Lawyers are arriving in court these days with a lot less baggage. Fewer and fewer attorneys are showing up with stacks of banker’s boxes stuffed with evidence, depositions, and research. Instead, they’re opting for laptops—sometimes even tablet computers. Lisa Censullo, CSC ’87, COO at Esquire Solutions, is helping to lighten the lawyers’ loads.
Esquire specializes in a new wave of high-tech 
court reporting. Lawyers taking depositions often call on Esquire to produce transcripts with digital and print components, deposition summaries, word indexes, and video—a far cry from the hard-copy versions of Perry Mason’s days.
Censullo’s tech career began with a student co-op at SEA Consultants; after graduation, she became the company’s computer coordinator, installing networks and software at a time when “computer” was not an everyday word. Since then, she’s worked a number of tech jobs, including Chief Technology Officer at LegaLink (later, WordWave), with one constant: she’s always been in the minority—a woman in a tech world run by men. And while that situation is improving, she says, there’s room for more. Even today, she says, she sometimes looks around the conference table and realizes she’s the only female at the meeting.
Censullo has had a hand in some big cases throughout her career. Remember Enron? WordWave was there in the aftermath.
“We set up a deposition suite in the Chrysler Building with tables, chairs, video screens, a videographer, a court reporter,” says Censullo.
The production allowed lawyers in offices in Boston, New York, and Chicago to watch a real-time feed of a deposition, complete with a live text stream of the transcript. And Esquire’s goods appeared on CNN last summer during the Casey Anthony trial, when lawyers used the company’s trial presentation software, Sanction, which allows attorneys to embed videos, enlarge photos in real-time, and produce animated recreations of a crime.
“It’s PowerPoint on steroids,” says Censullo.
—Maureen Harmon
