00:05
jury trials and family law matters are
00:07
pretty limited
00:08
meaning that a jury can only make
00:11
decisions about very limited issues
00:13
so in a child custody scenario a jury
00:16
can make a decision
00:18
about uh conservatorship
00:21
being are the parties going to be named
00:23
joint managing conservators
00:25
and who is going to be given the
00:27
exclusive right
00:29
to determine the primary domicile
00:32
of the child or they could name one
00:35
party
00:37
soul managing conservator and the other
00:39
party possessory conservator
00:41
or i guess technically and i had a case
00:43
like this once
00:44
they could name one party soul managing
00:47
and not
00:48
named the other party a conservator
00:51
even without terminating their parental
00:53
rights so
00:55
that’s a scenario where
00:58
to actually go to a jury on something
01:00
like that maybe you got a child
01:01
custody evaluation that wasn’t positive
01:05
for your client
01:06
maybe you’ve had rulings by the court on
01:09
other issues that were not positive for
01:12
your client or where the
01:15
court has made certain comments where
01:19
it makes you believe that they’re really
01:22
going to rely heavily on this negative
01:24
child custody evaluation we need to get
01:27
that in front of 12 people
01:29
that are going to better understand the
01:31
facts scenario
01:33
and give us a better chance so that’s
01:34
where you really would want that on a
01:36
child custody scenario
01:38
on a property situation kind of the same
01:41
thing from the standpoint if you’re
01:42
getting a bunch of negative
01:44
results from the judge themselves but
01:47
the court or the jury
01:48
is limited in what determinations they
01:51
can make so they can look at
01:52
the characterization of property meaning
01:55
is it separate or is it community and
01:57
that can be a huge deal
01:59
obviously the other is they can make a
02:02
determination
02:03
on what the value of the property is so
02:06
that can be significant on one of the
02:09
issues that we can run into on one of
02:10
these closely held companies is there
02:12
can be a lot of what’s called retained
02:14
earnings
02:14
okay and that should be reflected in
02:18
what the value
02:19
of the company is someone else might
02:22
value the company
02:23
and not be looking at that issue
02:26
as much as the most the time the
02:29
non-moneyed spouse
02:30
is is looking at that so those are
02:32
significant issues that sometimes
02:34
you want to take to a jury if you find
02:36
that you know the judge is just not
02:38
making
02:39
decisions that are really in your favor
02:42
and that can be a really good decision
02:43
sometimes
02:44
it does however it lengthens the process
02:48
which adds a pretty fair amount of money
02:50
so you need to think long and hard if
02:51
that’s something you really want to do