One of Younger’s commandments held that a lawyer should never permit a witness to repeat direct testimony on cross examination. He tempered this point with a story about Max Steuer, a bygone trial lawyer with the unenviable task of defending the owners of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory, whose sweatshop burned in 1911, killing 146 seamstresses trapped inside. In its sadness and its role as a catalyst for change, the Triangle Shirtwaist fire was the 9-11 of its day.
A witness named Katy told a horrific tale of surviving the conflagration and carnage. All who heard the sad young woman were stunned and angered. But, on cross examination, Steuer not only had Katy retell her story, he had her tell it again and again.
She did. Again and again. Always verbatim, never changing a word.
Steuer’s ear caught something others missed, and by breaking the rule against repeating damaging testimony, Max Steuer brilliantly demonstrated that Katy had been scripted and coached too well. An offended jury returned an acquittal.
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