Joel Stashenko’s informative article in the April 4 Law Journal, “PowerPoints at Trials Must Be ‘Within the 4 Corners of the Evidence’” calls attention to two New York Court of Appeals decisions issued on the same day. In each case, a convicted criminal defendant argued on appeal that the prosecutor’s use, during summation, of PowerPoint slides depicting trial exhibits but upon which were superimposed text, or comments, circles or other matter, was prejudicial. The cases are People v. Williams, 2017 N.Y. LEXIS 766 (April 4, 2017) and People v. Anderson, 2017 N.Y. LEXIS 769 (April 4, 2017). In each case, the state’s highest court affirmed the conviction. However, the court also supplied some much-needed guidance on what permissible boundaries exist when using PowerPoints of trial exhibit images during summation that are not in their unaltered, pristine form.
Although the Williams and Anderson decisions involved criminal cases, the lessons to be learned seem applicable to a wide swathe of civil trials and, particularly, to litigation of complex cases where lawyers seek to persuade jurors about complicated subject matter by using not only PowerPoints, but also powerfully demonstrative evidence including animations, computer simulations and other so-called “pedagogicals.” The boundary lines drawn by the Court of Appeals in Williams and Anderson are broad enough so they don’t stifle or handcuff lawyer creativity but they are sufficiently admonitory to put trial counsel and judges on notice that prejudice must be avoided and, if unfairness seeps into the case, it must be cured promptly and effectively.
