I spent a beautiful (but cold) Saturday afternoon here in Memphis doing a focus group on an upcoming trial involving a claim for disability discrimination under the ADA. As always, I came away from the session confirming many thoughts, but also having many new questions.

One thing’s for certain: I can’t stress enough the impact that doing a focus group makes in my trial preparation. Not only does a focus group give me tremendous insight to better prepare my client’s case, it also allows me to hone trial strategy so I can see whether my instincts and beliefs about the presentation of evidence/testimony are correct.

Today’s focus group both surprised and pleased me. For one thing, a number of self identified “conservatives” were willing to award my client a substantial sum of money based on their belief that my client had been discriminated against because of her disability. I confess that I generally prefer politically liberal jurors. The thought is that they will be more sympathetic to my client’s plight, as well as the law that my client is suing under. But I am not sure that my own beliefs about the political persusasion of jurors is accurate when it comes to awarding money. In other words, it may very well be that politically conservative jurors will award as much money as politically liberal jurors once they are satisfied that liability on the part of the company has been established.