This video is to help you prepare if you have received a notice of deposition and your deposition is going to be taken in your case. In this video, I am going to give you some simple guidelines of what a deposition is, what generally is going to occur, and how you specifically can make preparations prior to us doing our deposition planning meeting so that you're prepared and we can talk about specific topics that are going to come up in your deposition. So first, what is a deposition? Think of a deposition as an interview, or you might even say a cross-examination. In the deposition, the opposing attorney of record, or attorneys depending on how many parties are in your case, and guardian ad litem, if there's a guardian ad litem in your case, will be asking you specific questions related to your case.
Going to be a court reporter present, and the court reporter is going to take a— create a transcript of the entire discussion, everything that's said. In the deposition, the parties who will be present will be any party of record and their attorney of record. In depositions, we don't have third parties who are not named parties in the litigation, so you can't bring a friend or your spouse or a support person. You're going to be in the room just with me or another attorney from our staff. The depositions generally are— is always going to occur in a conference room, probably at one of the attorneys' office, maybe at the courthouse, um, just any place that we can have a formal gathering with a court reporter and have a conference room table to work at. That's where the deposition is going to be. So when you are being deposed, first, every attorney has a different style. I can't tell you in this video what the conversation's going to look like, 'cause it's largely going to depend on who's doing the questioning.
Some attorneys are more aggressive and confrontational. Some attorneys are very laid back in what they're asking. Some attorneys are going to try to interrupt you or trip you up. It's going to depend on the attorney. Once your deposition is set, and I will be familiar with your case, I can give you some ideas of what I think that attorney's style is going to be like, and you can prepare yourself based on that individual. But I've seen people do all kinds of different things in depositions.
We can't anticipate them all. During the deposition, I am permitted to make objections based on the rules of evidence. So if an attorney asks you a question, I can make an objection for the record. It is different from a courtroom setting in that For the most part, even if I make an objection for the record, you're still obligated to answer the question. The only time you're not going to answer the question is if I specifically instruct you not to. When we have our deposition planning meeting, we can talk about topics that you're nervous about being questioned about, that you are afraid to answer, that you don't want to answer, and we can talk about whether those are situations where you're going to have to answer regardless of how uncomfortable it is, or whether that's something that I can instruct you not to answer. If I instruct you not to answer a question, the other attorney might say they want to certify that question.
All that means is they could go to a judge at a later date and say, "I took this party's deposition. I asked this question. They refused to answer the question. I want you to order that they answer the question." I can tell you very rarely do I find certified questions actually get raised to a judge, But an attorney might say that in a deposition, and that is largely something that they are doing for the record. They might raise later, they probably won't, and it might be something that you find intimidating if you don't know what's gonna happen. So all that means is, I might ask a judge later to order you to answer this.
Deposition questioning is going to be about topics related to your case. So depending on what your case is, we can anticipate what the topics are going to be. If you're in a divorce, you're going to be asked most likely about your property and your debt. If there are valuation questions, you might be asked what your opinion is as to a value of a property. You might be asked about specific transactions. If we have a case where, and this is very common, there's a lot of credit card debt, and we have one spouse who says, "I don't know where that debt came from. They ran up that credit card and I had no knowledge of it." That attorney might have the credit card records and might ask you about specific transactions, the other party's knowledge of the transactions. That would be a very typical deposition scenario.
If there's questions about what your income is, if you are self-employed or you own a business, they might ask you specific questions about your tax return, they might ask you about your bank accounts, they might ask you about your monthly expenses. We will know, obviously, what the topics are, and when you come in for your deposition planning meeting, be prepared that those are the topics that you're probably going to be questioned on, and that we're gonna prepare you to answer. If it's a child custody case, they're going to be asking specific questions about your children. It's important prior to the deposition, if you're in a custody case, and this is just a good rule of thumb, You want to know, who's your child's teacher? Who's your child's doctor? Have you been to a parent-teacher conference?
If your child has an IEP, have you been to the IEP meeting? Do you have a record of the IEP? Have you reviewed the notes from the IEP? It is important to be able to answer specific questions about your child and their day-to-day life in a deposition, because that is how we elicit evidence that you're involved, that you know what's going on. So that's a very easy area to prepare on. If there are questions with regard to conduct, and that would be, you know, if you have a criminal history, if you've got a DWI, if there's been Children's Division investigations in your case, if there's been hotline calls on either side, you're going to be questioned about those, and we will talk about specifically what occurred, what your likely answers are going to be, and I will prepare you to answer those questions.
So all that I want you to do when you think about, "My deposition's scheduled, what's gonna happen?" First, we understand the process, which is, we're gonna go to someone's office and sit in a conference room and answer questions. That's the basic bare bones of it. And two, I'm gonna be questioned about my case. What are the topics in my case that are in dispute? If we're doing depositions, we're generally far enough in the litigation, everybody knows what the topics in dispute are. So schedule an appointment with me for deposition preparation. I like it if you've watched this video, and if you're at this point, you've watched it, 'cause then you have an idea of some basic things that you're already prepared for.
And then be prepared to discuss with me topics that are going to be raised in your deposition and topics that you specifically have some apprehension about being questioned on or want more information about how to answer.