Depositions in personal injury cases are almost always the most important pieces of evidence that are used at trial. Whether you are a plaintiff (meaning you are the person who was injured and have brought the case by suing another party or parties to seek reimbursement for your injuries, both physical and economic), or a defendant (a person who has been sued and alleged to have caused physical and/or economic injuries to another person), your deposition is critical to your successful prosecution of your claim (as a plaintiff) or to prevailing on your defense (if you are a defendant).

Because depositions are so important, it is imperative that you do everything in your power to prepare yourself to give the best testimony humanly possible. The best way to do this is to find the best legal deposition video available and study it intensely.

The way to know if a legal deposition video is any good is to check a few things.

1) Is it current?
If a video was produced more than a few years ago, chances are either some of the information and advice it contains is no longer current and/or it does not contain rule changes that govern depositions that have occurred since the video was released. You want a video that was released recently or one that has been updated recently.

2) Who recommends it?
Always check to see who is recommending the legal deposition video you are thinking about buying. When doing this, read the recommendations carefully. Many videos are recommended by non-attorneys. Frankly, those recommendations are not worth the paper they are written on. Only lawyers, who take and defend depositions for a living, know if a legal deposition video is any good.

3) Who’s using it?
Even legal deposition videos that are recommended by lawyers require further scrutiny. Examine the lawyers’ recommendations closely and make sure they say they actually use the legal deposition video you are thinking of buying. If they don’t, that usually means they just got paid to say it’s good.

4) Who made it?
This is the most important thing to look for. If the legal deposition video you are considering was made by anyone other than an attorney, it’s not worth your money. Again, attorneys, who take and defend depositions every day, are the best sources to prepare anyone for a deposition. Would you trust the guys at your car wash to tell you how to repair your car?

There are many legal deposition videos on the market. Unfortunately, few of them are any good. In fact, most of them are terrible. When shopping for a legal deposition video, use the checklist above and you will be on solid footing. If you want the best legal deposition video available, which is full of sound advice, used and endorsed by prominent attorneys across the country and was produced by attorneys with decades of deposition and trial experience, please visit www.depositionrescue.com.

Jeff L. Williams is a former trial attorney and co-founder of New Media Legal Publishing, Inc.