Preserving Appellate Complaints in Federal Courts

Trial lawyers often must make split-second decisions and judgment calls that do not follow all the procedural steps required to ensure presentation of an issue on appeal. Focusing on the preservation of appellate complaints in federal trial courts, this book helps civil trial and civil appellate lawyers take the right steps to ensure preservation of appellate complaints.

This guide sets out the rules for preserving complaints on appeal, beginning with a general approach to preservation rules. Chapters address pre-trial, trial, and post-trial preservation issues, as well as handling objections to a magistrate's ruling or recommendation. The book's focus on opinions from United States courts of appeals with citations from all circuits. Invaluable appendices make this an essential volume for lawyers who need to preserve complaints on appeal. The book includes a checklist of preservation items followed by two important research tools:

• Listed with each preservation item are West's Key Numbers relating to that topic that can be used to do additional, updated, and jurisdiction-specific research on preservation topics.
• Index to Wright & Miller's treatise, Federal Practice and Procedure, which is shown as it would appear if the reader were to expand the treatise in its online form on Westlaw. Including sections from the treatise relevant to preservation issues covered in this book helps to locate helpful sections in the treatise that contain more citations and nuances beyond the scope of this book.

While preservation rules vary greatly by state and the rules often change, unlike federal preservation rules, there are general philosophies behind preservation that are near universal and can aid the practitioner in all areas of preservation in appellate court.

Originally published on July 24th, 2020