LiveDeposition Certified Reporter Spotlight
Name: Linda Jorritsma
Title: Certified Court Reporter
Certifications: NJ CCR, RPR
What is your background? Started court reporting in 1979. Started doing realtime in about 1995. This has led to a career of reporting internationally for a while, traveling to England, Australia, Sweden, among other exciting places. I now have become a “trial reporter,” starting with mesothelioma cases in New Jersey, and I now do realtime trials, providing local and remote realtime and daily transcripts in a state that has decided tapes are better than court reporters. The lawyers I work with disagree! They hire us privately to provide the services they can’t get from a tape.
When did you begin your court reporting career? 1979
What sparked your interest in choosing court reporting as a profession?
I was a judge’s secretary and the court reporters there in the county I worked in told me I should become a court reporter.
What advice would you give students or those just entering the field of Court Reporting?
Don’t listen to everyone that says court reporting is going to disappear. That’s what they said to me 37 years ago!
What is your favorite thing about being a court reporter?
Being able to take time off and not having a fixed schedule. I like daily trials so I have my weekends off with no transcript!
As a Court Reporter, what is your worst nightmare or biggest pet peeve?
I do not like the lawyers who treat me like I am invisible. Among the great lawyers out there, there are those who think we don’t matter and make sure we know it.
Where is the strangest place you have taken a deposition?
On a trail in the woods, in the rain, with the lawyers holding an umbrella over my head.
When not court reporting, how do you spend your free time?
I live on a lake in New Jersey and I go to Florida in the winter, best of both worlds. I am able to take the winters off by working hard the rest of the year in New Jersey. I love spending time with my husband and children and my three grandchildren.
What do you like most about LiveDeposition?
The support is amazing. I had a rough start trying to figure everything out and the support team stuck with me and now I really love the program and the people. The lawyers I work with really like it.