60. Demystifying Depositions, with Jason Young

In this rebroadcast of our 2022 interview, we gather all sorts of admissions—about depositions—from NITA NextGen alumni Jason Young. After taking and defending thousands of depositions throughout his career, he’s no-nonsense and has figured out how to make the challenges easier on himself, his clients, and his witnesses. Jason also talks about the crucial work–life decisions all lawyers face as they begin their careers.

Topics 

3:46 The hard part of taking depositions  

5:55 Federal rules related to depositions 

9:13 Witnesses, both expert and lay   

11:36 Role of social media  

15:10 When to video-record a deposition  

17:35 The hard part of dealing with witnesses 

19:40 Timelines for expert witnesses, plaintiff versus defendant 

22:07 Subpoenas 

25:00 Obnoxious opposing counsel 

30:50 Preparing your witness 

34:42 Protecting your witness 

37:53 Remote depositions 

40:31 Work–life balance and advice for new lawyers 

44:35 Signoff questions 

Quote
“What a lot of inexperienced deposition lawyers have a problem with is they are terrified of the unknown in depositions and afraid to follow up on things, know how to shut things down, and that really scares a lot of people. And I guess the thinking with depositions a lot of times is, you want to know more. If there’s information that’s going to come out that’s going to hurt me, I want to know it in a deposition. If there’s additional facts I need or something I didn’t know, I’d rather find out in a depo than in trial.” Jason Young 

Resources
Jason Young (bio)
Blog interview (The Legal Advocate)
Federal Rules of Evidence with Objections (book)
NITA Deposition programs (registration)