The glossary
The litigation record, defined.
The terms you hit while working a case file — defined in plain English, with how each one actually plays in practice. New entries publish weekly.
Litigation terms
The working vocabulary of discovery, depositions, and trial.
Bates numbering
Bates numbering is the practice of stamping every page of produced documents with a unique sequential identifier, so any page can be cited, tracked, and retrieved unambiguously across a case.
Deposition designation
A deposition designation is a party's formal selection of the portions of deposition testimony — by page and line — to be offered as evidence at trial, met by the other side's counter-designations and objections.
Errata sheet
An errata sheet is the document a deponent uses after reviewing their deposition transcript to record corrections — from typographical fixes to, controversially, substantive changes to testimony.
Leading question
A leading question is one that suggests its own answer — "You never saw the contract, did you?" — prohibited on direct examination of your own witness, and the entire engine of cross-examination.
Motion in limine
A motion in limine is a pretrial motion asking the court to rule on the admissibility of evidence before trial begins — typically to keep prejudicial material from ever reaching the jury's ears.
Prior inconsistent statement
A prior inconsistent statement is an earlier statement by a witness that conflicts with their current testimony — the primary tool for impeaching credibility, and in some circumstances admissible as substantive evidence.
Privilege log
A privilege log is the itemized list a producing party must serve identifying each document withheld from discovery on privilege grounds — with enough detail to let the other side test the claim without revealing the protected content.
Subpoena duces tecum
A subpoena duces tecum is a court-backed command that a witness produce documents or records — "bring with you," in the Latin — as distinct from a subpoena that merely compels testimony.
Voir dire
Voir dire is the questioning process used to test suitability before someone is empaneled or heard — most commonly jury selection, but also the examination of a witness or expert outside the jury's presence.
Medical records, for legal readers
What the chart actually says — for the people reading it under deadline.
SOAP note
A SOAP note is the standard format for clinical documentation — Subjective, Objective, Assessment, Plan — and the structure behind most of the progress notes in a medical record.
Status post (s/p)
Status post — abbreviated s/p in charts — means "following" or "in the state after" a procedure or event: "s/p L4-L5 fusion" marks a patient's history as after that surgery.
Treatment gap
A treatment gap is an unexplained break in a claimant's medical care — a stretch with no visits between the injury and later treatment — that defense teams read as evidence the injury was minor, resolved, or unrelated.
WNL
WNL is medical-chart shorthand for "within normal limits" — a finding examined and judged normal. Its dark-humor alternate reading, "we never looked," is the caution: WNL records a conclusion, not the underlying data.