New California 7-hour Deposition Rule

California has added section 2025.290 to the Code of Civil Procedure, which limits a deposition to “seven hours of total testimony.” The new law will go into effect on January 1, 2013. The seven hours does not include examination by the witness’s own counsel. The limitation may be avoided by order of court, including a case management order. The law provides that the court shall allow additional time “if needed to fairly examine the deponent or if the deponent, another person, or any other circumstance impedes or delays the examination.”

LOCAL COURT REPORTER RECOGNIZED FOR PARTICIPATION IN NATIONAL COURT REPORTING AND CAPTIONING WEEK

VIENNA, Va., March 28, 2013—The National Court Reporters Association, the country’s leading organization representing stenographic court reporters and broadcast captioners, has announced that Linda Pugliese of San Jose, California, promoted the career opportunities in stenographic court reporting by participating in the 2013 National Court Reporting and Captioning Week. The awareness week, which took place February 17-23, consisted of a nationwide effort to highlight the contributions of stenographic court reporters and captioners to society and to showcase the career opportunities that exist in the court reporting and captioning fields.

LINDA PUGLIESE, a court reporter who owns and has operated CRS COURT REPORTERS from SAN JOSE, CALIFORNIA, participated in the 2013 National Court Reporting and Captioning Week by joining the grassroots efforts to promote the profession and educate local communities about the value stenographic skills bring to today’s marketplace.

“As highly technical career options, stenographic court reporting and captioning require an intricate blend of skill and knowledge,” said Tami Smith, president of NCRA and a court reporter for the 37th Circuit Court in Battle Creek, Mich. “National Court Reporting and Captioning Week not only celebrated and highlights the invaluable contributions that court reporters make to the legal and deaf and hard-of-hearing communities, it also showcases the tremendous career opportunities that are available through stenographic court reporting and captioning. We are grateful for LINDA’s extensive involvement in this initiative and for her never-ending support of this rewarding profession.”

Your Transcripts Electronically Delivered in Adobe PDF Format 

The Best For Viewing, Searching, Printing and Filing

CRS provides our clients with Min-U-Script electronically delivered transcripts with exhibits attached (optional)… all in the Adobe PDF format, the most commonly used and accepted format in the world.

• The best quality for viewing and printing in all styles
• Search one file or across an entire case using word index or Adobe Reader/Acrobat searching tools
• One click exhibit view/print from anywhere in the transcript
• Digest and collaborate using popular Adobe Acrobat tools
• Instant printing or emailing
• No special viewers required
• Meets all Federal and State electronic filing requirements

We Are Technology

Wireless Realtime in the Palm of Your Hand

NOW get realtime on your iPad or iPod.  The myView Viewer for clients is available free of charge in the Apple App Store.

CRS is proud to be an Ethics First Firm with National Court Reporters Association

The Ethics First program was created by the National Court Reporters Association as a positive and proactive effort to encourage reporters, firms, and the clients they serve to promote the impartiality and the neutrality of the reporting profession and avoid inappropriate gift giving and gift acceptance. When used correctly, the Ethics First trademark is designed to instill public confidence in and support for the court reporting profession. 

S.F. Eliminating Court-Provided Reporters in Most Civil Cases

COURT REPORTING SERVICES IN CIVIL CASES

Effective October 3, 2011, the services of Official Court Reporters will not normally be available during regular court hours in the civil departments of San Francisco Superior Court located at the Civic Center Courthouse.

When the services of an Official Court Reporter are not available for a hearing or trial in a civil case, a party may arrange for the presence of a certified shorthand reporter to serve as an official pro tempore reporter. It will be that party’s responsibility to pay the reporter’s fee for attendance at the proceedings, but the expense may be recoverable as part of the costs, as provided by law. [Rule 2.956(c), Cal. Rules of Court]

Call CRS for the most important part of your case, the trial.  You will be sure that our reporters are the best in the business and experienced in handling all aspects of court work.

DepoView for Video/Text Synchronization

When CRS synchronizes your videotaped depositions with transcripts and exhibits, we export to DepoView.  DepoView allows you to create and save video clips, search transcripts, and export synchronized video depositions to other programs. DepoView is the easiest way to review the deposition, search important segments, and extract key testimony from your video transcript.  Click picture below for an online tutorial. 

Is Your Depo Getting you in Hot Water with the IRS?

A message from the president of the Deposition Reporters Association.

Fear the Middleman

Why pay more to a "national" court reporting firm for your local depositions?
Truth is, "national" court reporting firms DO NOT have court reporters on staff in every locale across the United States or the world. Instead, they subcontract with local reporters. You can hire that same local reporter directly and save money in most cases. How do you save money by hiring locally? Marketing on a national scale is expensive. Local reporters don't have that expense. Higher operating costs and an additional layer of profit result in higher prices for the consumer, YOU.

You can save money by hiring locally for your out-of-state depositions too.
Contact CRS for all your out-of-town depositions. With our court reporter, videographer and interpreter contacts and knowledge of the court reporting industry, rest assured that you're getting a quality referral. CRS offers the convenience of one call does it all, just like the "national" firms, while avoiding the pitfalls of third-party contracting and other unethical practices that not only undermine the integrity of your court records, but could render your transcript void in some jurisdictions.

Click here for a more in-depth look at the benefits of avoiding the "national" middleman markup and hiring local reporters.

Beware of the "Usual Stipulations"

Here in Northern California court reporters are always faced with lawyers from Southern California making a stipulation at the end of a deposition, relieving the court reporter of his or her obligations under the Code of Civil Procedure. 

Our normal procedure is to always follow the code, which means the witness has 30 days to read his or her counsel's copy instead of the original and send an errata sheet to the court reporter.  The original remains in our office for 30 days and after that, any corrections received are placed with the original, sealed, and sent to the noticing party for safekeeping until time of trial.  These procedures ensure the integrity of the original.

Click here for a thoughtful article by Steven D. Archer, a partner in the Los Angeles office of Robins, Kaplan, Miller & Ciresi LLP on what it means to make the "usual stipulations" in a deposition. 

New! Realtime TV viewer

We now have the revolutionary StenoCastTV for instant-on real-time, no com ports to configure, no baud rates, no tokens!  Ask for a free hands-on demo today.

Click for Demo

Could your court reporter's gifts put you at higher risk for an IRS audit?

From Save Our Court Records:

The Law Firm of Hanson Bridgett Offers Legal Opinion Regarding Tax Implications!

Many court reporting firms have been promising valuable incentives to law firm staff in exchange for booking depositions. DRA and CCRA, two prominent court reporting associations, have retained the law firm of Hanson Bridgett to review the tax implications of these incentives and have shared the results for wide distribution.

According to the Hanson Bridgett analysis, law firms, attorneys, and staff should be aware that offers of such incentives raise potentially serious tax consequences for law firms and their employees.   As Hanson Bridgett writes: 

Court Reporter vs. Machine

An open letter by Deposition Reporters Association President Lisa Michaels on the differences between a professional court reporter and a tape recorder.

Video/Text Synchronization

EDIT YOUR VIDEO as easily as highlighting text. Using DepoView, you will have at your fingertips video, text, exhibits and the ability to create video clips to export to MS PowerPoint and transcript management software such as Summation.

• PDF exhibits hyperlinked to all references within the transcript.
• Transcript tracks video.
• Easily search through video by entering key words in the search box or use built-in Word Index.
• View and print out transcript in full-sized mode or condensed.

Call for free demo disk. To schedule your next video deposition, click here.

Santa Clara County Requires E-filing in Complex Civil Litigation cases

Here's a press release I received that demonstrates the importance of digital documents. CRS is dedicated to making your job easier, so all of our exhibits and transcripts are in electronic format and uploaded to our website for easy downloading. Our exhibits are always scanned in PDF format and our transcripts are in secure, industry standard E-Transcript format. When it comes time to go to trial and submit transcripts and exhibits to the court, it's all right there, on our website, already done for you. We've been offering this service since 1998, long before it became the popular "new" way to file documents with the court.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE – September 1, 2006
ELECTRONIC FILING AND SERVICE REQUIREMENTSFOR COMPLEX CIVIL LITIGATION CASES ONLY

In October 2005, the Superior Court of California, County of Santa Clara launched an electronic filing (E-filing) pilot program permitting the electronic filing of documents on designated complex civil litigation cases. The current E-filing service provider is Glotrans and the Court’s E-filing website address is http://www.scefiling.org. The E-filing program is an expansion of the Court’s existing Complex Civil Litigation document management website. Initially, parties stipulated to file their documents electronically.
The Judge presiding over Complex Civil Litigation cases has ordered that all actions classified as provisionally complex pursuant to CRC 1800(c) must be electronically filed and served. The Order is effective September 1, 2006. In addition, all actions classified by the Complex Litigation Judge as Complex Litigation are subject to the Court’s Electronic Filing and Service Standing Order, unless exempted by order of the Complex Litigation Judge for good cause. The Electronic Filing and Service Standing Order is published in electronic format on the Court’s website at http://www.scefiling.org and in print format at the Historic Courthouse and the Downtown Superior Court.

E-filing has a wide range of benefits to attorneys and to the Court. It improves accuracy and provides better access to Court records, and should result in significant cost savings to attorneys and their clients, and to the Court. The E-filing system allows interactive communication between the filer and the court through an electronic window. With the click of a mouse, legal documents are sent directly to the clerk of the court through the electronic window. After the case has been accepted, it is digitally stamped with an electronic endorsement and an email is sent to the filer confirming approval of the document. Court fees are pre-programmed into the system and are paid directly to the court when the documents are filed. After successful filing, the document is available to all parties in the system’s central repository. Service is rendered electronically to all case parties who have registered with the website and an electronic proof of service is automatically generated and processed by the Clerk at review time.

Voice Recognition