Commanding the Courtroom: Trial Persuasion Techniques That Win

Ed Dudensing, Founder and Lead Counsel | Dudensing Law

Ed Dudensing founded Dudensing Law and serves as its lead counsel. Since 2003, his practice has been devoted entirely to representing victims of elder neglect and abuse in skilled nursing facilities, assisted living facilities, acute hospitals, home health agencies, and hospice agencies. Over a career of more than two decades, he has secured four of the largest elder abuse verdicts in California history and recovered well over $200 million on behalf of his clients, earning national recognition as one of the leading elder abuse attorneys in the United States.

• Education & Credentials

Mr. Dudensing earned his undergraduate degree in political science from the University of California, Berkeley, and his Juris Doctor from the University of California, Davis School of Law, where he graduated in the top 3% of his class, was inducted into the Order of the Coif, served as Executive Editor of the UC Davis Law Review, and was elected to the Order of the Barrister for his skills in oral advocacy. After passing the bar in 1994, he clerked for two years for the Honorable Robert C. Broomfield, Chief Judge of the Federal District Court in Arizona, then practiced as a litigation associate at Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe from 1996 to 1999. From 1999 to 2003, he served as a Deputy District Attorney in Sacramento County, where he first-chaired more than 50 trials to verdict, including murder, rape, and financial elder abuse cases. He is admitted to the State Bar of California.

• Recognition & Leadership

Mr. Dudensing has been repeatedly selected as a Northern California Super Lawyer between 2011 and 2026. In 2026, the USA Chambers & Partners Guide ranked both him and his firm Band 3 for Litigation: Mainly Plaintiffs in California, and he was named an Attorney of the Year finalist for Law.com’s California Legal Awards, listed among Lawdragon’s 500 Leading Lawyers in America, and included in Lawdragon’s 100 Managing Partners You Need to Know. His 2025 honors include selection as a Top 100 Lawyer by the Daily Journal, the William F. Taylor Memorial Award from California Advocates for Nursing Home Reform for lifetime achievement in elder abuse, and the Mentorship Award at the ALM/Law.com California Legal Awards. The Capitol City Trial Lawyers Association named him Advocate of the Year in 2023 and awarded him the Morton Friedman Humanitarian Award in 2026.

• Professional Involvement

Mr. Dudensing was named to the Board of Directors of the Consumer Attorneys of California in 2025. He is the sole author of The Rutter Group’s Elder Abuse Litigation treatise and teaches elder abuse litigation as an adjunct professor at UC Law San Francisco. He speaks frequently before the American Association for Justice Nursing Home Litigation Group, the Consumer Attorneys of California, and California Advocates for Nursing Home Reform (CANHR), and holds memberships in the National Consumer Voice for LongTerm Care, CANHR, the San Francisco Trial Lawyers Association, and the Capitol City Trial Lawyers Association. His commentary on long-term care accountability has appeared in national and state media, including The New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, The Hill, and The Sacramento Bee.

• Experience

Mr. Dudensing has brought cases against some of California’s largest nursing home, assisted living, and healthcare operators. His jury verdicts include $29.1 million in 2010, $42.5 million in 2019, and $30.9 million in 2023. In March 2026, a Sacramento County jury returned a $110 million verdict against Colony Capital, a publicly traded Real Estate Investment Trust, and Formation Capital, a private equity investment firm, in a case arising from Greenhaven Estates, the largest elder abuse verdict against an assisted living facility in United States history. As lead appellate counsel, he has established significant precedents in elder law, including Valentine v. Plum Healthcare Group, 37 Cal. App. 5th 1076 (2019), Hutcheson v. Eskaton Fountainwood Lodge, 17 Cal. App. 5th 937 (2017), and Goldman v. Sunbridge Healthcare, 220 Cal. App. 4th 1160 (2013).

SESSION 1 – Building the Winning Narrative: Jury Selection, Opening Statement, and the Case-in-Chief | 12:00pm – 1:00pm

Trial attorney Ed Dudensing opens with the foundation of his recent nine-figure elder neglect and wrongful death verdict against Colony Capital, a publicly traded Real Estate Investment Trust (REIT), and Formation Capital, a private equity investment firm. Using real slides, witness strategy, and courtroom moments pulled directly from the case file, he shows how to read jurors for authenticity, likability, and vulnerability, and why weeding out beats preconditioning. He then turns to the roadmap technique for the opening statement, defining defendants early and setting themes jurors will carry through trial, and to case-in-chief strategy: organizing witnesses to tell a story, using documents tactically, and handling “surprise” evidence.

BREAK | 1:00pm – 1:10pm

SESSION 2 – Closing the Case: Cross-Examination, Closing Arguments, and Punitive Damages | 1:10pm – 2:10pm

The second hour moves from the case-in-chief to the verdict. Mr. Dudensing demonstrates how to crossexamine the defense by extracting concessions and knowing when to get in and out. He then breaks down closing argument techniques, including anchor slides, statistical evidence, syllogisms, and confronting defense arguments head-on, and walks through the structure of the rebuttal closing argument. The session ends with the punitive damages phase: proving reprehensibility and using the defendant’s financial condition effectively.