When I was in law school, I was fortunate to attend many hours of public defender training. I can still clearly remember the cross-examination teacher describing his technique for impeaching a witness. He recommended something called “the 3 Cs.” The 3 Cs stood for “commit,” “credit,” and “confront.” I don’t know if it’s his thing or something widely known to trial lawyers, but it’s a pretty solid, general approach to impeachment. Let’s say you have an officer who’s saying something highly incriminating, something that he didn’t put in his police report. You want to impeach him with that omission. Using the 3 Cs technique the teacher recommended, you’d first commit the officer to his current statement. Make sure the judge or jury understands exactly … Read entire article »