L-R Thomas Melsheimer and Judge Craig Smith

For 25 years, Winston & Strawn partner Thomas Melsheimer and Dallas County Judge Craig Smith would get together after work and swap stories about their front-line experiences in court. Until one day, the old friends had a revelation: We should write a book.

The result, “On the Jury Trial,” was published in late October by the University of North Texas Press, combining specific examples with overarching strategies for effective advocacy. At 254 pages, it's not particularly long, but Melsheimer and Smith pack a tremendous amount of hard-earned wisdom into it. As a bonus, it's often rather funny. I've not seen a book quite like it before.

“We decided we didn't want a book of a bunch of war stories,” Melsheimer said. “We wanted to take what we've been learning and seeing in cases and craft something educational—not just for young lawyers, but lawyers of any stripe or age.”

The managing partner of Winston's Dallas office, Melsheimer squeezed in writing time over an 18-month period, often on airplanes or sitting in airports, he said.

He drew on his unusually broad range of courtroom experience—he's tried cases involving everything from patent infringement to product liability to bank fraud. One of his highest-profile wins was in 2013 on behalf of billionaire entrepreneur Mark Cuban, who was completely cleared of insider trading charges by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.

Smith, a former plaintiffs lawyer, has been a judge in the 192^nd District Court in Dallas County since 2006. He's been president of the Texas Association of District Judges and was awarded trial judge of the year by the Dallas chapter of the American Board of Trial Advocates.

The book covers all major aspects of trying a case, but the chapter on the opening statement—“without question, the most important part of any jury trial,” the authors assert—is especially engaging.

It's a cliché to say an opening should “tell a story,” they write, noting that even experienced trial lawyers “sometimes make this point as if it is some profound discovery.” (I, for one, can vouch for that.)

And yes, of course, an opening should tell a story, but that's not enough—you've got to get the listener actually invested in the outcome of the case.

Melsheimer and Craig flag two concepts to do so: passion and reduction.

While an opening statement is not supposed to be an argument, that doesn't mean there's no room for passion.

“Why is passion important?” they write. “In our view, the single biggest compliment a trial lawyer can receive from a juror is this: 'Mr. Lawyer, you really seemed to believe what you were saying.' … [A] fundamental aspect of persuasion is for the listener to sense that the speaker really believes what she is saying.”

How to show passion? With your voice—raising it, lowering it, speaking more slowly or quickly for emphasis—or by using details to humanize your client, for example.

Their concept of reduction is also close to my heart. As a legal reporter, I'm constantly required to write a lead sentence that sums up a dispute. A lawyer should be able to do that too—even (or especially) if the case is complex.

“If you can't state your case in a single sentence, you are not going to be in a position to deliver a passionate opening statement that will invest the listener,” Melsheimer and Smith write. “By focusing on reducing your case to one sentence, you are framing the narrative into a statement the jury can remember and invest in. … Reduction does not mean important facts are glossed over or summarized in a superficial way. What follows from the 'reductionist' topic sentence will be evidentiary details.”

They even tell you how to start: Just say “This case is about [blank].”

One of the things that makes the book so interesting is that Melsheimer and Smith also use real-world examples from court transcripts (without the lawyers' names) of bad opening statements.

Among the no-nos: “Ponderous homages to the jury system.” Telling jurors what opening statements are. Saying you're “proud” to represent your corporate client. Too many PowerPoint slides. (“An opening statement should bear little resemblance to a boardroom presentation or to one given to a local PTA.”)

For example, they picked apart an opening in a wrongful death case, where the lawyer spent the first four minutes offering pearls like “In our system of government, we are entitled to trials by jury. The plaintiff is entitled to a trial by jury. The defendant is entitled to trial by jury,” and sucking up to the judge by saying things like “It has been a very big pleasure for me to be able to come here and appear before him.”

What the lawyer didn't do right out of the box, they write, “is frame his case for the jury as to why his client is not liable. He uses neither passion nor reduction. And he violates one of our 'rules' by stating that what he says is 'not evidence.' We have never found that useful.”

You can buy the book on Amazon, or order it off the website Onthejurytrial.com. All of the authors' proceeds benefit UNT Dallas College of Law.