The modern method of trial persuasion is storytelling. We convey our case through words, images and sounds in the form of a story. Human beings love stories. Just watch a storyteller enter a room and one hundred ears alert and are waiting for the story to begin. Jesus, Plato and Socrates all used stories or parables to make their points. Jurors process information by developing a story for what happened. If you don’t provide the story, they will make up their own. A trial is not a battle of lawyers, but a battle of stories.

A good article on opening statement and storytelling.

Roy Black’s Criminal Evidence Workshop