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Bar News - February 22, 2002 Hi-Tech Evidence Presenter Donated to Merrimack County Superior Court By: Lisa Sandford THANKS TO A fundraising effort spearheaded by the county bar, a courtroom in Merrimack County Superior Court is now equipped with a digital projection system that allows evidence to be presented electronically around the courtroom, saving time and streamlining the trial process. The evidence presentation equipment allows a document or other piece of physical evidence - such as a bullet - to be placed on a viewer and its image to be broadcast to thin-screen monitors located around the courtroom. In Merrimack County Superior's Courtroom One, there are seven monitors in the jury box, one on the witness stand, one on the judge's bench, one on each counsel's table and one at the projector podium. The projection system allows counsel or a witness to notate a particular area of the exhibit using a touch-screen illustrator, which offers various colors and overlays with which to highlight. One touch of the screen erases all notations. Zooming in on a piece of evidence is also possible. Using the videotape component of the evidence system, an attorney can play a video on all monitors, stopping action at designated points and again marking up the exhibit - or having a witness do so - using the illustrator. What this new technology does is make the trial process more efficient by making it easier to present evidence and eliminating the need for passing around paper documents submitted as evidence. "It makes referring to documents easier by eliminating the paper shuffling, and makes things moves faster," said Merrimack County Superior Court Clerk William S. McGraw. "It also gives everyone a chance to look at physical evidence at the same time." The digital projection system was a gift of the Merrimack County Bar, which led the fundraising effort to bring the "2002 version of an overhead projector" to the Superior Court, as attorney Ronald L. Snow, one of the leaders of the effort, called it. Snow, who is with the Concord law firm Orr & Reno, originally became familiar with the technology through a friend in the high-tech business, Julie Tobey, who eventually installed the digital projection systems for both NH's federal court and Merrimack County Superior. Snow helped with the federal court initiative to bring the technology to NH about five years ago and ran training seminars when the technology was first brought to that court. When Michael Brown of the NH Attorney General's Office recently approached Snow about helping to obtain one piece of the technology for Merrimack County Superior - a document imaging camera - Snow agreed, but suggested going a step further. "I said, 'Let's raise enough money for the whole system'," said Snow. He and fellow members of the Merrimack County Bar began fundraising in the community to raise the approximately $40,000 for the document camera, illustrator, monitors and associated equipment and for their installation. In addition to the county bar, funds came from the Dudley & Gene Orr Foundation at the New Hampshire Charitable Foundation, the Jameson Trust, and from a number of Concord area law firms. The Merrimack County Bar will consider whether to donate additional funds at a meeting later this spring. There is no state funding for this initiative. There are plans to add further equipment to Merrimack County's system in the near future, including a large flat-screen monitor that would hang on the wall so the audience could see the evidence displayed, and computer outlets so an attorney could plug a laptop computer into the system from counsel's table. Using certain software, attorneys could then maneuver through documents and video clips very quickly, Snow said. Another advantage of that feature: A disk can contain up to 17,000 pages, pages that then don't have to be hauled into court. At press time, the digital projection system had been used for two trials so far, including one involving pro se litigants, according to McGraw. He said that reaction to the new system has been positive. "It's very easy to use, it moves things along," he said. "I had one attorney say to me, 'Gee, this thing is addictive.'" Snow said that in addition to speeding up trials and saving paper, the system makes it possible to present evidence more clearly to jurors. "A physical exhibit is difficult to present traditionally. You put an easel with a diagram, for example, in one place and all the jurors can't see it. You move it, and then the witness can't see it. This technology makes it possible for everyone to look at the exhibit simultaneously now and clearly understand what is being presented," said Snow. Debra W. Ford, of Devine, Millimet & Branch in North Hampton, was one of the attorneys trying the first case in which the evidence presenter was used. She used it to exhibit interrogatories, photographs and other documents, and used the zoom feature to focus on particular areas of documents. She also presented two videotaped depositions on the system. Ford said she was impressed with the new technology and how it streamlined the trial process. "I thought it was excellent - very efficient. It made it easier for the jury to see and understand the exhibits and it cut down on the time it usually takes to pass exhibits around," Ford said. "It's an efficiency issue - it saves time in trial," she said. Ford added that she appreciated the Merrimack County Bar's making the gift to the court. Aside from the federal court, there are no other digital presentation systems in NH courts. Snow hopes that the installation of this new technology in Merrimack County will encourage other courts to look into installing evidence presenters. "It gives you great flexibility in terms of presenting evidence. I'm hoping Courtroom One of Merrimack County Superior will become a demonstration courtroom for the rest of the state," Snow said.
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