James Seckinger
Professor of Law
Office: 3102 Eck Hall of Law
Phone: 574.631.4844
Fax: 574.631.4197
Email: seckinger.1@nd.edu
Staff Assistant: Beth Smith
CV: View
Professor Jim Seckinger is recognized nationally and internationally as a top advocacy professor and author.
Professor Jim Seckinger is on the faculty at the Law School, University of Notre Dame, one of the founding Directors of the National Institute for Trial Advocacy [NITA], has visited at Cornell Law School and the University of Toronto Faculty of Law. Seckinger is also on the faculty of NITA and the Foundation for International Arbitration Advocacy [FIAA].
Seckinger is widely published and has received numerous awards for his excellence in teaching trial advocacy, deposition skills, and evidence. Seckinger is the recipient of the ALI-ABA Committee on Continuing Professional Education’s prestigious Francis Rawle Award.
Seckinger organized and taught trial advocacy skills to Prosecutors for the International War Crimes Tribunal for Rwanda in 1996 at the very outset of the Rwanda War Crimes investigations. Seckinger also provided similar training for the Prosecutors for the Special Court for Sierra Leone in 2004.
Professor Jim Seckinger has taught lawyers common law trial advocacy skills in Australia, El Salvador, London, New Zealand, Panama, Scotland, Singapore, several Provinces in Canada, and throughout the United States.
Professor Jim Seckinger is one of the four founding members of the Foundation for International Arbitration Advocacy [FIAA] headquartered in Geneva Switzerland. Seckinger is the primary author of FIAA’s educational materials for Fact Witnesses and Expert Witnesses in International Arbitration. Seckinger has taught in FIAA programs in Bogota, Geneva, London, Mumbai, Paris, Sao Paolo, and Singapore. Seckinger also teaches an FIAA program on International Arbitration Advocacy in an LLM program at the Universite de Geneva
Professor Jim Seckinger has received a Lifetime Achievement Award, where the award presenter noted: That's what Jim [Seckinger] does. He finds people; he lifts them up and then lets them go. It's a ministry for Jim, a mission, to leave things, people, better than when they came. It was a stupidly easy choice to award this lifetime achievement award to Jim Seckinger — a mentor, a friend, a fundamentalist, and the foundation for advocacy training, not only in the U.S., but around the world. And he shares. It's the greatest gift professionally anyone could ever give.
Courses Taught
LAW75715, Deposition Skills
LAW75710, Intensive Trial Advocacy
Scholarship
Books
Problems in Trial Advocacy, Notre Dame Law School Edition (National Institute for Trial Advocacy, 2d ed. 1996).
Problems and Cases in Trial Advocacy, Law School Edition, 2 vols., with K.S. Broun (NITA 1977; 2d ed. 1981; 3d ed. 1987; 4th ed. 1990; 4th ed. revised 1993; 5th ed. 1995).
Problems and Cases in Trial Advocacy, CLE Edition, vol. 1 (problems), vol. 2 (cases), with A.J. Bocchino and D.H. Beskind (NITA, 5th ed. revised 1992, 6th ed. 1995).
Problems and Cases in Trial Advocacy, New Zealand Edition, et al. (New Zealand Law Society 1986).
Materials for Trial Advocacy: Problems and Case Files Adapted for Canadian Use, English/French Bilingual Edition, with K.S. Broun and G.D. Watson (Osgoode Hall Law School of York University and Ecole de Droit de L'Universite de Moncton 1983, 1989, 1993, 1997).
Teachers' Manual for Problems and Cases in Trial Advocacy, Law School Edition, with K.S. Broun (NITA 1977; 2d ed. 1981; 3d ed. 1987; 4th ed. 1990; 4th ed. revised 1993).
Teachers Manual for Problems and Cases in Trial Advocacy, New Zealand Edition, with others (New Zealand Law Society 1986).
Articles
Professor Seckinger has published numerous articles on the subject of trial advocacy and trial techniques, including:
Closing Argument, 19 American Journal of Trial Advocacy 51 (1995).
Other Items
Presenting Expert Testimony - An American Perspective (Australian Legal Convention 1991).
The NITA Method and Effective Teaching Techniques (two videotapes) (NITA 1991).
Areas of Expertise
- Arbitration
- Civil Litigation
- Depositions & Discovery
- Examination & Witnesses
- Expert Testimony
- International Dispute Resolution
- Pre-trial Litigation
- Trial Practice
- War Crimes Tribunals