Advocates have to account for juror cynicism

Americans today, more than at any point in a generation, are frustrated with financial institutions and markets, senior executives, regulators and government in general. Lawyers in financial markets cases on both sides of the courtroom need to try cases that address this stark reality in jury pools across the country. Although the economy is showing signs of recovery, few potential jurors have forgotten how the economic crisis contributed to the failure of key businesses, trillions of dollars in lost consumer wealth and substantial taxpayer burdens for generations to come. While millions of Americans learned new vocabulary — like “bailout,” “too big to fail” and “TARP” — many of those people and their families lost jobs, defaulted on their mortgages, watched their retirement savings disappear and went to sleep at night just hoping to survive the Great Recession.

Trial lawyers long have known that jurors view cases in relation to current events, and the successful ones identify and address juror predispositions in their trial strategy. This basic precept is even more important in the present economic climate: Effective representation of institutions and executives accused of financial misdeeds requires their counsel to develop themes and defenses that embrace juror cynicism and frustration over the economic collapse and its commonly perceived causes.