I purchased the first generation iPad and now own the iPad2. This post is about real world experience using the iPad at trial, a criminal trial in this case, that involved a moderate number of documents.
First, the trial involved discovery of approximately 300 pages and eventual exhibits numbering less than 20. All were easily converted to pdf documents during trial preparation using a small, hearty scanner that sits on my office desk next to my 27″ Apple iMac, an amazing robust computer in its own right. Anyhow, after scanning all the received documents into my client’s folder, that folder also contained all legal research, motions filed, copies of relevant journal entries and court orders and transcripts from at least one pre-trial hearing. Once on my iMac, those documents were automatically synchronized to the cloud via a $5/month service called Sugar Sync. This secure service (similar to the more well known DropBox, but in my opinion, much easier to use) allows me to have a backup of all client files in the event of a disaster at the office. Also, it allows me to sync those files with my iPad. So, the day before trial, I double checked that sync by opening the SugarSync application on my iPad, free to download by the way, and selected my client’s files to sync. The sync was done in less than five minutes and I now had every file in my client’s file on my iPad. How to manage and display them?
I invested about a year ago in a little application called GoodReader. It’s not lawyer specific, but it may as well be. The developer makes regular updates and there is not a better application for handling, annotating, managing, viewing and displaying pdfs that I have found for the iPad. It has functions, actually, that are superior to the functions in Adobe Acrobat itself. But that is another post. So, Goodreader also allows synchronizing with a variety of cloud services, including SugarSync. It has a handy feature that allows you to grab all attachments to emails as well and have them deposited into the app for use. You can move and rename files as well as create folders to hold files. Plus, whatever your folder structure is in SugarSync, it is duplicated within Goodreader. From there, Goodreader quickly opens your files, keeps multiple files open at once, allows highlighting, bookmarking, annotation, emailing of annotated files and displaying of those files on the screen.
Throughout the trial, there were numerous sidebars. On several of those sidebars, I was able to run through my client’s folder and find documents, an expert report for example, and have it displayed on my iPad, by the time I reached sidebar in what was a medium sized courtroom. The opposition literally wheeled in two large boxes of paper each day of trial, plus their rather clunky laptop and still, we were sometimes waiting for them to find documents in time to discuss issues, argue points of law or even present to a witness for cross examination purposes.
My closing argument was easily created right on the iPad with the $5.00 Keynote application. Better than Powerpoint and easier to use with the ability of moving objects on the screen with your finger instead of a mouse. Intuitive is the word. The presentation was flawless in its technological execution. I was able to easily connect the iPad to the electronic courtroom’s setup using a VGA adaptor that Apple sells for $29.00.
Throughout the trial, my iPad was propped up at a great viewing angle using an inexpensive, foldable, portable stand. My bluetooth keyboard, from Apple for $59.00, worked perfectly. The AA batteries have been in the keyboard for months, still going strong. While listening to witnesses testify I could not only adjust cross examination questions, but also open other documents containing my notes for closing or other arguments and insert quotes from those witnesses on the fly and quickly switch back to note taking about their ongoing testimony. This made it very easy to have all my gathered thoughts at the ready for preparing the closing argument, quoting witnesses or the judge’s coming instructions, etc.
One of the issues in the case was the driving distance between two points at rush hour in the city. Google Maps, being online in the courtroom through the courthouse’s wireless as we all were, easily calculated the distance and also provided real time traffic for the same time of day. A quick screen shot of that map and I instantly had a great cross examination exhibit for the witness.
Now, some of you may be saying, “All that stuff can be done with a laptop, bigger screen, heartier operating system, etc.” Well, some of the above can be done with a regular laptop. But, one trick of the above cannot be done with a laptop, a battery that you can confidently rely on to last ten hours, even if you have to remain unplugged.
For those of you that travel with laptops, you know what I am talking about, the endless search in airports, courthouses, other places when you are waiting, to find outlets. With the iPad, that worry and that search is over. It truly lasts all day, as advertised, which is rare in the boastful battery life back and forth of competing laptop manufacturers. You can almost guarantee their claims of laptop battery life are overstated in real world use by 25%. Not the iPad. It’s the real thing.
The bottom line is, you don’t need any other device than an iPad to conduct a trial. It has it all and I haven’t even detailed the use of the juror selection application. More on that later.
AUG