In a court case where the facts are not in dispute, why is it still necessary to have a really good lawyer? If a judge is aware that a specific defense applies, do they really need the defense to explicitly raise it?

Question

At trial there are a number of things I get you really do need a lawyer for- you will need a lawyer to handle procedural steps like getting evidence admitted (or dismissed) and the process for jury selection, a good persuasive lawyer can make convincing arguments to establish a different set of facts or perspective to sway a jury.

However, there are times when the facts are not in dispute and the case boils down to the lawyers making arguments as to whether the defendant broke the law based on those facts. Wouldn’t the judge normally know at this point? If the judge knows a prosecution is bullshit, but the defense failed to identify and explicitly raise in court why and how the prosecution is bullshit, wouldn’t it be really unjust for the Judge to still send the defendant to prison?

In: Other

Answer 1

If the facts are not in dispute, the first thing the side that has the upper hand would do (in the US) is apply for what is called ‘summary judgement’.

Think of this as a expediated way to get a case done. If the facts are not disupted, you say so and ask for summary judgement, that means, everyone agrees on the facts, so theres no need to go to court, the judge can simply make the decision based on the facts of the case that have been presented in writing and evidence. This is very normal. This happens like, all the time. Of course if you think the facts are in your favor, you’d want to do this right away.

If you were on the, lets say, less promising side of that equation, you’d want a good a lawyer as possible to try to make an argument for the judge to reject the ask of summary judgement which if he ruled against you may mean you lose the case, without ever having a courtroom trial.