Verdict In on High-Tech Courtroom Presentations

Enlarged and projected on the wall, the photos seemed to fill the Ventura courtroom.

One showed the accused killer and rapist flaunting his white-power tattoo. Another pictured him huddling with fellow gang members. Still another showed him hugging the victim, a Santa Monica College student who he had known for years.

Several of the images of defendant Justin Merriman were punctuated with the printed words “Find Him Guilty.”

Once reserved for salesmen and marketing experts, multimedia presentations such as those in the recently concluded Merriman trial are becoming increasingly popular in criminal courts from San Diego to Sacramento.

Following the lead of civil lawyers, prosecutors are playing videotapes and presenting computerized slide shows to keep jurors interested--and awake--during lengthy arguments.

“The days of the Lincoln-Douglas debates are gone,” said Ronald Janes, a chief deputy district attorney in Ventura County and member of a statewide committee on visual aids. “It’s virtually impossible to hold the attention of people while lawyers argue for several hours.”

That point is critical, lawyers and judges say. In many cases, the ability to drive home a message to jurors is as important as the evidence and the law.

Defense attorneys argue that computer presentations give prosecutors an unfair advantage.

The high-tech tools are expensive, costing several thousand dollars for scanners, laptop computers, projectors and sound systems. Public defenders offices often cannot afford the equipment, training and staff that such presentations require.

But as the technology becomes more prevalent, defense attorneys may have to make the investment to keep pace with their adversaries.

In the recent trial of John Reiner, accused of extorting money from legal investigator Erin Brockovich--and able to afford to hire his own defense attorneys--both sides went high-tech.

During his closing argument, Chief Deputy Dist. Atty. Michael Frawley projected a verdict form on the wall and outlined the word “guilty” in red. He also played a recorded cash-register sound while displaying a check made out to the defendant.

Michael Nasatir, a private Los Angeles defense attorney, showed pictures of letters and faxes and zoomed in on specific parts for emphasis. Nasatir said he felt compelled to use computer graphics to argue his case so he could highlight important parts of documents and tape-recorded conversations.

“I think it’s the wave of the future,” he said. “You are going to be seeing it in every trial that has a significant number of documents.”

The computerized slide shows are the next step in an evolutionary process of visual aids in the courtroom.

Attorneys began making handwritten charts on butcher paper in the 1970s. In the next decade, overhead projectors and transparencies debuted. Then lawyers started making maps and timelines on computers and printing them on poster-size paper.

Civil law firms started using the new technology before their counterparts in criminal court. And companies have sprouted to meet the burgeoning need.

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For example, Advanced Courtroom Technologies, a Northern California company, offers a program that can call up a video clip, document or photograph simply by scanning a bar code into the computer. So if a witness is on the stand and contradicts earlier testimony, the lawyer can easily replay the earlier clip.

The company leases its equipment to civil firms for $30,000 for a monthlong trial.

For most criminal trials, however, lawyers say the cost outweighs the need. So attorneys often are finding ways to present the information in a slightly less sophisticated way.

They scan photographs and magnify them. They create maps and depict animated characters running through neighborhoods.

They list reasons why a defendant should be found guilty or not guilty, point by point and in bright, bold colors.

Some prosecutors have been resistant to using any of the technology, however, preferring to rely on paper charts that jurors can take with them into the deliberation room. That way, the attorneys say, they don’t have to learn how to use the programs or worry about computer breakdowns and technical glitches.

“When you are in front of a jury and it’s a publicity case, there is a downside,” said Ronald Bowers, head of trial support for the Los Angeles County district attorney’s office. “If something goes wrong, it goes very wrong.”

Even so, judges have generally been supportive of the technology because it speeds up trials and reduces wasted paper.

Ventura County Judge Vince O’Neill, who presided over both the Justin Merriman and John Reiner cases, said computer presentations can be effective if technical difficulties don’t occur.

But O’Neill said if attorneys are too computer-dependent and problems arise, “things tend to grind to a halt.”

During the recent power outages, the court had to hook up an extension cord from an emergency power source to keep the projectors and computers running.

Janes, the deputy D.A., said the risks are worth it.

“It caters to the way people learn today,” he said. “It’s absolutely critical that we present information to jurors in the way they’re used to getting it.”

In Ventura County, the courts are investing about $200,000 in six high-tech portable projectors, which will enable lawyers to magnify evidence during trials. County prosecutors have used the multimedia programs in three homicide trials and are currently preparing for two more.

Katherine Clark, a paralegal assigned to technological trial support, said she has been in demand among prosecutors since the Merriman trial ended a few weeks ago. Defense attorneys tried the case without using computer gadgets.

“Everybody wanted to see how it went with the Merriman case,” Clark said. It went well, she said, with jurors convicting Merriman of murder and recommending he be sentenced to death.

“The word of mouth spread,” Clark said. “I’m really busy now.”

The Ventura County public defenders office has purchased some equipment but still lacks projectors.

Susan Olsen, who supervises felony lawyers, said she expects the attorneys in her division to soon begin doing computerized slide shows.

The Los Angeles County district attorney’s office has spent between $40,000 and $50,000 on computer equipment for slide presentations, according to Bowers.

The office also has a trial support staff of four paralegals who help attorneys prepare computer-generated slides and who create posters and visual aids.

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In Riverside County, every courtroom has television screens and document cameras, and every deputy district attorney has a laptop computer.

The district attorney’s office also has several cordless mouses, so lawyers can run their slide shows while walking around the courtroom.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Jack Lucky said nearly half of the attorneys in his office are using the slide shows, partly because computers are less cumbersome than large posters.

“Whether I have one slide or 100 slides, I carry the same equipment over to court,” Lucky said. “And I don’t have to reinvent the wheel with every case.”