A few days ago
Anonymous

Can you name two grounds for a new trial?

And should the defendant receive a new trial?Should they also get a new judge?

Top 1 Answers
A few days ago
Goldmind

Favorite Answer

Happy to. Could be due to (i) jury misconduct or misconduct of the other party; (ii) newly discovered (material) evidence; (iii) the jury disregarding a judge’s explicit directions; (iv) a jury awarding excessive damages; (v) an error in the application of law – generally assuming the error was objected to in court; (vi) a verdict contrary to law.

There are others I’m sure. One final point. It’s not enough that there was a mistake – it has to be a mistake big enough that the losing party could have won had the mistake not been made.

As far as a new judge, I think you can’t generally control that unless you get a mandatory recusal. That would happen if the judge is shown to have some bias/conflict of interest. Unusual to get I would think. But I’m not a trial lawyer.

Hope this helps and glad those years of law school could be put to some practical use!

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