Jerry Palmer is managing partner of Palmer, Leatherman & White. He practices as an evaluative mediator. Because of extensive trial experience, appellate experience and counseling of hundreds of clients, he believes that mediation should focus on the hard issues in a case that will be outcome-determinative, whether they are issues of law, issues of fact, persuasiveness of evidence or intangible factors on which triers of fact determine cases. Probable results, costs and risk of litigation are what usually drive the settlement.