Q: Deceased witness, prior litigation (public records at courthouse) show important info as Memorandum not depo...hearsay?

A: If you've gotten this far you already know the rule and the exceptions. You problems will be not just the hearsay rule but authenticity, since you apparently have only fragments of the testimony. If there is enough information in the record to lay the required predicate, maybe you get it in.

You've tried to track down the actual transcripts or the shorthand tapes from which they were made, right? If you can find the court reporters that recorded the depositions or in-court testimony, there's a chance that they archived the shorthand tapes from which the transcripts were made (or not made, just recorded). They can trot them out and transcribe them. Cake. If the transcripts are from hearings in court, find out who was the judge's reporter at that time and contact her. It's a long shot but that's where I'd start. If it was appealed, the appellate record might have excerpts from the transcripts, too, and those are archived for a time, maybe electronically even. Sometimes the reporter information is in the exhibits appended to the record. Could also start by contacting the law firms that may have hired the court reporters -- often they use court reporting firms that may keep their tapes a long time. And in the last 20 years they started storing things electronically. Might not be such a long shot, if you can find the reporters.

Was the question of law actually answered with finality? If so, do you have res judicata or collateral estoppel? Same parties? Same claims? Or were the rulings interlocutory? Were they mooted by the settlement and vacatur of the Findings and Conclusions? Is this what you're trying to establish with this information?

Good luck.

A: It is impossible to answer this question based on your short synopsis. You would have to work with an attorney who can review the prior court file and tell you what if anything might assist you with your present case. Testimony in court at a hearing that was given under oath would not be in the paper file but the court may have recordings that you can get and have transcribed by a court reporter. Depositions that were taken by the parties to that case might still exist but would not be filed with the court. Usually attorneys don't store files for more than 10 years so hard to say.