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Questions and answers are fundamental to any litigation, investigation or research project to fill gaps in knowledge and better understand a situation. Many tools have been developed to help litigators and researchers manage questions and answers including outliners, to-do lists, "question spreadsheets", and so forth. However, as we explain in our Just the Facts article "Case Knowledge Management™ -- as easy as DEF...", merely obtaining answers is insufficient:
"Key evidence that has been identified but then lost or buried in the database, forgotten or otherwise not used, for any reason, has no value -- an obvious but easily overlooked point."
In this article we'll cover how MasterFile lets you stay on top of your questions, set out interrogations, helps you record the answers and most importantly helps you to quickly use the information in your argument.
Here's what we'll cover:
Types of questions and their use
It is generally assumed that questions arise during depositions, interrogation of witnesses, and trial. However, questions are often actually directed at your own team or simply raise matters to be researched -- not necessarily to anyone in particular. Their purpose affects how such questions and their answers are best handled.
In general, questions arise over:
- Administrative issues
Administrative questions typically focus on getting answers for issues such as: "Do we have an original copy of this document?", "Who was the author of this document?", "To whom has this document be sent to?" and so forth.
- Research
Research questions arise during preparation of the case and need to be answered well before trial as they deal directly with the facts of the case and can therefore affect strategy. These questions typically seek clarification when evidence or information is contradictory or incomplete. They may also set out hypothesis that need investigation or raise strategy issues to consider. Research questions can be directed at anyone involved in the case -- i.e. the "players" including the parties, their counsel (including your own team), the witnesses, etc. -- or even no one in particular if the issue to be researched requires further consideration before it can be directed.
- Interrogation -- before and during trial
Interrogatories are formal questions put to witnesses and/or the parties typically during examinations and discoveries, or on the stand during trial, either in written form or verbally. These questions can be to obtain "on the record" background information, clarifications of issues or to challenge a witness whose statements are inconsistent or factually incorrect when compared to the evidence.
Jotting down and reviewing questions
When questions arise they are always about a document, a document's extract, or some fact of the case. Therefore, MasterFile lets you quickly jot down questions in the "Questions raised" field of the "Things to do" section of document, extract and fact profiles, as shown below, as they come to mind so issues are not forgotten
 Questions for interrogations which may require reference to evidence, notes and other points to be raised during questioning will be drafted from the above. All profiles with questions appear in the "Outstanding questions" views available on the menu panel as shown at right. These views let you review facts, extracts and documents with questions, or view all questions in all profiles by player or by issue/topic.
MasterFile does not record questions in separate records by player name and then link these to the profiles. Rather, questions are prefixed with the player's name or initials to indicate to whom a question is directed. This allows questions to be quickly and efficiently jotted down without cumbersome database operations. In addition, questions are not scattered across "question records" and all outstanding questions for a given document, extract and fact in the profile can be seen at a glance, shown above, and in the "Outstanding questions" views such as "all questions: by Issue/topic" below.
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To find all questions assigned to a particular player, simply search any "Outstanding questions" view for the player's name/initials in the "Questions raised" field. Alternatively, as the example above shows for "Rob Lee", a "Questions" reminder task can also be assigned to a player. All profiles assigned "Questions" reminder tasks, as above, appear in the "all questions: by Player" view grouped by the players' name, as shown below.
Setting out interrogations
In general, questions during pre-trial or in-trial interrogations/examinations differ from other types because these questions:
- are not simple "one-liners" but instead require other facts and evidence to lay foundation and set the context for the question, and
- are set out and asked in a specific sequence, as a thread, in order to establish facts, impeach a witness or generally make some point.
Consequently, drafting such interrogation threads requires forethought similar to setting out argument. "Spreadsheet grids" or conventional database records are a poor medium to attempt this task as that would be like trying to write a thesis in a spreadsheet cell.
An interrogation is a document and therefore, like all other documents, it can and should be simply stored in MasterFile's document repository and profiled, as shown below, by author, date, a simple description and an appropriate document type, such as the "Miscellaneous\Questions" document type pre-defined in MasterFile.
However, instead of drafting your interrogation document in Word, draft and format it in MasterFile's unique rich-text fields (RTFs) so you can then use MasterFile's doc-link technology to link relevant evidence directly to your questions.
MasterFile's doc-links are a simple way to create instant one-click descriptive references to documents, extracts, facts, work product, sources, authorities, attachments, exhibits, research, etc. Doc-links can be interspersed within text, letting you insert your reference exactly where you need it -- next to the relevant questions, argument, commentary or notes.
In the profile section below, note how you're able to draft and format your questions for clarity and link in foundation facts or evidence as needed.
As we described above, questions that arose during document and fact review can be quickly listed using the profile's questions field. The "Outstanding questions" views serve as a reminder of that list of questions while drafting your interrogation. Then, as you set out each question in your interrogation document, remove it from the questions field of the document, extract or profile where you originally entered it so views only display the remaining questions for you to focus on.
However, in order to ensure you or your team don't forget about the interrogation document itself, we suggest entering a "note" in the interrogation document's questions field itself, as shown below, so the interrogation document appears in the "Outstanding questions" views.
Using answers and ensuring key evidence is not lost
Simply recording an answer in a database record, a "question spreadsheet" or wherever the question was written, is generally unsatisfactory because although it may let you find the answer in the short run while the question is fresh in your mind, in the long run your information will be scattered wily-nily across the database, or sit idle in the "question spreadsheet". Making sure the information in answers you've collected is actually used in argument is what counts.
Therefore, there are two aspects to note: the answers must be firstly flagged so they do not get lost or buried in the database and secondly, the information must be used -- in other words, even if answers are initially recorded with the questions, ultimately the information must transferred to the facts and argument to which they relate to add to the understanding or clarification of the relevant issue about which the question was asked in the first place. In MasterFile, this means using new information gleaned from answers to set out:
- new relevant facts for the case or investigation,
- new evidence to clarify or substantiate argument in existing facts, or
- counter positions in existing facts.
If you know in which facts and argument the information is to be slotted, enter it directly as you review the answers. Alternatively, like Post-it notes, you can flag key evidence in MasterFile from those answers as "Evidence to add to facts". This is set in the "Things to do" section of document and extract profiles as shown below:
This new information then appears as a reminder on the "Evidence to add to facts" views and is not lost or forgotten, as shown below:
Note that whenever you locate key evidence either during document reviews or while prosecuting the case you should add it directly to the relevant facts or flag it as above for later use. If the document is large, you can create an extract of the key evidence and flag just the extract to avoid re-reading the document to find that key piece of information.
How to record answers so their information can be used efficiently
Answers to questions are either received electronically in a document or verbally. A document is easily handled like any other in MasterFile; we'll concentrate on verbal responses here, as there are several options and approaches.
- Transcribed interrogations record answers and therefore, simply make and use extracts of whatever information is relevant.
- If the interrogation was not transcribed and you created an "interrogation document", then it's best to enter the response directly after each question. You can do this on-line or on hardcopy that is later transcribed. Then, as in the case of an electronic transcript, extracts can be created and doc-linked to relevant facts along with any comments. This method allows you to keep all the responses from one interrogation session together.
- If you are not planning on an "interrogation document", we suggest you print a digest report of the relevant portions of an outstanding questions view so you're able to write in answers quickly during the interrogation. Questions and answers can then be transcribed into an "interrogation document" as above, or answers can be entered directly into facts and argument as explained in the previous section on using answers.
Further information
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