"The best advice for a trial lawyer is: this is not about you," says Meg Simonian, a medical malpractice trial lawyer practicing in Alaska who has navigated some of the most challenging trial conditions in the country. Meg joins host Charla Aldous to discuss building a career in a state with restrictive caps on non-economic damages — and how she pushes past those limits. She shares her hard-won strategies for trying cases in remote Alaska communities — including how to understand the "personality" of the community you're in. She also opens up about balancing a career with raising five children and the lessons she’d pass on to younger lawyers. Tune in for Meg's insights on exhibit organization, deposition strategy, and why getting out of your own way is the most important skill a trial lawyer can develop.

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More likely than not, that 0.01% is all it takes to tip the scales of justice. Join us as inner circle legend, Charla Aldous, Eleanor Aldous, and Caleb Miller. Walk you through the critical moments, big decisions, and bold strategies that win high states cases and show you how to turn that 0.01% into a game-changing verdict. You're listening to the podcast where winning is more likely than not. Produced and powered by LawPods.

Welcome to the next episode of "More Likely Than Not," the podcast from the Aldous Law Firm. We are very happy to have my inner circle sister, Meg Simonian, with us today. Hey, Meg.

Hi, Charla. It's still a little crazy that I'm one of your sisters in the inner circle, but honor of my life.

You are very deserving and I love, love, love having you in the organization. It's been such a great addition. And you're from the great state of Alaska.

Yes. Born and raised, which is a thing here.

I've never been to Alaska, so I want to talk to you a little bit about how you grew up. Where were you born? What did you do? Where'd you go to college? Things like that. Just some background information for our listeners.

Sure. I was born and raised in Anchorage, Alaska, which is the big city, and it's not a big city by other standards.

How big is it?

The whole state is about 750,000, and we're about half the population. If you count all the outlying areas of Anchorage. And I grew up in a family of seven and was the first of my family, including my parents and extended family, to go to college. And I think it's important to this podcast that of the family of seven, I had five brothers.

Wow. Yeah. Where were you in the lineup, Meg?

I was the second to youngest.

Where was the other sister? I've got to ask.

She's the oldest. She's the oldest. And I don't think there's really any better experience for becoming a trial lawyer than having five brothers. It really does prepare you in every way to do what we do. And so I am grateful to them for that.

If you can survive that, you can survive anything.

Exactly. I mean, you have to learn to let nothing faze you, get under your skin. And that is definitely a skill that I bring to my practice every day. So

You're the first in your family to go to college. Congratulations. Where did you go to school?

I started at Pepperdine University in California, and it was such a huge shell shock to be so far away in such a different place in Malibu, California. But I came back to Anchorage at the University of Alaska Anchorage. And there I, on a whim, I saw a flyer, I joined the debate team, which is a nationally recognized debate team from the University of Alaska and went on to win with my partner, the National Debate Championship. But even before that, I was planning to go to law school. I majored in English, but law school was my goal.

So the National Debate Championship as in the National of the United States?

Yeah.

From Alaska.

Yes.

A woman.

A team of women. It was both of us.

Both of you were women? Oh, that is so cool.

Yeah, it was very cool and exciting. We were in Arkansas of all places for the national championship.

Had you ever been involved in public speaking or anything like that before being on the team?

I hadn't. I hadn't.

And were you intimidated at first or did you jump into it and think this is what I was born to do?

It was the latter, definitely. I mean, it was never that. It was definitely the latter. And because our team was so small and we traveled, we couldn't specialize in debate. We had to do all the speaking events because the way these competitions work, your team is trying to get enough points to win or get those kind of accolades as a team. So we had to do debating plus speaking events like extemporaneous impromptu and prepared speeches. So it was like these crazy tournaments where we'd fly. We were probably the only schools flying. We'd show up and we'd debate and do speaking events all day, every day for several days. And especially if we got into the outrounds and the speaking events are the debate rounds. And also really great training for trial work.

Oh yeah. And so you did this while you were going to law school?

College. Oh,

It was in college. Oh, okay. Yeah. Oh, I thought you were talking about the national competition in law school, but you did it in college.

Yeah. And it was like, I mean, because my high school didn't have a debate team at that time. I think most in the city do now. So it wasn't something I had even known about as a potential thing to do before that. When we were outside, because we were competing against a bunch of schools from the lower 48, they had all been doing it forever. They were all seasoned and they typically focused on either debate or speaking events because they had big enough teams that they could do that. But our team, we didn't have that.

You did it all. I loved it. But before you were on the debate team, had you already decided that you wanted to be a lawyer?

I had.

When did you start thinking about becoming a lawyer, Meg?

I can't remember really a time that I thought about doing anything different. And I have thought about this. Why was that? Because obviously nobody in my family were lawyers and we didn't even know lawyers.

I'm right there with you. I did not know a lawyer when I became one. It was only when I went to law school.

Yeah, not something that was ... And so I think it's because from a very young age, my teachers would say to me and other adults would say, "You should be a lawyer." Because

You argued a lot.

Yeah. I just was sassy and argued too much, but people would say that to me and I thought, "Well, that sounds like a good idea. Maybe I should do that.

" So did you go straight from college into law school?

I didn't. I worked in politics for a little while. I worked in the state legislature and then went to law school. So I took a little bit of a break for maybe a year or two doing that and then went to law school, but it was always my plan to do that. And then I went to school in Boston at Northeastern University.

I thought you went in Alaska. So you went to law school in Boston.

We don't have a law school in Alaska. We're one of the few states that don't.

Are you kidding me?

I'm not.

How was it being away from Alaska for three years being in Boston?

Well, Boston's a great city. It's a great city to be in school even when you're so busy in law school. And I really liked Northeastern. The reason I chose it is they have the co-op program there, so you have to do co-ops to graduate. So when you're not going to school, I think most people do some sort of internships, but they're required at Northeastern to graduate. And they have all of these networks set up and they have a really strong network in Alaska because a lot of Northeastern grads came up here after law school because they'd come here to do internships here. At that point, I definitely did know lawyers. They were on my soccer team and I'd run into them in the legislature and everybody encouraged me to apply to Northeastern because of that program. So it had a real connection to the state, which was great.

That's really cool. And then after you graduated from law school, did you go back to Alaska?

I did. And I did almost all of my co-ops here except for one on, I did a co-op on the Third Circuit in Philadelphia.

And once you became a lawyer, Meg, tell us about your early career, what you did.

Well, I can't really talk about that without saying. Also, I got pregnant in law school and had my first baby, Henry, and my first of five, I have five kids. And so that was after my second year of law school. I took a quarter off. I took one quarter off and then finished, came back to Alaska and clerked and was pregnant with my second baby test while I was clerking and studying for the bar. So being a lawyer is intertwined with being a mother for me. I never was one without the other, it seems like. So I have to talk about that in a way. But I did end up becoming a public defender as my first job, which was what I wanted to do, although I went to law school thinking I was going to be a prosecutor, strongly believing I was going to be a prosecutor.

But my first co-op at the US Attorney's Office, it just didn't feel right. And then I did a co-op at the Public Defenders and I thought, okay, this is definitely my people.

That is so interesting. So you did not enjoy the prosecutorial side.

I didn't.

You're always for the underdog.

I was convinced that was what I was going to do. And it's just funny, maybe an early career lesson is try not to be convinced of these things and be open to the experiences that present themselves because I'm really glad I listened to that part of myself and didn't go the prosecutorial route, although I have lots of respect for it. It just was not the right fit for me. You're right. It was the underdog. It was relying on federal agents or police officers to make your case instead of your own creativity and looking at it carefully. That whole part of it always was hard for me.

Meg, we have a lot of young lawyers that are listeners, and I think that's really important what you just said. You might have preconceived ideas about what you want to do when you get out of law school, but sometimes you just need to follow your heart, your soul, and your gut and go with what feels right. Did you always know you wanted to be a trial lawyer of some sort?

Yes, I did. Yeah,

That was me too. I knew I wanted to be in the courtroom, wasn't sure in what capacity. So how long were you in the public defender's office?

I was at the Public Defenders and then I was at the Office of Public Advocacy, which is the alternate public defender. So I started in misdemeanors at the public defenders for about two years, and then I was doing felony trials at Office of Public Advocacy for another three or so years with young kids, that job, which I think those jobs are so important and I have so much respect for people who do them, but it was just so hard to leave it at work and come home. And I think living in a small community when you see this, it's not that small in Anchorage, it's 250,000 people, but when you're exposed to the underbelly of the community all the time, it wears on you. So I decided to switch to civil work. And I bet

During those five or so years doing criminal defense, you got a lot of trial experience.

Yes, I did, thankfully.

And I don't know about you, Meg, but I've always thought it doesn't matter what kind of case you're trying, whether it's a traffic ticket, civil conspiracy, anything. A trial is a trial is a trial. What do you think about that?

I think that's true. I think that all of the similar elements are there. I think the work you do in civil work, depending on the type of cases you handle, can become much more complex, but those fundamentals, they're the same. Talking to people or trying to pick a jury who can be fair. And I think from the criminal perspective, as a criminal defense attorney, it is very similar in terms of dealing with juror bias and trying to ferret that out. So it has those same commonalities.

So when you decided to make the transition from criminal law to civil law, did you go with a firm? Did you branch out on your own? What did you do? I went with

A firm and I was super lucky to be hired by Rick Friedman's firm, which was then Friedman, Ruben and White. And Rick started in Alaska and they had an Anchorage office. At that point, the firm had opened the office in Bremerton, but there was still an Anchorage office that Rick would come in and out of. And Kirsten at the time, his wife, who's an amazing trial lawyer as well.

They're two of my very favorite people on this earth.

If you're talking about lessons that I would've told my younger self or to young trial lawyers, definitely try to pick good mentors because it makes all the difference. I was so lucky to have both of them as mentors and Jeff Rubin, who is an amazing lawyer. Also, after that, I came to Dillon and Findley and had Ray Brown and Maury Long who are incredible mentors as well. So you get lucky in life, but you should also look for those people if you can and maybe take the job that doesn't make as much money or doesn't seem like the right step because you get that opportunity to be exposed to someone who cares so much about the craft because it makes so much difference in how you learn to practice. I

Love the way you said that, that cares so much about the craft because not all lawyers are that way.

No.

And not all trial lawyers are that way. It truly is a craft to Rick Friedman. He's been on our podcast. It was just absolutely amazing. When you were at Friedman and Ruben, what type of law did you practice?

So that practice at the time was primarily insurance bad faith cases and not necessarily in Alaska, although there were some odd cases that were in Alaska. And I was learning to be the support for the trial lawyers. I wasn't the trial lawyer in that role. And at that time, the firm was small. There weren't other associates. There were very few partners, several of whom were Rick or his brothers, Ken and at that time, Jeff. And so it was really a great opportunity because some people might look at that and think, oh my gosh, there's not other associates. You're going to have all this work dumped on you. But it was great because I got to build the skills that you need in complex civil litigation that are really actually very hard to, I think, hone when you are in the kind of crazy triage practice you're doing when you're a public defender or prosecutor where you're putting out fires all day long.

They cared about excellence and turning over every stone and making all your work quality work. And so that was a huge gift.

Where all did you all try cases when you were at Rick's office?

Well, the cases I were involved in were all Alaska cases that we tried. The work I did on discovery and motions and things like that involved cases out of the state, but the trials were here. So I got to carry his bag and Kirsten's bag to court several times, which I count as some amazing experience.

So when did you transition to another law firm and start trying cases on your own?

So then I got divorced and remarried and had-

How many children do we have at this point?

So now we just have two.

Okay.

Then I got pregnant with my third baby and the first baby not in law school or trying to start my career. And I really wanted to take time off. So I took some time off to be with Ivan. He's my third baby, which was also really amazing because I felt for my first two babies that I was kind of in a fugue state as a new parent because I was trying to build my career and trying to do all of that at the same time. I'm sure you remember those days.

Oh, do I ever? My kids sometimes ask me when they become adults, "How did you do it, mom? Raising four of us in a law firm." I said, "Well, I realized early on I couldn't give you back." And you liked food, shelter, and clothing, so you just kind of do it. So how long did you take off after you had Ivan?

I took about 18 months to two years off. And there was this question, well, the firm was definitely closing down it's Alaska and focusing on Seattle and well, Bremerton more at that point. And I was just never going to move there at that time because I had young kids and my parents were older and I was helping take care of them and I just couldn't leave the state that wasn't going to work. So I knew that I took the time off and then I was approached by Dillon and Findley by Ray Brown to see if I was interested in coming to work here. And he and Mori Long did primarily medical malpractice work.

Had you ever done medical malpractice work before then?

No. Wow,

That's jumping into the fire.

It is.

It is. I've often said if you can do medical malpractice work, then you can do just about anything because it's very complex in many ways. I

Think it definitely feels like that. I mean, I remember when I first started, I don't know if you had this experience because I had Ray as a mentor and I could listen to him, talk to experts or do depositions. I remember thinking, "I'm never going to be able to say all these words or know all these things." It just seemed like so insurmountable of a learning curve.

I'm right there with you. I would listen to lawyers use medical terms. I'm like, "How did they learn all of this? " It's just you dig in and you read the textbooks and start just reading articles and journal articles and then it becomes fun. I love it because every case is different. You learn something totally different. So were you doing just only medical malpractice cases when you first joined the new firm?

Pretty much entirely that. Maury had been drawn into this really complex oil gas litigation thing. So Ray needed someone. He'd had her all along and then he didn't have her. So he needed someone to fill that in because she was so embroiled in this other litigation. So that's what I was doing and I loved it.

Has that been consistent over all these years? Do you still primarily do medical malpractice?

I do primarily do medical malpractice in a state where we have horrible tort reform counts on non-economic.

That's what I was going to ask you.

And I now think I should move to another state on a semi-regular basis now that my parents are gone and my kids are close to being grown, but it's been a good place. We do have horrible caps, 250 and 400 on non-economic, but we also have an exception for recklessness. And it's a jury question. And if the jury decides recklessness, then there's no cap on non-economics.

When you say 250 and 400, how does that work?

Well, it's a post-trial. The jury doesn't know. It's a post-trial remitter.

But 250,000 for non-economic damages?

250,000, unless it's serious physical injury, 70% disabled, then you get 400 or 400 for death for non-economic, which limits the cases that we can take, obviously. But we do take cases that are mostly non-economic type cases if it's a case we think we can make a recklessness argument. And we've been successful in trial multiple times getting a jury to agree that the conduct was reckless. I

Did not know you had that exception. I knew you had caps. I wish we had that in Texas because our non-economic damage caps are 250,000 as well. And all I did was medical malpractice until 2003 when the tort reform changes came and I kind of reinvented myself. And so I still do some of it, but I don't do exclusively med mal, but it's really tough. And what I found difficult is, for instance, if somebody comes in and due to hospital or doctor's negligence, they lost their child and you have to tell them, "Your case is worth 250,000," it just breaks my heart to this day. I hate it. Do you experience that with clients?

We do experience that and it's so unjust. And I have hope that that pendulum is swinging back. I do think when I started, which was that the nadir of tort reform, conservative juries, which is the late 90s, mid 90s, late 90s, I mean, I feel like that pendulum is shifting. Now, things don't happen quickly, but the level of distrust in the public for health insurance companies and doctors even, and the way that the medical hospitals, the way that it's become a corporate type of mindset instead of patient safety, I think you can find that and touch that in the jury pools, even in a conservative place like Alaska. I

Often say, I think the pendulum is going to swing as well, but probably not in my career time, but maybe in my daughters who practices with me, I hope so. So when you try cases in Alaska, you try them, I assume, in some smaller communities rather than Anchorage.

We do. So we have in Alaska, there are four judicial districts, a couple of which are not on the road system. So Alaska is not like we have a road system that connects us because our state is so vast, much bigger than Texas, even though Texas likes to-

Texas likes to think they're the biggest of everything.

They're the biggest. We're bigger. And there's about 2,200 lawyers that practice actively in this state.

1800 of those or so are in the Third Judicial District, which is Anchorage and the outlying areas. So where I grew up and where my law firm is a bigger city and the biggest practice, but these other areas like Juno or Fairbanks or the Bush communities, Bethel or Nome or Kodiak or those kind of places are much farther removed and much smaller. But there are hospitals in most of them in large part because of the Indian Health Service or because of in the late 70s, there was this big push to create all these community hospitals and communities. And we had pretty powerful senators, Ted Stevens and that. So that Alaska got a lot of money for that sort of things, helped to get money to create these community hospitals, which are now mostly owned by private entities. Sometimes they're owned by boards within the communities that actually govern them, which makes it a little tricky.

I would assume when you're trying cases, because I started out my career, I lived in my hometown of Sherman, which is a population of 30,000, and we were a small community and I practiced in other small communities like Denton, Texas, Gainesville, Texas. I didn't go to the big city for quite a few years. And I found it's really different trying a case in a small community versus a city. Has that been your take as well?

Absolutely.

Tell us about that. How do you change what you do when you're in a small community? Because I've often found that they're very protective of their doctors.

They definitely can be. I mean, I think, and I don't know if this is unique to Alaska because maybe some of them are more isolated. I think that they all have their own sort of unique personalities as a community. And I don't know if that's the same as you experienced in Texas. Sometimes they are very protective of their hospitals and doctors, and you definitely need to know that going in. I think other times, there's a hospital, this is actually on the road system out in the Matanuska Valley. It used to be called Valley Hospital, and now it's called Matsu Regional. But if you talk to people who grew up there, they called a Death Valley Hospital. So you need to know that. And similarly, in Fairbanks, which is the university's there, it's got military bases, so that's our second largest community. And for whatever reason, they're not maybe because of the way that the hospital has been run and the in and out of different corporate entities, they're not as protective of the hospital and the doctors there as just, I think, part of their personality as a community in a way, maybe because the military and the university people are in and out of the community a fair amount, but they're not as insular, even though it's a small community.

So I think you have to try to learn the personality of the place you're going to go.

How do you do that, Meg?

Well, talking to people who live there is one of the best ways, which is hard to do. I know because in some places where you grew up in Sherman, I mean, if somebody comes around and starts talking to people-

That could be on the jury pool.

Talking to people. So that's hard to do sometimes, but you can talk to people. And another way now in the time of internet, even though I used to make a habit of always if there was a local newspaper reading the newspaper and starting to read it as soon as the case came up, doing research on it to see if any of the names, players in there are in there for any reason, because you want to kind of know how they're known in the community, maybe doctor, but maybe they're really active in Boy Scouts or whatever, you need to know that stuff. But also because a lot of those have folded and don't exist anymore, I found that in med bal, a lot of these hospitals have either these newsletters that are available online that you can do research on and read. And you should definitely do always, if you have nurses or doctors, search them on the website because if they're mentioned in those newsletters, they'll come up.

And another place to look is in minutes of the board, because often in these smaller communities, there's, at least here, these boards exist that run the hospital and they're required. Even when we've had these outside corporations, national corporations like Banner and other places buy these hospitals, they still keep these boards. So you can often get the minutes from them and you find out a lot of valuable information that way, not directly relevant to your case necessarily, but sort of what's going on in this-

The culture.

The culture. Exactly.

I can't believe when you said newspaper, it took me back. I had literally forgotten this, but when I tried cases in the smaller communities other than Sherman, I would start reading the local newspaper because one thing you want to be able to do when you're in Voir Dire, and we call it in Voir Dire in Texas, and even when crossing witnesses, you kind of want to know what's going on in the town. So if something comes up, you can say something to let the jury know, I'm not a complete stranger here and know the major roadways-

And how to pronounce them.

I'll tell you, you want to make a jury mad like in Durant, Oklahoma, if you go in and say, "Are you from Durant?" You're going to be ousted. It's Durant.

Exactly.

I've seen ... And it's the same way in some of these smaller communities, if you mispronounce their roadways or their county, they take it personal.

They do and they know. And I think you get a lot of information from reading those papers that just also just sort of explains, gives you a sense of the personality in a way that you can't always get. And they still exist online for a lot of communities. And letters to the editor, the people who are writing it, those are great too, because you really get a sense of what matters to people in the small places, and it's very valuable.

So is the majority of your cases, are they in Anchorage or in these outer line communities?

Most are in Anchorage, and that kind of ebbs and flows. It's always harder when it's outside of Anchorage, even outside of Anchorage, because you have to fly ... I mean, you can drive to Fairbanks, but it's an eight-hour drive.

It's eight hours?

Eight hours. And we're huge.

Goodness gracious. That's unbelievable.

And if you wanted to drive to ... June know it's several days because you have to take the ferry and go through part of Canada kind of so you can't ... It's really far to get to either place.

But they usually have flights from Anchorage to these smaller communities.

You do.

So that takes a lot of travel.

And they're not cheap either. It would be as if you were flying to Florida. It's the same cost, essentially. If they're not cheap, it's a lot of travel. There's not a lot of places to stay. I mean, we're getting ready to try Case in Juneau, beginning June 1st. That's on the water. It's our state capital, but cruise ships go there in the summer and it's a huge tourist destination in summer. So there's no hotel rooms available or Airbnbs and things like ... And it's not like you can stay an hour away and drive. You have to be there. So you have to think about those things for sure.

Far in advance. How do you handle voir dire in these smaller communities? Is there anything different that you do than what you do in Anchorage?

Yes. I think we find people in the communities we know or that are friends of friends and we get the lists early and we talk to them about everybody on the list and hopefully have someone there with you when you're picking a jury so you have some insider information. We definitely try to do that in any case where we're picking a jury in an outlying community where we're not members of that community.

So basically local council.

Essentially, they're like not just for the voir dire part of it, just really for that part of it. Who do you know? Who do they know? How are they connected? And then we do a lot of, as I'm sure you do, ton of internet research and database research on the potential jury pool as much as we can, letters to the editor, everything like that so we can find out as much as we can.

I've got to ask you, when you first started practicing in Alaska, were there many female trial lawyers?

Well, in public practice, I would say it was pretty ... There were a lot of women involved in prosecuting and public defender work for sure, but definitely not in civil practice when I came over to civil practice. Absolutely not.

Have you experienced having to overcome sexism in the Alaskan Bar? I know that's a loaded question.

Oh, often, and this used to happen forever, maybe it's because I'm getting older, it doesn't happen as often, or maybe it's because it's changing. When I would walk into a deposition room, the videographer almost always assumed I was the court reporter who hadn't shown up yet.

That is the same thing with me. And it doesn't happen anymore because I'm so much older.

I don't know if it's because of that or because I think it is changing. I mean, at least to hear there has been a lot of that old white guy guard who've retired and there are definitely more younger women, I think, involved in trying cases and trial lawyers, but that was part of it. I mean, also I think I've had jurors comment on my clothes and my hair when we talk to them after a trial. I don't think that ever happens to male colleagues ever.

And you know what else I've noticed, especially female jurors, they always watch and see what shoes you're wearing.

Always.

I love watching it and watching their eyes to see when they're going to go to my shoes. So I'm more careful about what shoes I wear than I am the suit or dress that I wear. For sure. And it depends on the women that are on the jury, what shoes I wear. It's crazy. You've noticed that too?

I know. And I try to take the ... I don't want to be distracting. I want them to look at them and be bored by them. Absolutely. I want them to think about are they expensive? Often we're walking over to court in our snow boots and then take them off and we have to change into our heels in order. You

Don't want any red bottom shoes in the courtroom? No. No red bottom shoes in the courtroom.

Absolutely not. Although I wager most jurors in a Alaska wouldn't know what that meant. But maybe- I didn't

Even

Think about that. But one who does, you don't want them to know it.

If it's one, that could be your holdout. I know that you've mentored young lawyers in your career, Meg. If you were going to tell someone the top three or four tips being a trial lawyer, what would they be?

Okay, that's a really good question. I would say that you don't have to make your life fit your career. You have to take it as it comes and you can plan and you can have all of these intentions, but things come up. There are twists in the road. It all changes. But if you're devoted to it and you have passion for it, which you have to, I think you have to. To do this work well, you have to have a passion for it, but to do it well as a woman with kids even more because you have to be able to balance that somehow. And I would say that would be my second, if it was a young woman lawyer, I would say your presence matters way more than perfection for your kids.

Oh, I love that. Your presence matters more than perfection.

Way more. And so they make sacrifices. My kids have made sacrifices for my career that they didn't choose. And I'm sure yours did too, just because that's what happens if you have a career. But I think they also gain from knowing you're there and knowing you're there when it counts and knowing you're doing something you love and you care about. They see all my kids, I think all of them have had the opportunity to see me in trial and they see how much you care about your clients and that matters to them and that you're doing something for somebody else.

That's what I was going to say. And even talking to them about the cases, the tragedies you're dealing with, I think it develops a compassion and empathy in your children to know, wow, there's a lot of people out there that have it a whole lot worse than I do. It's pretty amazing.

Yeah. And they get to see that when you're not with them, you're doing something for somebody else that matters. And so I think that is something I would've told myself. And then the other thing that I think is the best advice for a trial lawyer is this is not about you. Getting yourself out of the way of what really matters, which is your client and your client's story and trying not to get ... It's so hard sometimes to not get hung up on the judge's rulings or that you're right and they're wrong or that this is not fair. Just looking at it from the perspective of this is not about you and how do I move forward and make the best of whatever it is? Because there is a way to make the best of whatever it is.

That's crazy that you're saying that, Meg. I have said the same thing. I said, when you're nervous, when you go into the courtroom and you're nervous, how do you look? How do you sound? Am I doing this right? Always remember, it isn't about you.

Yes.

It's about the client. And if you can continue to focus on that, you get outside of yourself. And I think you become much better at the job.

I agree. And that's a level of humility that sometimes people don't think of it as humility, right? Because it's all wrapped up in your own hangups and your own imposter syndrome and all the things that we all have. So there's value in paying attention to that stuff, figuring out what it is that's getting in your way, that's making it more about you. There's definitely value in that. You'll be better if you do.

You really will. I totally agree. Well, tell us about, when you think about your cases, is there any case that comes to mind that you think, wow, that was all of them are meaningful, but this one really stayed in my heart and my mind for a long period of time, if not forever.

Well, we had a case that wasn't a med mal case because we do do some cases that aren't med mal cases. That was a wrongful termination case against the city of Anchorage for a police officer, which for me was complicated given my background with police officers.

Wait, now I want to make sure I understand this. It's against Anchorage and it's for the wrongful termination of a police officer.

Yes.

That had to be an adjustment for you.

It was, because I have a complicated relationship with police officers, obviously, from what I used to do. And so it was a case that challenged me to put aside those kind of preconceived notions. He was an amazing client. One of the best clients I ever had. And he likes to tell this story that by the end of the case, before every deposition, I would say, "They're going to lie. Police officers lie." You told

The police officer that.

And he would say, "They're not going to lie. Police officers don't lie." And by the end of the case, he had come around and recognized that many of them would lie. And I had come around and recognized some wouldn't. And so it was this great ... But the thing, my son-

I got to ask you this. Did he go to the depositions with you?

He would listen. Actually, because he'd been fired, he was actually in Afghanistan. So he would get up in the middle of the night to be involved in them and he would listen. And it really exposed the underbelly and tribalism of police that I didn't ... The only group I'd say that's more tribal than police officers is doctors. And they're similar actually in terms of how they approach these things.

Did y'all try that case?

We tried that case in federal court with the jury because they removed it to federal court because of our ... Which is, in my opinion, the place that justice goes to die often. So it's terrible law and employment cases and things like that. And it was a huge verdict for an employment case and we won. And it's a unanimous verdict in federal court. I don't have to have a unanimous verdict in state court. And we won. And maybe the reason I'm thinking about this is my son, who at the time I think was about nine or 10, came to watch the opening and closing argument. And then he asked me when it was done and he'd heard that the jury came back because I'd said to the jury in my closing argument, "He's here because he wants his name back and you have to give him his name back." And he said to me, "Did Tony get his name back, mom?"

Oh, I love it.

So that was a case that in terms of money the firm made, I probably made 25 cents on the dollar, just because it wasn't ... But it was a huge verdict and it was against the city and it was right.

And it was meaningful.

Yeah.

And he got his name back.

And he got his name back. He did.

I love that. What a great, great story.

That's our gift, right? We get to do that sometimes. We get to strike a blow for justice.

Such a wonderful feeling. When you're talking about the tribal dynamics, how do you get through those? I've seen different women especially deal with different ways. Some of them head on, some of them just kill them with kindness. How do you handle it, Meg?

I would say I read the room. I use both. And that's also probably a skill that I developed early on with five brothers. If you don't read the room, you don't ... So if it is somebody who ... I mean, I think you can hit it head on and you can take it head on, but you have to get there. The jury has to get there with you. You can't start that way.

This is so fun for me because you're saying things that I've always said and thought. I really believe as a female, you cannot walk into a trial with the guns blazing. They expect it of men, but they do not expect it of women.

And in depositions, what I find is that you can start asking the questions in a very calm, collected way that make them upset about the tribalism. You're going to get them to react in a way that reveals it eventually. It just so happens. If you're doing it right and you're thinking about it and you're prepared and you read the room, if they're totally arrogant and outrageous, and you can get to a point in the deposition where you can say, "Doctor, I'm going to ask you. Just listen to the question and answer the question." Then you're there, but you don't start that way. You start giving them the chance to not be jerks. And then if they do, then you have the authority-

Katie bar the door. Here we go. Yes.

Katie barred

The door.

That's so funny.That's Ray Brown always said that. Katie barred the door.

Did he really? I love that. I want to talk to you a little bit. You've said some about motherhood and trial work, but I'm the mother of four and you're the mother of five. To our female listeners out there, I just want them to understand that you can be a mother and still be a great trial lawyer.

Yes. How did

You do it?

Well, you do it because you do what you have to do. I mean, it's the same with what you said. You had to put food in a shelter on the table. You do what you have to do. And I think you also ... I'm a new grandma. My oldest daughter just had a baby and-

Oh, congratulations. I

Know. It's the best job ever. It's so amazing. It's so awesome. But she's not in law school or studying for the bar or any of those things. She's taking care of her baby. She's overwhelmed just like I was overwhelmed with all those other things. I mean, it's no different. It is no different. So even if you have the choice and you have the ability to just focus only on being a mother, it's still hard. And you're still going to have all those doubts and second guessing and everything that happens when you're a mother. So just try not to be so hard on yourself. Boy,

That's good advice. Don't try for perfection because you're not going to get there.

Don't try for perfection. No. I

Love what you said. Be present, not perfect. That's really, really good.

Yeah. That's the best you can do. And then sure, there are definitely times where I'm getting up at five in the morning because I feel guilty and I'm going to make some blueberry muffins for my boys because I know that that's going to make me feel less guilty. I do those things too. And everybody does those things, but so do moms who don't have the weight of trying to build a law career and be really good at it too. And

One thing I do tell young lawyers, if you don't love it, it's a hard way to make a living. I mean, it's a lot of stress. You win or you lose. It's combative and you're dealing with tragedy, people that rely on you. But the counterpart to that, to me, Meg, is it feeds my soul. I mean, it just feels so good to help those who have had something catastrophic happen in their life.

I agree. And they deserve to have someone who cares as much as you care and I care, represent them. I can remember what it felt like the first time I got to go across that gate and into the galley of a court. And it felt to me like I was supposed to be there. This is home for me. I really don't try to lose sight of the fact that the reason I get to do that is because somebody has trusted me enough to represent them on the other side of that gate. And that's a gift. We get to do that and that's pretty amazing.

Very, very lucky. Let me ask this, do you do focus groups?

We do, which can be tricky, especially in the smaller communities.

That's what I was going to ask you. How do you do focus groups in those smaller communities?

We've done it, but I don't think we would do it again, especially now with advent of the big data and the work that you can, like John Campbell and they can do for you because that is the time we've done it in a small community, it got tricky. It got tricky with our clients. It got tricky because there's no way you can get people in those communities who don't know what's going on as much as you try to sanitize it and make it not about a case. And I think it's because of those perils, it's not great. And because of what I was saying before about, if you aren't pulling from smaller communities and you're doing it in Anchorage, it's going to lose some of the value because you don't have that personality as a factor. I think that changes when you get a bigger sample, right?

When it's a big sample and they're trying to pull from, then that potential can be mitigated somewhat, I think.

So you all do do the big data studies with John Campbell and Alicia?

We've done it. We have. We've hired them and we've done it. I've found it very useful. I don't do it in every case just because the cost is significant.

The expense doesn't justify it in some cases, but if you have a significant case, I mean, I think it's invaluable.

I do too. We've done all versions of focus groups where we've tried to be very methodical and specific about it. And we've also done the more sort of throw it together at the last minute just to get people in and just trying to keep it ... We've done it where we've done it outside of the office so they don't even know the law firm's involved or things like that, but we've done it both ways. And I think the more information you get, the better, even if you're doing it in a way that's cost-effective for your firm or the case or otherwise. I mean, I've heard people talk about, I do the elevator thing. I try to come up with how to explain my case in a couple sentences and just talk to everybody I need about it in the elevator, at the hairdressers.

And it's amazing the things that they can tell you that you've never thought of with just people like that. What about jury questionnaires? Do you use jury questionnaires?

I do, and I try to use them in every case.

It's really funny, Meg. I did for years, and the last two or three cases I've tried, I've stopped doing it because what we can get on social media and AI, but I always look and see how good is the defense lawyer Because if the defense lawyer is not accomplished and hadn't tried a lot of cases, I don't do jury questionnaires because they're not going to dig deep enough to find out. And there've been some studies I'll share them with you that show that is a truth.

I would like to hear that. Well, I do think there's a lot of things on them that cut against you, right? They're going to reveal something that it could be a juror that wouldn't have come out in voir dire and you might've been able to hold that juror. That definitely happens.

And I think we as women have good intuition and sometimes I feel like I'll be able to read a juror better than maybe the lawyer on the other side. And if they don't have the benefit of that jury questionnaire, I've got to step ahead. So people have asked me if I've used them. The last two cases I've tried, I have not used them.

And I find that the defense doesn't ... I mean, we're always the one who asks for them, and I usually don't have any opposition to them from the defense, but they don't typically bring it up. I mean, there's some things that ... And I try to keep them very short. And there's some things like I want to know if they are related to a doctor or those kind of things that you can get those out. Or if it's a small community, if anybody they are close to works at the hospital or in that capacity, that's important to know. So those are kind of things that you can save time if you can get them out that way, but there's a cost to them. I'm sure that's why you're deciding not to do it.

I haven't. I was surprised myself. I was a little nervous about it the first time, but we got a juror on there that I knew was going to be great for us. And I mean, she was under the radar with the defense completely.

How are you using AI?

Well, we're using the ... Not AI. I said that. I should have said the internet, social, but big data. Oh, big

Data. Yeah, that's great. When they give you that direction about the kind of jurors that you would want, because sometimes ... I mean, a lot of it is things I would've thought of, but sometimes there are some things where I'm like, oh, I don't know that I would've thought of that.

Thought of that. Exactly. Speaking of time, do you all get unlimited voir dire in Alaska?

No.

What are the time limitations?

The time limitations changed somewhat recently where they were trying to make it shorter. So they bring in the panel now. We got this edict from the Supreme Court from a committee filled with people who don't try cases from the court system about juror efficiency, that it's like they were going to make smaller panels. The focus is on making sure that the jurors don't have to wait around so much. So I think that now it's a half hour for each side per panel. The way it works typically is they fill the box and then with the people, and then you get to ask questions of the panel as a whole, of the people seated as a whole and half hour each. But I found too that if you're using your time wisely, most judges are going to not cut you off, hold you to it. That has been the case.

We have merit selection, not elected judges in Alaska, which is a huge gift as well. I know that you don't have that.

That would be nice.

In Texas. Yeah. And so, I mean, I do think we have a bench that is better in some ways that way where they get retention votes, but they're not elected first. They're appointed and they have to go through judicial counsel and things like that. So I think that they do ... If you're using your time wisely and you're not being repetitive and it's bringing out issues that the court's having to make decisions on in terms of cause or not, the judges are more reasonable about taking more time.

One thing I would ask you, just because I'm curious or myself, I assume you don't attend every deposition in every case. You have other lawyers that do some of them?

Yes, I do.

Okay. So when Meg is getting ready for trial, take us through that. What do you do?

Well, we're doing that right now, except we're still trying to finish some of the depositions like the ex. We have expert reports in Alaska and depositions and not great law about holding them to their report. So we take a lot of the depositions and I do try to do most of the liability experts and then other people do, or my colleagues will do the damages experts, the ones that are not so medical and medically heavy. But getting ready for trial, like for instance, we were talking about exhibits recently about, I try to streamline the exhibits. I try to have the most important document as the exhibit number one, even though it's not chronologically ... In this case, it's botched surgery and I want the op report of the surgeon who did the remedial surgery as the first exhibit because it explains what happened.

That's really smart. I do the exact same thing. Rather than chronological, let's talk about the importance of them because when those exhibits go back to the jury, they're going to look at exhibit number one first.

Yes. And I do that. We've hired some new staff recently, so I was explaining to them why we do that. And the strategy is we don't ... Because I find the defense, they always just pile. They just mark everything, they mark repetitive things. They're just maybe trying to bury you in the things, but then you're in this situation where the one document that matters to your argument is buried within a hundred, and it's unlikely the jurors are going to write that. They might write Exhibit 20, but not page 42 of exhibits. So I try to do that. I try to think about all of those issues and try to narrow the number of exhibits so that they fit in a binder. And all the exhibits when we admit them are three hole punched and at the end, somebody on my trial team is responsible for going up that day and making sure that it gets put in the binder, our exhibits.

So they get this organized set of exhibits and the defense gives them piles of paper.

I love the binder.

Yeah, like the binder with the ... And so then it's all organized and it's there. You have to mark, I find, all the big, huge exhibits, but you don't use them and you don't admit them unless you need to pull something from it and then you just add it as a different number. So those are things we're talking now about. We're definitely talking about visual aids, what we're going to use. I really spend time thinking about that. And I like to have a spectrum. I like to have the visual aids that's the animation that's going to pull in if there's imaging, the imaging, and then show what happened as best as possible and show ... In this case, it's a question of the physics of asometry related to how this ligament was repaired. So I want to show that. But I also will come up with something really simple and I will always have ... I did a nerve injury case and I had a teat tree branch.

I made my husband chop down that didn't have any leaves on it just to show. And I use that. And in an abdominal case that had to do with a botched abdominal surgery, I had a big, huge, giant gummy worm. So I try to come up with something that both, you need both because there's going to be people on that jury that want both. And it gives you the opportunity to mix it up with your experts and with other witnesses so you're not just showing the same animation or-

Keeps it interesting. I do flip charts still. I mean, I still write down things in flip charts.

I really like the flip charts for writing things down-

As they're saying it.

Yes. And that I stole from Lloyd Bell because I watched one of his trials that he did and saw how he used it. And I was like, "My next trial, I did that. " And then you can use those and use those with the picture of the witness if it's a standard of care and the description, you can use that in closing.

I do the same thing. I didn't know Lloyd did that, but I do that as well. It's great. Let me ask you this. If you were going to give your younger self some advice, what advice would you give to your younger self?

I would say not to be so hard on yourself. I mean, I give my daughter that advice, my sons that advice all the time, not be so hard on yourself that just lighten up a little bit. And also to try to find the positive in it. Even when it's the worst ruling, even when it's the most ... It feels like a body blow of some fact, try to think about it in every perspective, every way you can to find something that makes it, as Mark Mandel would say, that makes it a fact that you can live with, even if it is the fact you just can't get over on the other side. You have to think of it as a way and not get stuck. And this judge just hates me and won't rule in my favor. And I mean, every time, and I say this to lawyers I work with all the time, I'm like, "We just need to find a way to weaponize this ruling against them." And that's like, because there's something there that you can use.

I don't know about you, Meg, but I always kind of refresh myself with Mark Mandel's advanced case framing book when I'm starting to try a case. What are my vibe I just can't get over? It's on the good side and the bad side. And it has helped me tremendously in theming a case. Is that the same with you?

Yeah, I love those books so much. I actually, because you and Eleanor told me about the recent podcast with him, I went and listened to it. It was great. And it's just the way he ... That there are these filters through which all the evidence should go through to get to this theme at the end of the case that you're going to use.

And speaking of taking the ruling and weaponizing it, I think another very important thing for young lawyers to understand, if something disastrous happens in the courtroom, the jury cannot see you sweat.

No.

I heard a story just recently about a renowned trial lawyer. There was an expert he was crossing and the expert was not giving him what he wanted, but he would ask the question emphatically. And then when the expert answered, he'd say, "Exactly." And then they said it again. He goes, "Exactly." And so the jury came back in his favor and they said, "We thought that guy was bad for you, but we thought we just might've gotten it wrong because you kept saying exactly after every answer, which I thought was brilliant."

Sounds so funny.

I remember one time that I put my client on the stand and I said, "Jim Bob, what is your wife's name?" He said, "Which one?" I said, "How about the one sitting behind me on the bench here?" You can't make that stuff off.

No, I had a client once in a deposition where the lawyer said something like, "Have you ever been arrested?" And he started crying and I was like, "Okay, I have no idea where this ... " But I was like, "Oh, I think maybe we should take a little break." And I was like, "What are you crying about? " And he's like, "Well, he asked me about my mom a few questions ago and just made me

Emotional."That's part of the game. I mean, sometimes you'd rather be at the bottom of the ocean, but the jury needs to think that it didn't even phase you. Just sit there and smile and shake your head like, "I agree."

Absolutely, absolutely. And I do think if you can move past whatever the sting is of whatever happens, you can find a way to try to use whatever it is to your advantage. And that, I think for younger lawyers or lawyers just starting out, it's hard to see that, especially if you get wrapped up in yourself.

If you get wrapped up in yourself, that's exactly right. And I've also found, Meg, that in trials, you're going to have some good days and bad days. I mean, you just got to take your lickings and keep on ticking. That's what I often say. Well, it has been a joy having you on our podcast today. Thank you so very much for being here.

Thank you so much, Charlie. You're one of my heroes. It's such an honor that you'd think I have anything to add to your podcast.

Are you going to go to London to the Inner Circle meeting?

I am.

Oh, good.

I can't wait. I'm very excited.

We'll be there. Well, to our audience, thank you so much for listening to "More Likely Than Not." Please like and follow us. And if you have any questions or any guests you'd like to have on, please email us at info@morelikelythanot.com. See you next time. I think you can tell, and we at Aldous Law here, we actually kind of like each other and we absolutely love, loved what we do. And we work a lot of our cases up from the get- go, but we're brought in on cases a lot. We try cases all across the nation. If you have a case that you're interested in talking to us about, we'd love to hear from you. We've tried everything from trucking, workplace injuries, explosions, and burn cases, dram shops, ride-share sexual assaults, birth injury, your personal injury cases. If you need a partner to help you with your case, please call us.

We can be contacted at aldoslaw.com. We'd love to hear from you.

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