers. So I kind of want to be that equalizer. Let me help share my knowledge and give back because I went to conferences and learned from other lawyers when I was younger. And so this is my opportunity to help other lawyers get better, share my knowledge so we all get on the same playing field basically. So we talked about how to intake a TBI case, what to look for, why a TBI is different than for example, an orthopedic spinal case. Because when I was a young lawyer, what I would do is I would just look for the orthopedic cases. And I'm pretty sure when I was younger, I missed a bunch of TBI cases. And when we're talking about TBI, we're talking about mild traumatic TBI.

(: 40:24

I'm not talking about one where I have a trial coming up where a portion of the guy's skull is missing and they took out a portion of his brain. That's a different type of TBI case. I think everyone can see that visually. We're talking about the case that the person looks like you and I. They're normal from the physical outward appearance, but inside there's something going on that's not working right. And so it's our job to be able to communicate that and help the jury understand, or most of the time most cases aren't getting tried, right?Help the adjuster understand we're doing it differently here. This isn't your average person or your average lawyer taking on an ortho case. We're treating this. What I tell everyone, and I didn't make this up, I learned this. A TBI case is like a wrongful death case. The person that the family knew prior to the crash is now a completely different human being.

(: 41:17

And so some people have, depending on if you have a frontal lobe injury, they're emotionally different. And so you have the family members come in and explain how they're emotionally different. So we walk through intake, how to work up a case, how to get your evidence, the mountain of evidence that we need to put on our case. Then we talked about direct examination. We talked about the neurologist, the neuropsych, the radiologist, and then we went all the way through trial. So we kind of in about an eight hour span, we go through it. I mean, obviously it could probably be a three-day class if I really broke it down and went in detail. If we had that

Dan Ambrose (: 41:55

Kind

Sagi Shaked (: 41:55

Of time. If I had the time and if we had that time -

Dan Ambrose (: 41:58

If we had the time.

Sagi Shaked (: 41:58

We would do it. But it gives them a good outlook and a good outline. And again, I share information. I'm not hiding it. The presentation's on TLU. I want people to get better. There's plenty of articles that I talk about that are on the presentation. If you want, you can email me or just it's on TLU anyways. What's your email? Sagi, that's S-A-G-I@shakedlaw.com. So I love helping people. I want people to get better and we're all in it together. It's us against them. They've got an unlimited amount of money and they're willing to spend it to screw our clients right. So we have to work together. And part of what you're doing is amazing, putting this package together of amazing lawyers who want to help and give back.

Dan Ambrose (: 42:50

TLU On Demand is the library for trial. You catch everything you missed over the last six years and we've collected all the pleadings, transcripts and PowerPoints for all these cases and presentations from Las Vegas, New York and from right here at the Pasaia. And it's an ap for your phone and there's a DAN GPT feature on the desktop so you can search the entire database for exactly what you're looking for when you need it. If you're not a subscriber, you can call me on my cell phone or text me 248-808-3130 and I will send you a 30-day comp code so you can try it at no risk. And then finally you will see what you've been missing out on for all these years. All right. So we're going to finish this program off. I'm going to demonstrate the defense medical expert cross because I think I've gotten better at it.

(: 43:42

I used to do it probably the last time I did it was maybe close to a year ago, but I'm going to do it again right now. Sound good, Dr. Shaked? Sounds like a fair end. So I'm going to do it one chunk at a time, then I'm going to explain the chunks. So it's doctor, you're a board certified medical expert.

Sagi Shaked (: 44:00

True.

Dan Ambrose (: 44:01

To become board certified, this requires advanced education. True?

Sagi Shaked (: 44:10

True.

Dan Ambrose (: 44:11

This education, it takes place both during medical school and after you get out.

Sagi Shaked (: 44:17

Correct.

Dan Ambrose (: 44:19

But while you are in medical school, you do take classes.

Sagi Shaked (: 44:23

Yes.

Dan Ambrose (: 44:24

One of the classes that you take is on how to conduct a proper medical evaluation.

Sagi Shaked (: 44:30

Yes.

Dan Ambrose (: 44:32

So that's segment one. So basically the basic skills we're learning is to say, it's usually say doctor, we have an inquisitive face or it could be same as an intense face, like I'm interested face. So it's doctor and the hand comes up just underneath my chin in a nice relaxed way after I make eye contact with you. I don't say doctor until I have eye contact with you. Then I inhale because I'm training my breathing. Then as I move my hand, as I talk, I move my hand out. You are a board certified. And I pause. I not only pause, but inhale, medical expert. And then when I do the last part, medical expert, I open my hands up. Hand up so kind of fingertips point towards you. Raise my eyebrows. Hold it just for a moment, but my voice doesn't rise though it just stays flat, but it's like assertive.

(: 45:17

Medical expert, pause, drop. So those are the main skills. And then the looping to become board certified. This requires advanced education. And then doing things in the present tense causes you to visualize it, causes a witness to visualize, it allows the jury to. This education, it takes place both during medical school and this is also glance control. So this is the first time I looked away from the witness at my hand, but he looks down at my hand, the jury looks at my hand. I require it back towards my face. Then reset, I say, and after you get out. And so those are really the key skills that we learn there because we have to build these one at a time. And so in training, everybody does that one round so nobody's sitting around too long. Then we go into the second segment, which is the right way because it's the right way versus the wrong way to do a medical evaluation.

(: 46:08

So doctor, you're trained that a proper medical evaluation, it must be impartial. Correct. And I have my flip chart here blank, but pre-written proper. Of course, we pre-wrote these here so that way it would be a little faster to do this. So I would have proper pre-written. And then I write number one, impartial in capital letters. Then I would just put a number two there and leave this blank, but that way it causes curiosity. And now I'm going to define impartial because every word has different meanings, depends upon context, right?

(: 46:46

So in the context of this trial with the expert witness and the trial lawyer, what do I want the jury to understand to be impartial to be? By impartial, what we mean is that you're not an advocate for either side.

Sagi Shaked (: 46:59

True.

Dan Ambrose (: 47:02

Doctor, you're trained that a proper medical evaluation must not only be impartial, but it must also be objective.

Sagi Shaked (: 47:14

Correct.

Dan Ambrose (: 47:15

So then I write down objective, capital letters, then I put a number three. Now I'm going to define objective. By objective, what we mean is that you don't cherry pick the evidence to support a desired opinion. True?

Sagi Shaked (: 47:33

True.

Dan Ambrose (: 47:34

And in training, you want your witness not to answer every question. So it forces you to train your listening and that way you're more engaged too because listening is the key to cross. And then of course I put a number three to keep the jury interested by little Brent Crubs. Doctor, you are trained that a proper medical evaluation must not only be impartial and objective. So this is called glance control. When I look, the jury looks and I come back to the witness, but it must also be complete.

Sagi Shaked (: 48:06

Correct.

Dan Ambrose (: 48:07

Then I write down complete. By complete, what we mean is that you consider all relevant information.

Sagi Shaked (: 48:16

True.

Dan Ambrose (: 48:16

So that's the right way to do a proper medical evaluation. And these definitions, they're hard for anybody to disagree with because they're accurate, they're reasonable. And my friend Orlando DiCastroverde just had a trial. We got a great result, a couple million bucks, but the expert would not agree to some of these things. And he says, "No, I don't agree with that. " He's like, "Okay. Epert disagrees." Or you can say, you know what I mean? So it doesn't really matter, especially when we go to the risks associated. So this is the right way. And out of all the experts you've ever had in your whole career, all of them, how many based upon these definitions were impartial, objective, and complete?

Sagi Shaked (: 48:59

None.

Dan Ambrose (: 48:59

Not one, right?

Sagi Shaked (: 49:00

Not for the defense, that is. Not

Dan Ambrose (: 49:01

For the defense, right Because if they were, they wouldn't have been called. Yeah. But see, the witness notes are being set up because they're not stupid. I mean, they're doctors. They're in the hot seat for a reason. They know. But there's nothing they can do to stop the setup is the beauty of it. Because then we move on to the segment three, which is the wrong way. Doctor, the opposite of a proper medical evaluation. One that is impartial, objective and complete. Well, that would be a biased medical evaluation. Sure. So now I pre-wrote biased. Of course, I had the speed pulled out already. And Doctor, you're trained and you know that there are certain risks associated with a paid expert's choice to conduct a biased medical evaluation.

Sagi Shaked (: 49:56

I agree.

Dan Ambrose (: 49:58

One of those risks is that the jury could be misinformed about the patient's condition.

Sagi Shaked (: 50:05

True.

Dan Ambrose (: 50:06

So now I write misinformed. I read number two. Doctor, you're trained and you know. And so when I say doctor, I inhale. You're trained. Inhale. And you know. Inhale. But trained and you know, that's called stepping. So if you're trained and you know it and you still choose not to do it, it's no longer a mistake. There's no excuse except you chose not to. So doctor, you're trained and you know that if a paid expert chooses to conduct a biased medical evaluation, not only could the jury be misinformed about the patient's condition, but they could also be misled as the extent of the patient's injuries.

Sagi Shaked (: 50:53

Correct.

Dan Ambrose (: 50:54

And so people are listening to this, can't see. But when I say but I turn to the jury and look at my jurors and say they could also be. So it's like warning to the jury warning, this person's going to mislead you. Then I write misled, then I put number three. And so this is an example of stepping. So if somebody's told you an untruth, if the first time you say, okay, they misinformed me. It's not that big a deal. But if somebody's previously misinformed you and they told you another half truth, well now you're much more likely to believe they're trying to mislead you. And if purposes previously belied you and they tell you another half truth, well now you're much more likely to believe they're deceiving you. But if we go right, especially with a doctor or let's say a police officer, a witness that has inherent credibility, and we go right to deceived.

(: 51:37

A lot of jurors are going to have a real time hard belief in that, that a good doctor, a trusted doctor who's already wealthy is going to get up here and lie for money. But as we walk them through this path and we step them, then they're much more likely to accept that he's trying to deceive us.

Sagi Shaked (: 51:55

And logically, it just makes sense.

Dan Ambrose (: 51:57

Yes, that do. Doctor, you're trained and you know that if a paid expert chooses to conduct a biased medical evaluation, not only could our jury be misinformed about the patient's condition and misled as the extent of the patient's injuries, but perhaps worst of all, they could be deceived into undervaluing the human harms and suffering that were caused.

Sagi Shaked (: 52:29

Correct.

Dan Ambrose (: 52:31

So I write down deceived. So that's the second segment, which is all the risks of doing a biased medical evaluation. And of course this cross can be adjusted to any expert witness. I call this a foundational cros. If you master this cross, you will master the skills of cross and it can be multipurpose. Let's say this was a biomechanics expert. Well, the jury could be misinformed about the forces involved. And then they can be misled about the potential for injury. And then finally undervaluing the human harms and suffering that were caused. That's always what the defense expert's ultimate goal is, isn't it? Absolutely. To get them to undervalue. It's always the ultimate goal. So it's easy once you've got the frame too, because once you have this frame, then to learn a new cross is so much easier because you don't have to think about any of your hand movements, your voice, and you start to think about your crosses.

(: 53:26

Okay, which segments of cross would I want to use my flip chart for? How am I going to emphasize it? Because this is like the greatest teaching tool there is as a flip chart. But now we get to segment four, which is doctor, let me ask you this question. Let's call it the refocusing move or like squirrel. So I recommend you ask a refocusing move at the end of every subject across every chapter of cross. Tells the jury the 25 questions that previous came. This is why I asked him. This why we're here. So doctor, let me ask you this question. On December 4th, 2023, you have a choice to make. So tell us all, what do you choose to do?

Sagi Shaked (: 54:04

What do you mean?

Dan Ambrose (: 54:05

What I mean is do you choose to conduct a proper medical evaluation? One of that is flip the chart over, make it a whole bunch of noise, drawing your attention. Impartial, objective, and complete, like you are trained to do. Or do you choose to violate your training? I conduct a biased medical evaluation knowing all

Sagi Shaked (: 54:32

The risk. Of course, a proper evaluation.

Dan Ambrose (: 54:35

Proper? So what you're telling this jury under oath is that the medical evaluation you did in this case was impartial, objective and complete, just like you were trained to do.

Sagi Shaked (: 54:57

Correct.

Dan Ambrose (: 54:57

So when I say proper, I'm saying it like, oh my God, I just gave you one last chance to come clean to this jury, but you just continued to lie. I am in disbelief. Shocked at the level of your lie, sir.

Sagi Shaked (: 55:09

Yeah. So now the setup is done.

Dan Ambrose (: 55:11

The setup is done.

Sagi Shaked (: 55:12

And you're ready to start attacking as to why it's improper, right? Why he has a biased evaluation because you can start showing - We can start showing evidence. Missing information and you

Dan Ambrose (: 55:22

Start - Things he didn't consider. And then when he starts being an advocate, when you ask questions, he argues with you. It's like, Doctor, are you being an advocate now? Sure sounds like it. And then cherry picking. You consider this, this, and this thing. Isn't that cherry-picking doc? Didn't you just promise you wouldn't cherry-pick? Is that complete when you didn't consider all these things just because they don't support your bullshit hypothesis? Well, Sighi, I think that's going to cover us here. We got some partying going on here. So in case you hear some background music, that's Club 9th Street going on across the way.

Sagi Shaked (: 55:58

Hermosa Beach.

Dan Ambrose (: 55:58

Club Hermosa Beach. It's a wild place out here. And if anybody's ever in LA, hit me up because we're always doing stuff down here at Hermosa. Am I right?

Sagi Shaked (: 56:09

Absolutely. Thanks for having me.

Dan Ambrose (: 56:11

All right. Thanks for being down here, Sagi. And so we always made this one really super fun. That was only five students, including your son, but four of you all stayed here.

Sagi Shaked (: 56:20

That's it. Yeah. It was a lot of fun. I highly recommend it to anybody who wants to improve their trial skills. And if you really want to be better in the courtroom at your presentation skills and your persuasive skills, you have to do the bootcamp so you can get better. And it's only fair for your clients.

Dan Ambrose (: 56:40

Well, you got a trial coming up in a couple of weeks. We're going to find out. See everybody at AAJ in Chicago. I think this should be published by Thursday. So we'll be there on Thursday for a few days saying hi to everybody, supporting the civil justice system. Chicago is such a special place in my heart because I don't know if you know, but that was my first AAJ back in 2012. That's why I met our mutual friend Connell. And Connell introduced us back in 2000, I think, 13 in Baltimore the following year. And that's why I ran into my old buddy, Nick Riley from the Trial Lawyers College. And he invited me to come out to Las Vegas to watch him speak for Cala. And that's where I met my buddy, Steve King right here who's currently present here. And two months later I told my partner I got some good news.

(: 57:29

My law partner back in Michigan.

(: 57:31

I got some good news. I got some better news. And she's like, "What's the good news?" I said, "Good news is I'm moving to California." And her face drops. And then she's like, "What's the better news?" I said, the better news is once I get set up, you can come out there and live in California too and have a great life. And if you don't want to come out to California, you can have a law firm. So your income's going to go up substantially. And so sadly for us - You chose the law firm. I mean, I wish she would've come out here, but I just saw her. It was very kind of her. She came out to the last Huntington Beach program a month and a half ago just for the night with another friend of ours, Tiffany, that used to teach with us too.

(: 58:15

So it was really great to see her. And next year, June 2nd through 5th, we're going to be tearing it up again at the Pasea. Oh, but we're going to be tearing up again before then because February 18th through 20th, I almost forgot to mention, we are doing a Philip Miller Advanced Deposition College. And simultaneous to that, we are doing an AI conference at the Poseia Hotel in Huntington Beach. It's going to be AI and deposition conference. So try out new stuff. I'm pretty stoked about this. So anyways.

Sagi Shaked (: 58:50

Always learning.

Dan Ambrose (: 58:51

Should have mentioned that earlier, but all right, Sigi. Sounds great.

Sagi Shaked (: 58:54

Thanks for having me.

Dan Ambrose (: 58:55

All right.