Time To Reform Connecticut Jury Selection

Justice delayed, we’re told, is justice denied. In Connecticut, delay is routine. State lawmakers can change that during the current session of the General Assembly. Lawmakers should reform the manner in which jurors are selected in civil and criminal cases. All it would take is a simple change to one state statute.
Lawyers call the process of jury selection “voir dire,” pronounced “vwah deer,” although westerners like to pronounce it “vor dyer.” It is an old French term meaning “to see, to speak.” It is the process of questioning...
January 31, 2013

Playing At Gun Reform

Laws banning assault weapons, prohibiting clips capable of carrying dozens of rounds of ammunition, and requiring background checks of all gun purchasers will be about as effective in stopping gun violence as selling chastity belts in red-light districts. Most murders are crimes of passion and impulsive opportunity. Now that the United States is awash in guns – with approximately 80 firearms for every 100 people – lethal violence is everywhere.
Ask young men growing up in the nation’s inner cities. They’re dropping like flies in places like Chicago. We’ve...
January 17, 2013

Thomas Jefferson Didn't Own An AR-15

Have you bought your AR-15 yet? Do you have enough ammunition? Are you ready to shoot your way to freedom and security? And what about a stockpile of food, and reserves of water? How long can you hold out on your own when the end comes, or when the tyrants in Washington come goose-stepping to your front door?
Press accounts of the long lines at gun dealers’ shops nationwide reflect gun and ammunition prices are soaring. A friend even saw her doctor standing on line to buy a gun on a news clip. It’s like a collective psychosis. Just what are we preparing for?
When I was in...
January 17, 2013

Trial Lawyers Need Not Apply?

IF you or a loved one needed life-saving surgery, would you choose a surgeon who had only read the textbook, or would you want a doctor who’d performed surgeries?
You’d select a person who hadn’t just mastered the texts, but also had mastered the craft.
Answer this question, then: Why, when it comes to the selection of judges, do we almost routinely say experience doesn’t matter? Trial lawyers, the folks who read the law and then march into a courtroom to try to use what they’ve read to help a real, living, breathing person in need, rarely get to the...
January 13, 2013

Double Standards at CTLA?

January 3, 2013
I’m not sure why the Connecticut Trial Lawyers Association turned on Irving Pinsky the other day. Pinsky filed a claim before the state’s...

Jason Zullo's Sentencing Memorandum

January 3, 2013
Imagine my surprise tonight when a reporter from a local paper sent me an email asking to see a copy of my sentencing memorandum in the Jason Zullo...

Wrong Time, Wrong Target In Newtown Suit

January 3, 2013
Irving Pinsky’s phone has been ringing off the hook. Some callers are wishing him well. But 50 or so folks want him dead, or so they...

The Leap From Genes To Minds

December 27, 2012
Discussion turned, in the wake of the Newtown killings, to better mental health services. If we could simply identify homicidal rage before...

Zeitoun and the Rule of Law

December 27, 2012

I spent the other day reading a book my wife gave me for Christmas, Dave Eggers’ Zeitoun. It’s the report of one family’s...

Guns Are Just Like Cigarettes

December 20, 2012
Cigarettes don’t kill people, people do. That would be the tobacco lobby lying to the world. We’d recognize the claim at once as...

Visit His Websites

Pattis & Smith Law Firm
Norman Pattis
RSS Feed
Become a patron

Press Videos

Books

Taking Back the Courts
Norm Pattis Taking Back the Courts

The Wizard of Oz was one of my favorites movies as a kid. Little did I know judges were so much like the wizard, hiding behind empty trappings of power. This book tells you things you need to know about what really goes on in court. Read it, weep, and then demand that the courts do better.

In the Trenches
Norm Pattis In the Trenches

Plenty of lawyers write about the law, but few who write try cases. Judge for yourself whether I talk the talk and walk the walk in this collection of occasional essays about life in the law's trenches.

Juries and Justice
Norm Pattis Juries and Justice

How prepared are you to take seriously the notion that 'we the people' are, in fact, sovereign? Discover the secret, and unused, power of jurors. 'Ask why; then nullify.'

Norm Pattis

About Norm

Norm Pattis is a Connecticut based trial lawyer focused on high stakes criminal cases and civil right violations. He is a veteran of more than 150 jury trials, many resulting in acquittals for people charged with serious crimes, multi-million dollar civil rights and discrimination verdicts, and scores of cases favorably settled.

© Norm Pattis is represented by Elite Lawyer Management, managing agents for Exceptional American Lawyers
Media & Speaker booking [hidden email]