Convince reluctant witnesses to cooperate by remembering the truth in detail, referring us to others and/or coming forward to testify

Most of the witnesses we interview are expected to be reluctant to help us—at best neutral in sympathy to our client, at worst downright hostile. That's because when litigators are confident a witness is friendly, they naturally tend to conduct the interview themselves.

The bedrock for our efforts to get reluctant witnesses to help us is asking for the truth. We make clear we ask for nothing more or less than accurate details of what they know. Then we urge them to let the chips fall where they may in coming forward to testify.

We often prevent unsympathetic people from hanging up on us by saying something like, “We're not asking you to wear our team's jersey. We just want the facts, whatever they are.”

We view a series of interviews as a journey. (The research homework we do beforehand is like packing for the trip.) We expect the early interviews to provide us with a witness map of people we need to see, as well as friendly introductions to them from friends we've made along the way. By the time we knock on the door at journey's end, the process should have taught us what to say to open it.