Catalog

Second and third-year students may take Advocacy of Criminal Cases (ACC); Alternative Dispute Resolution; Negotiating, Counseling and Interviewing (NCI), Deposition Skills, Advances Appellate Advocacy and Trial Advocacy. In these upperclass courses, the students have the opportunity to perform extensive simulated exercises (often recorded) and receive direct professorial feedback. Students can also take many other courses across the curriculum that utilize simulation techniques.

Advanced Appellate Advocacy (3) (ADV700)
Professor Susan Abraham

In this course, we will cover the basic procedural and substantive issues involved in the filing, preparation and arguing of an appeal, including the requirement of preservation and the applicable standard of review. At the same time, working with a case file, students will have the opportunity to prepare an appellate brief and engage in oral arguments, thereby developing advanced skills in both written and oral advocacy. Finally, we will have opportunities to become involved in actual appeals by observing practicing appellate arguments and participating in moots to help prepare appellate attorneys for oral arguments.

Advocacy of Criminal Cases (4)

Professors Frank Bress and Faith Colangelo

Advocacy of Criminal Cases (“ACC”) introduces students to the law and skills involved in criminal practice. The twice weekly seminars alternate between skills exercises, discussion of criminal law, procedure and ethics, and simulations of the major stages of a criminal case from post-arrest through trial. Throughout the semester, student litigation teams consisting of two prosecutors and two defense attorneys, each supervised by one of the seminar faculty, litigate a single criminal case. The semester-long case simulation includes interviews (police, client and witness), arraignments (local criminal and superior courts), a probable cause hearing, scheduling conferences, plea negotiations, a suppression hearing and argument, and a full-day jury trial. In addition, students draft accusatory instruments, discovery and suppression motions, memoranda of law, and requests to charge. Approximately half of the seminar sessions are devoted to focused skill exercises and drills and discussion designed to prepare the students for their roles in the semester-long case simulation. The topics covered include charging, arrest and pre-trial release, discovery, suppression and exclusion of evidence, and trial. The skills developed include information acquisition (interviewing, direct and cross examination, and drafting discovery requests), development of a case theory, case planning, and persuasion (memoranda of law, oral argument and summation). The course follows New York’s penal and criminal procedure laws and rules of evidence. Enrollment is limited to sixteen students and permission of the instructors required. ACC is offered in the Spring only. Trial Advocacy may not be taken in the same semester as ACC.

2nd Year students are advised to sign up for the fall section of Evidence. Recommended Co-requisites: Criminal Law Procedure: Investigation, Criminal Law Procedure: Adjudication, Trial Advocacy.

3rd Year students: Pre-requisites: Evidence, Criminal Law Procedure: Investigation, Criminal Law Procedure: Adjudication. Recommended Co-requisite: Trial Advocacy.

Alternative Dispute Resolution (2)

Professors Richard Berry, Lawrence Grosberg and Gary Tidwell

Surveys mechanisms currently used instead of courts and federal agencies to resolve conflicts between two or more parties, including ADR systems such as conciliation, negotiation, mediation, arbitration, voluntary med-arb, court-ordered arbitration, rent-a-judge, and mini-trials. Students are presented with live and audio- visual demonstrations, simulation exercises, and lectures and classroom discussions of the ADR systems surveyed. The course is graded on the basis of a required paper (60%) and a one-hour examination (40%).

Deposition Skills (1) (ADV 451)
Professors Susan Abraham, Frank Bress, Mariana Hogan

Students in the course will learn the purpose of depositions; how depositions fit into an overall plan for case theory and development; the rules governing the conduct of depositions; how to begin a deposition and conduct preliminary questioning; how to elicit information from witnesses using the “funnel” approach and open-ended questions; how to seek admissions at depositions using leading questions; the role of defense counsel at a deposition; the goals and methods of preparing a client for a deposition; how to deal with an “obstreperous” defense counsel; and the ethical issues in representing an employee of a corporate client at a deposition.

Negotiating, Counseling, and Interviewing (4)

Professors Donna Dougherty, Kiera Flad, Craig Fleishman, Kris Franklin, Daniel Master, Louis Raveson and Beth Schwartz

Introduction to the lawyering skills of negotiating, counseling, and interviewing and to alternative methods of dispute resolution, through lecture, live demonstrations, and videotapes in a weekly classroom meeting. Students complete role-playing exercises and then discuss them in weekly small section meetings. Simulation exercises give students an opportunity to practice a particular skill in a specific lawyering situation, and also teach students how to learn from their own lawyering experiences. Each student is videotaped at least once; all students receive individualized feedback on their role-plays. The substantive law in the simulation exercises varies, including commercial, public, and criminal law. Students are evaluated on their performances in simulations, class participation, assigned written work, and a final examination.

Trial Advocacy (3)

The Honorables Margaret Clancy, Patricia Williams, William Mogulescu, Paul Gardephe, Professors Frank Bress, Laura Brevetti, Jennifer Brown, Eugene Cerruti, Lisa Del Pizzo, Lloyd Epstein, David Kelley, Avraham Moskowitz, Lawton Squires, Alan Vinegrad, Robert Baum, John Meringolo and David Raskin

A lawyering skills course, providing focused study and practical training in the overall skill of conducting a jury trial. Weekly readings, discussions, and demonstrations of the various trial skills from opening statements to summations. The heart of the course lies in the simulation exercises performed by students in small sections with professors who are themselves skilled trial advocates. The course meets twice a week, once in a large lecture/demonstration meeting and once in a small performance section. Each week is devoted to a separate skill, which is discussed, developed, and demonstrated at the large class meeting, and then performed by students through simulation exercises in the small section meeting. Each student concludes the course with a live, half-day mock jury trial. All student performances, both in the small section and at the mock trial, are videotaped. There is no examination or paper; students are graded on the basis of their overall performance in the course.

CONTACT INFORMATION

Sharde Goodloe
Administrator of Simulation Courses
New York Law School
40 Worth Street, 9th Floor Reception
New York, NY 10013-2960
P: 212.431.2181
F: 212.966.2053
E: Sharde.Goodloe@nyls.edu