Friday, September 14, 2012

If you look up "Obtuse" in the dictionary, her picture is there...

Here is two minute snippet of how my deposition went on Wednesday.  (The facts have been changed to protect the guilty.)

If the witness would have simply answered "yes," "no," or "I don't know" to my questions, we could have been finished in about 3 hours.  Instead, she acted like this, and it took 6 hours:

* * * *

Me:  While Mr. X worked for you, did Mr. X receive training in Y?

Witness:  I have no personal knowledge of that.

Me:  Do you have any kind of knowledge, other than personal knowledge, regarding whether Mr. X received training regarding Y?

Witness:  No.

Me:  So would it be fair to say that you do not know whether Mr. X received training in Y while he worked for you?

Witness:  Well, I have no personal knowledge about that.  
[Editor's note:  her emphasis, not mine!]

Me:  Is there some kind of knowledge other than personal knowledge that you do have regarding whether Mr. X received training in Y while he worked for you?

Witness:  No.

Me:   So then, if you have no personal knowledge and no other kind of knowledge, do you have any knowledge about it at all?

Witness:  Well, I have no personal knowledge about it.

Me:  When I asked you whether Mr. X received training in Y while he worked for you, is there some reason that you could not simply respond "I don't know" or "I don't have any knowledge about it"?

Witness:  I'm just trying to make things clear.

Me:  It would make things very clear if you could simply answer "yes," "no," or "I don't know" to my questions.  Do you think you can do that, so that things will be more clear and so that we can finish this deposition in a reasonable amount of time?

Witness:   OK.
[Editor's note -- she's already not complying...]


Me:  Did Mr. X receive training in Y while he worked for you?

Witness:  I have no personal knowledge about that.


* * * *

Holy crap.  

Can you spell   "I-N-T-E-N-T-I-O-N-A-L-L-Y   O-B-T-U-S-E"  ?

10 comments:

stephen Hayes said...

It must make you want to pull your hair out. TV makes being a lawyer look like so much fun but I bet it isn't most of the time.

Gerry Hatrić said...

You have the patience of a saint!!

SkylersDad said...

Were you deposing some sort of high ranking political figure? :^)

Janie Junebug said...

I have no personal knowledge about anything. I also have no knowledge, and neither does the she in question.

Love,
Janie

Scope said...

I have impersonal knowledge of this type of response.

Green said...

Holy crap, this is exactly why I LOVE reading depo transcripts.

Jo ~ said...

smack that biotcccch upside the head!

Anonymous said...

haha hopefully you gained some personal knowledge on how to deal with this sort of thing in the future!

It's nice to see you're doing well! I've been away from the blogosphere for awhile and am trying to catch up with everyone's lives :)

Jan

Raine said...

How frustrating!!

John D. said...

HA! hahahahahahaha. : )