On October 2, 2026, Herring Imming hosted the Southern California Chapter of the American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers’ inaugural annual Evidence Basics Seminar. EBS is now a companion to our annual Trial Basics Seminar, which Herring Imming founded in 2015. As with TBS, EBS is geared toward family law lawyers with limited trial experience wanting to learn basic evidence principles and related skills from the AAML’s experts. We present EBS to reach out to our community, improve the skills of less-experienced family law lawyers, and give back to our profession.
Fomer AAML National President, Jim McLaren, previously emphasized that it has been said that each family law case has different needs. We recognize the availability of various alternative courses of resolution. But we believe that if a case cannot be settled, then the consequence is that the courts are there to decide the issues. Our job is to be prepared to expertly litigate those cases to their logical ends.
EBS was a fast-moving event. We gave a whopping 21 presentations throughout the day. Topics ranged from Types of Evidence and Protecting the Record to Use of AI, Trial Presentations,& Evidence in Opening Statements and Closing Arguments. Our audience of nearly 175 continually interacted with us via Zoom’s “Q&A” feature.
EBS was blessed by the presence of evidence guru and friend, Judge Jack Lucky (ret.), as our moderator. Sincere thanks to all our other presenters: Robert Benavente, Nicole Whyte, Gordon Cruse, Kyle Siems, Leigh Galyon, Alexander Payne, Annette Hall, Andrew Botros, Jillian Duggan-Herd, Claudia Ribet, Marshall Waller, and Christopher Melcher. I was glad to handle the programs, “Opinions – Lay Witnesses, Expert Witnesses, Minor’s Counsel, and Custody Evaluations” and “Motions in Limine.”
In the over ten years of TBS – and now EBS — we have educated over 2,250 family law attorneys throughout California! Making it all sweeter is that the AAML presents TBS and EBS at no cost. We provide substantial Mandatory Continuing Legal Education Credits to boot! It remains a huge pleasure and honor for our Chapter to continue serving, sponsoring, and facilitating TBS and EBS.