When Should a Trial Exhibit Remain Visible on an Easel?

A key trial exhibit should remain visible as a continuing anchor for your client’s position while witnesses and digital presentations change.

Quick Answer

A key trial exhibit should remain visible on an easel when it reinforces your client’s position and provides the jury with a continuing visual anchor. A photograph, timeline, diagram or calculation board can remain in view while witnesses change and the courtroom screen presents other material.

Choose an exhibit that is legible from the jury box and position it so it does not obstruct the courtroom presentation. Once the court permits its display, plan to keep the key exhibit visible unless the judge directs that it be moved or covered.

Key Takeaways

• Select one key trial exhibit that clearly reinforces your client’s position.
• Keep the exhibit visible as a continuing visual anchor while witnesses and digital presentations change.
• Confirm that the complete exhibit is legible from the jury box.
• Position the easel so it does not obstruct the witness, judge, jury or digital screen.
• Once its display is permitted, keep the key exhibit visible unless the judge directs otherwise.

Keep the Trial Exhibit Visible as a Continuing Anchor

A physical exhibit offers something a changing digital screen cannot always provide: a fixed visual reference. The screen may move from a photograph to a document, a video or another witness’s exhibit. A carefully selected board can remain visible throughout those transitions.

In decades of courtroom and trial-presentation work, I have found that this technique is most effective when the exhibit expresses an important idea the jury will need repeatedly. A damages calculation, timeline, scene diagram or important photograph can anchor your client’s position while the testimony and digital presentation continue to develop.

The board must be readable from the jury box. Its placement also matters. The easel should not block the witness, counsel, judge, jury or digital screen.

Choose the exhibit carefully. One important trial exhibit can create continuity throughout the presentation. Several competing boards can divide attention and weaken the effect.

Plan for the Trial Exhibit to Remain in View

Continued display should be a deliberate trial tactic. Before trial, identify the exhibit that best reinforces your client’s position and plan for it to remain visible while witnesses change and other evidence appears on the digital screen.

A change in witness or subject does not automatically mean the physical exhibit should be removed. Its value comes from remaining available as a consistent visual anchor. Counsel can refer to it again when later testimony connects to the same calculation, event, location or central point.

Plan the placement before trial and determine who will position the board. Raise the intended continued display with the judge when appropriate and follow the court’s direction. If the court directs that the exhibit be moved or covered, comply with that instruction. Otherwise, the presentation plan should be to keep the selected key exhibit in the jury’s view.

The goal is not simply to leave a board standing. It is to choose an exhibit important enough to keep reinforcing your client’s position throughout the presentation.

Remember—you are the storyteller.

Related Articles

• Should You Still Use Foam Boards in a Digital Trial Presentation?
• How Can You Convert a Witness-Marked Foam Board into a Digital Trial Exhibit?

Learn More

• Trial & Deposition Technologies
• Silent Advocacy and Trial Law
• Blending Trial Technologies: Reaching Today’s Jurors Where They Are
• How Teaching Trial Technology Transformed a Generation of Trial Lawyers at Temple’s LL.M. in Trial Advocacy
• From News Anchors to to Algorithms