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One of the biggest questions with shows like The Lincoln Lawyer, Suits, or L.A. Law is the legal accuracy and the liberties that are taken for the sake of entertainment and dramatization. While most of these shows try to adhere as much as they can to the law while keeping the dramatization that television demands alive, more often than not, the dramatization overpowers legal accuracy.
The Lincoln Lawyer, compared to some of the other shows following courtroom cases, is higher up on the legal accuracy scale. However, one aspect of the law that always falls to the chopping block in most legal dramas is the law regarding evidence.
Such is the case with The Lincoln Lawyer as well, but with the fourth season coming up for the legal drama, they have more reason than just legal accuracy to correct this mistake.
Keep reading to find out why Netflix's legal drama cannot afford to take liberties with the Federal Rules of Evidence.
The Lincoln Lawyer has been more legally accurate than most legal dramas
Netflix's legal drama, set to return with its fourth season, will be an adaptation of the sixth book in the Michael Connelly series of the same name, titled The Law of Innocence. The Michael Connelly series Lincoln Lawyer, is one of the most accurate legal dramas on the market, much of which has to do with the fact that Connelly himself was a crime journalist.
The legal accuracy of the book is one of the reasons why it was adapted into the film and now the TV series. The creatives behind the TV show are also contributing factors to the legal accuracy of the Netflix show.
Ted Humphrey, one of the showrunners for the Netflix legal drama, previously had a career as a lawyer before he decided to shift to screenwriting. His experience as a lawyer also comes in use for the adaptation, ensuring that the show is legally accurate.
On several occasions, The Lincoln Lawyer has displayed this accuracy and has even taken the time to help the reader get comfortable with the legal jargon, such as "hearsay" or "relevance".
One of the accuracies displayed is the judge deciding which evidence gets admitted into the court for trial in front of the jury. Another situation where multiple levels of hearsay were presented was when a detective gave a testimony he had heard from another detective, who had in turn heard it from a witness.
It's not often that a legal drama attempts multiple layers of hearsay and has the audience invested in the story without it getting too complicated, but the creatives behind The Lincoln Lawyer made it work without drowning in the legalese. However, despite following most rules, there is one section of rules where they fail.
The Lincoln Lawyer ignores one aspect of the law
The one aspect of the law that The Lincoln Lawyer fails to follow is the rules around evidence. According to the Federal Rules of Evidence, both sides in the case, be it the prosecution or the defense, need to be provided access to all the evidence and discovery long before the trial starts.
The aspect of "surprise" that is used more often than not in the legal dramas on TV, where one side comes up with a burning piece of evidence that surprises the other side and wins them the case, might make for a cathartic episode on TV, but in real life, it's illegal. No party can add surprise evidence or a witness under any condition.
The one thing about court proceedings is the absence of surprises, as both sides and the judge are made aware of the evidence and the witnesses, and until and unless a witness changes their testimony, which is a rare occurrence in real life, surprises are just not regular happenings in a court of law.
For legal dramas, however, surprises are their bread and butter for entertaining TV, and the rules of evidence fall to the chopping block in their crusade to make entertaining television, even for The Lincoln Lawyer.
This aspect of the law cannot be ignored in The Lincoln Lawyer Season 4
The fact that The Lincoln Lawyer boasts itself as a legally accurate drama means their blatant ignorance of this rule of evidence is more than enough to reflect poorly. However, more than just for the sake of legal accuracy, it is the source material for Season 4, which might force Netflix drama to correct its mistake.
The fourth season of the legal drama is set to be an adaptation of Connelly's The Law of Innocence. In The Law of Innocence, Mickey Haller finds himself in the hot seat where only his clients have sat before him. His prosecutor will be none other than Dana "Death Row Dana" Berg, played by Constance Zimmer, whose stubbornness and spitfire dedication to win the case cause her to ignore the rules of evidence.
This determination and her ignorance of the rules will land her case and Mickey's fate in a lot of trouble, making for a big plot in the drama.
Therefore, The Lincoln Lawyer will have to go a step further in legal accuracy while balancing the cost of entertaining and dramatization in the upcoming season, and once they cross this line in the fourth season, it will be hard to go back to the old ways.
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