Principles for Juries and Jury Trials: From the Bench and the Bar, How to Facilitate Good Decision Making in Jury Trials

Hon. Charles N. Clevert, Jr. (Ret.) joins JAMS after nearly 40 years of distinguished service on the federal bench in the Eastern District of Wisconsin. While on the bench, Judge Clevert presided over a wide variety of complex litigation matters, including civil rights and discrimination cases, contract disputes, ERISA litigation, wrongful termination, sexual harassment and retaliation, torts, product liability, securities fraud and Chapter 11 business reorganizations.

Appointed at age 30, Judge Clevert became the youngest federal bankruptcy judge in the nation and Wisconsin’s first African American federal judge. He went on to serve for over 20 years on the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin, including three years as Chief Judge of that court.

DENNIS J. DRASCO is a Certified Civil Trial Attorney in New Jersey and is listed in The Best Lawyers in America, New Jersey Super Lawyers(Top 100), (Top 10 in 2011), Chambers USA - America's leading lawyers in Business and Who's Who in American Law. He is a Fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers, the International Academy of Trial Lawyers and the Litigation Counsel of America. He is a New Jersey Court Approved Mediator and Federal Court Mediator.

He is a member of the House of Delegates of the American Bar Association, currently serving on the Nominating Committee of the House as Section of Litigation delegate, having previously served in the House as Essex County Bar delegate of 2009-2013. He is a former Chair of the ABA Section of Litigation, having served as Chair of the Section in 2004-2005. He was previously Vice-Chair and Chair-Elect. The Section of Litigation is the largest Section in the ABA with over 60,000 members.

He served as Chair of the Commission on The American Jury (2006-2009), having served as Co-Chair of the ABA American Jury Project in 2004-2005 and chaired ABA National Jury Symposium in 2006 and 2008. He has been a member of the ABA Coalition For Justice and served as the Section of Litigation Liaison to the Standing Committee on Judicial Independence and the Commission on Public Financing of Judicial Campaigns. He has been Co-Chair of the Section of Litigation Coordinating Committee on Diversity, Task Force For The Minority Trial Lawyer, its Strategic Planning Committee, and Co-Chair of a NITA Program to teach legal services attorneys trial skills. He is currently a member of the ABA Standing Committee on Meetings and Travel.

He is a Past President of the Association of the Federal Bar of New Jersey. He has been a moderator and panelist on several New Jersey Federal Bar Judicial Conference Programs on Jury Innovation, Cross Examination, Federal Practices in New Jersey and September 11, 2001 Victim's Compensation Fund and social media issues in Jury Trials. In 2000, he received the Essex County Bar Association's Civil Trial Attorney Achievement Award and in 2006 received a "Professional Lawyer of the Year" award from the New Jersey Commission on Professionalism in the Law. In 2009, he received the Essex County Bar Association's Walter A. Lucas Special Merit Award. In October, 2010 he received the ABA Jury Service Impact Award by the ABA Commission on the American Jury. He is a member of the Lawyers Advisory Committee to the United States District Court for the District of New Jersey.

He previously served as a member of the ABA Litigation Section Council and as Co-Chair of the Condemnation, Land Use & Zoning and Construction Litigation Committees, where he wrote articles and served on several programs as a panelist, including programs entitled "ADR in Construction Litigation", "When the Banker Becomes Builder", and "Environmental Contamination on the Construction Site" and chapters in two books published by the ABA on Condemnation Practice.

He is an active Member of the ABA Forum on the Construction Industry, the New Jersey State Bar Construction and Public Contracts Law Section and the ABA TTIPS Life, Health and Disability Committee and has authored articles on ERISA litigation.

He recently authored an article for the Journal of Dispute Resolution entitled: "Public Access to Information in Civil Litigation v. Litigant's demand for privacy: Is the "Vanishing Trial" an avoidable consequence?" 2006 J. Disp. Resol.

He is currently Chair of the Essex County Bar Association's Judicial Selection Committee and past Chair of its Joint Medical-Legal Committee and Annual Conference.

He is a Master in the Seton Hall Law School Inn of Court and was elected a Fellow of the American Bar Foundation in 2002. He has served on many civic and charitable boards, including the United Way of North Essex and is immediate past President of the Essex County Legal Service Foundation.

He is admitted to practice in New Jersey, New York, the United States District Court for the District of New Jersey, the Southern and Eastern Districts of New York, the United States Tax Court, the Second and Third Circuit Court of Appeals, and the Supreme Court of the United States.

Dennis specializes in the trial of complex commercial, construction, condemnation, insurance, medical malpractice and legal malpractice cases in Federal and State Court in New York and New Jersey and the mediation and arbitration of those cases in ADR forums. He is listed in Who’s Who Legal: Construction 2014, 2015 and 2016 and is Past Chair of the ABA Section of Litigation, Construction Litigation Committee.

After success as a practicing lawyer, Judge Lynn began her service on the United States District Court for the Northern District of Texas in February 2000, where she is known as a brilliant, fair and hard-working jurist who has presided over high-profile cases. In 2004, The Dallas Chapter of the American Board of Trial Advocates honored Judge Lynn as “Judge of the Year.” Judge Lynn has served as chair of both the ABA Section of Litigation and the ABA Judicial Division. She has chaired the Committee on the Administration of the Bankruptcy System of the Judicial Conference of the United States, the Federal Trial Judges Conference, and the Research Fellows of the Southwestern Legal Foundation (now The Center for American and International Law), and served as a member of the ABA Standing Committee on Federal Judicial Improvements. She is a Fellow and former Committee Chair of the American College of Trial Lawyers, and a member of the American Law Institute. She has served as President, and on the Board of Directors, of the International Women’s Forum of Dallas. Judge Lynn is a former President of the Patrick E. Higginbotham Inn of Court where she is still an active member. Last year, when a new American Inn of Court for intellectual property lawyers was chartered in Dallas, its founders designated it “The Honorable Barbara M.G. Lynn American Inn of Court.” She has spoken on trial, evidentiary and intellectual property topics at seminars and conferences across the country. Ever the teacher, she has presided over countless mock trials for high school and law school students.