Notes from the Editor

Before turning to the issue content, however, I would like to pump up a Forum program that gets love but which—in my opinion—still does not receive enough love for its noteworthiness. That program is the Forum’s Trial Academy, which takes place this year in Dallas, Texas, from March 12-15, 2025. For those unfamiliar with the program, the Trial Academy is a multi-day hands-on course for attorneys to hone their trial skills and get real-time feedback from seasoned construction litigators every step of the way. In recent years, the Trial Academy has even expanded its reach to provide meaningful training to those on the expert witness side of construction litigation, giving our consultants an opportunity to practice their testifying skills and work closely with attorneys on trial teams.

The Trial Academy is real experience–for the first two days of the program, attorney-students perform openings, multiple fact witness direct and cross-examinations, multiple expert witness direct and cross-examinations, and closings. Expert students hone their testifying skills by testifying in multiple roles across the first two days. All of these training sessions are accompanied by real-time feedback from seasoned Forum attorneys (re: older, like me) on what went well and what did not. These are constructive critiques out in the open but participants learn so much about their techniques and how they can be bettered. There is even video review so you can watch yourself perform examinations or how you testify and see how you move your hands in that way that you will promise yourself you will never do again.

The third day is a full-day mock trial, with attorney teams of two putting on their cases and one of the faculty serving as the judge. A bonus is that all of this takes place in real courtrooms in a Dallas courthouse. The case file that is used for all phases of the program is a true construction contract dispute—so unlike nearly all other trial ad programs, the Forum’s Trial Academy is centered squarely on skill development for our field of law.

While the Trial Academy is open to anyone interested, I personally think that it is most beneficial to mid-level associates (i.e., persons who understand the core concepts of construction law and have taken/defended a few depositions but have never performed “without a net” in trial) and mid-level experts (i.e., persons who have assisted with/authored reports but who are looking for some testimony experience).

This year’s Trial Academy is co-chaired by Meera Wagman, Managing Director with Secretariat in New York, New York, and Lance Currie, Partner with Carrington, Coleman, Sloman & Blumenthal, LLP in Dallas, Texas. It is sure to be a success under their leadership. The Trial Academy holds a special place for me because I co-chaired the program in 2020 and 2023, and had served on the committee for the program prior to that. This year I am serving on the faculty and I am so looking forward to the experience.

If I were a betting man (and as FanDuel knows, I am), I would wager that the 2025 Trial Academy is close to fully booked … but in the event a few spots remain open, I strongly encourage anyone who is reading this and who is potentially interested to look into it and register (you will be a little behind the curve on prep but that is what cramming is for). And even if the program is fully booked this year, keep it on your radar for next time, which should be in spring 2027. Since 2012, the Forum has run the Trial Academy every two years (with a 2022 COVID-19 interruption that caused a one-year hiccup).

Back to The Construction Lawyer, in this issue we feature three articles. The first article is “Trolling, Stonewalling, and Sham Pleadings: How Far Is Too Far?—Handling Opposing Counsel’s Discovery Phase Ethics Violations” by Kimberly Hurtado; in this article the author addresses an unfortunate reality in litigation—tactics from opposing counsel that border on being (or are) ethically improper and approaches to handling such scenarios. The second article, “Management of Supply Chain Risk: What to Do When Your Switchgear Is Lost in the Mail” by Jeffrey C. Bright, explains the continuing impact that supply chain problems present for the construction industry and the legal implications of material and equipment delays. Finally, our third article is the winning submission from the Forum’s 2024 Law Student Writing Competition—Keemiya Pourmonir’s (of Loyola University New Orleans College of Law) “Are Net-Zero Pledges Red Herrings to Escape Meaningful Decarbonization?”—which takes a critical look at the current legal challenges facing the United States’ pledge to reach “net-zero” emissions by 2050. Congratulations to Keemiya and thanks to each of our authors for their quality content. As always, we also have the Hard Hat Case Notes and Construction Bills columns, authored by some of our esteemed contributing editors.

Thanks for reading!