Nicholas James Zacherl

Nicholas James Zacherl is a State Department Conference Interpreter, and fully certified as a court interpreter in 20 US states. He has worked as in intern as a political consultant in the European Union and the United States, and has thousands of hours of interpreting experience in business, legal, conference and non-profit settings.

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Nicholas instructed the French and Spanish section of the 2019 Summer Intensive Interpreting course at the University of Hawaii at Manoa, and has taught professional training courses for certified court interpreters. 

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Nicholas is the son of two teachers, and loves learning, and believes in protecting democracy, the planet, and human kindness.

ARBITRATIONS-DEPOSITIONS-TRIALS

● over 400 days of trials and depositions, and

● over 1000 days spent in court on general calendars, conferences, and hearings,

(90 percent simultaneous with equipment, 10 percent consecutive)

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August 10th, 2022

High dollar remote German/English consecutive interpretation of deposition testimony regarding the corporate structure of a farm equipment manufacturer, as well as combine, harvester, and attachment parts including mechanical terminology around drive trains, power takeoffs, transfers, augers, clutches, and safety measures.

July 7th, 2022

French/English remote simultaneous interpretation of a focus group of members of the West African community of New York around awareness raising campaigns for colon cancer screening

April 30th, 2022

English to German simultaneous interpretation of several highly detailed eulogy speeches for four native German speakers at the wake of a prominent software CEO in San Diego, California

April 12th, 2022

High dollar remote Spanish/English manufacturer liability deposition requiring consecutive interpretation of mechanical, patent, and engineering vocabulary relating to Body Control Module (BCM) connectors and their design, as well as corporate, legal procedural (US and Spanish), and general US deposition procedure vocabulary

March 23rd, April 26th, 27th 2022

High dollar remote German/English manufacturer liability deposition requiring consecutive interpretation of mechanical, patent, and engineering vocabulary relating to Body Control Module (BCM) connectors and their design, as well as corporate, legal procedural (US and German), and general US deposition procedure vocabulary

March 10, 2022

High dollar remote German/English manufacturer liability deposition requiring consecutive interpretation of mechanical and engineering vocabulary relating to amusement park rides, as well as corporate, legal procedural (US and German), and general US deposition procedure vocabulary

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March 5th, 2022

Remote French/English personal Injury deposition requiring swimming pool, medical, and general legal terminology

February-March 2022

In-person Spanish/English Multi-defendant murder trial assignment in Placerville, California requiring Spanish/English intepretaiton of medical, firearms, ballistic, and general trial vocabulary.

February 25th, 2022 

In-person Spanish/English personal personal injury deposition in Irvine California involving construction, medical, and labor terminology.

May, 2020

Remote day-long German deposition involving technical financial, legal, and probate law terminology

June, 2019 (Spanish)
High-profile murder trial in Minden, Nevada involving detailed forensics and trial procedural vocabulary

May 2018 (German)
High dollar civil trial in Stockton, California between a prominent potato harvester manufacturer
and a private injured workeri involving highly technical testimony (machine parts, business operations, business organigram and roles, European law and technical standards and procedures, etc.) from German expert witnesses on the witness stand for hours at a time before a bilingual English/German legal team, opposing counsel, the judge, and a full jury all present in
the courtroom.

May, 2017 (German)

American Arbitration Association Arbitrators (highly specialized expert judges ) heard witness
examination by lawyers representing German electric wind turbine manufacturer Senvion and
opposing counsel representing French Energy concern EDF. Vocabulary and communication
centered around the technical details relating to the mechanical, business, logistical and
technological context of a high-profile blade throw incident in France.

August, 2013 (French)

Lawyers representing Artemis Racing America’s cup team took deposition from a French boat
design expert concerning technical characteristics of the design of the fore beam of an AC72
catamaran which, upon collapsing, resulted in the death of a sailor.

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BUSINESS SEMINARS, CONFERENCES

• approximately 100 days, 99 percent simultaneous booth hours

July, 2015 (French)

Algerian tech trade delegation to Silicon Valley, July, 2013
Judges, senators, founders, inventors, and other political and community leaders toured law
firms, business incubators, top tech firms, and a very wide variety of other think tanks,
foundations, and startups in the San Francisco Bay Area. Topics ranged from the laws and
culture of the startup industry in Algeria and the US, as well as technical details of hardware and
software innovation.

August, 2014 (Spanish)

The North American General Contractors’ congress met in San Francisco. A four-day
conference covered topics such as the impact of US trade legislation on the construction sector,
raw material and machinery market pricing,

July, 2013 (Spanish)

Dutch paving equipment manufacturer Topcon held a training for expert Latin American
surveyors from across the hemisphere. Highly technical vocabulary and communication
surrounding state of the art equipment, the surveying industry, and use protocol spanned five
Days.

May, 2013 (Spanish)

Genentech reported on technical details of an Alzheimer’s Study conducted to study the
company’s latest proprietary technology surrounding Alzheimer’s treatment and research.
Vocabulary and communication surrounded the technical functioning and manufacturing
process of Genentech’s research and treatment technology, as well as the industrial context
surrounding the issue.

November, 2010 (German)

Harley Davidson general licensed dealer meeting in Fulda, Germany required interpretation
between the German hosts (the meeting was in German) and the licensed dealer
representatives who did not speak German. Discussion included the internal politics of the
Canadian/british-based dealer association leadership, the problem of the grey parts market,
sales performance of new models, client culture, dealer bonus systems, etc.

May, 2010, January, 2011 (German)

Industry giant Kloeckner steel wholesale, warehousing, and distribution LLC in Duisburg,
Germany required interpretation into Engish for an Irish member of the board of directors at the
company’s annual European Works Council. Topics included company acquisitions, the
intersection of national political issues in the companies countries of operation (Union strikes in
Spain and Bulgaria, collective bargaining policy, and general turnover performance.

NGO WORK

• approximately 50 days, 95 percent simultaneous booth hours

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May, 2016 (French)

Sexual Gender Based Violence NGO summit in San Francisco specifically centering around
efforts to use blogging and other initiatives to measurably reduce the incidince of rape in the
(especially francophone) nations of the Great Lakes Region and Central Africa. The conference
required simultaneous with occasional consecutive interpretation and was a prime example of
spending time with an effective group of world citizens effecting concentrated change around a
specific issue.

May, 2012-2016 (Spanish)

The Waterkeeper River Rally hired me to work as a Spanish interpreter in May of 2012 for their
latin American members at the annual River Rally Conference. I then helped organize and
participate in their Spanish-English interpreting team between the years 2013 and 2016 until
they hired a full-time in-house staffer to manage language services. Approximately 200
Lawyers, scientists, and professional activists from every corner of the earth would gather at an
annual general conference to check in on the strategies (education, citizen involvement, ‘name
and shame’ media campaigns, direct negotiation with polluters or ‘overusers’ of water, litigation
strategies, local team building) and initiatives to conserve and protect our planet’s water
resources. I am grateful for the lifelong friendships and memories.

September, 2013 (Spanish)

Jorge A. Subero Isa, former president of the Supreme Court of the Dominican Republic
attended a series of seminars and workshops at public fora and law schools around the San
Francisco Bay area. Jorge’s visit ended with a broadcasted keynote speech at the
Commonwealth Club of San Francisco on his work extending the rule of law (increasing access
to justice institutions, modernization of the basic law (Napoleonic Code) of the Dominican
Republic to a more accessible and relevant set of documents in Spanish, etc.) which required
consecutive interpretation after an equipment failure.