The Eleventh Circuit pattern jury instructions are model charges, in separate civil and criminal volumes, that federal judges in Alabama, Florida, and Georgia use when instructing juries. They are maintained by the Judicial Council’s Committee on Pattern Jury Instructions, last revised in September 2025, and posted free on the court’s website. Judges are not bound to read them verbatim, but they are the standard starting point for the final charge.1United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit. 11th Circuit Pattern Jury Instructions
Where to Find and Download Them
The official home is pji.ca11.uscourts.gov. From that page you can download the full civil or criminal volume as a PDF for offline review, or open the Pattern Jury Instructions Builder to select only the instructions relevant to a specific case and generate a custom document.2United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit. Pattern Jury Instructions For attorneys assembling proposed charges, the builder is faster than paging through the whole volume.
Confirm you are working from the most current version before relying on any instruction. The Committee updates the volumes periodically to reflect new appellate decisions and statutory changes, and the September 2025 revision is the latest.1United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit. 11th Circuit Pattern Jury Instructions
What the Civil Volume Covers
The civil volume is organized into preliminary instructions given before trial, trial instructions given during or at the close of evidence, basic instructions covering foundational concepts like the civil burden of proof and witness credibility, and substantive claim instructions for specific areas of federal civil law.3United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit. Pattern Jury Instructions Builder – Civil Cases
The substantive claim set is where most trial attorneys spend their time. It includes model charges for adverse employment action claims, constitutional civil rights claims, securities fraud, civil RICO, Jones Act negligence and unseaworthiness, copyright infringement, trademark disputes, and False Claims Act cases. Each set walks through the elements of the claim or defense in question and provides language the judge can adopt or adapt. If the claim you are litigating is not in the pattern volume, you will need to draft a proposed instruction from scratch, grounded in binding circuit precedent.
What the Criminal Volume Covers
The criminal volume has four sections.2United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit. Pattern Jury Instructions
Basic Instructions are the general principles a judge gives in nearly every criminal case: presumption of innocence, the government’s burden of proof beyond a reasonable doubt, the role of the jury. Special Instructions cover topics that come up frequently but not universally, including accomplice testimony, character evidence, and defense theories such as entrapment, alibi, insanity, coercion, and good-faith reliance on advice of counsel.4United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit. Eleventh Circuit Pattern Jury Instructions (Criminal Cases) Offense Instructions give element-by-element breakdowns of specific federal crimes, spanning drug offenses, conspiracy, counterfeiting, bribery, civil rights violations, false claims, and tax crimes, among others. Trial Instructions are procedural directions the judge delivers during or at the close of trial, including guidance on deliberations and verdict forms.
Offense Instructions are the most heavily used section. Each one lays out what the government must prove beyond a reasonable doubt for a given statute, which helps both sides focus argument and helps the jury understand exactly what the prosecution has to establish.
Defense Theory Instructions
A criminal defendant generally has the right to an instruction on any recognized defense theory the evidence supports. If the evidence is there and the judge refuses to give the instruction, that refusal can be reversible error. Request the instruction in writing and get a ruling on the record. Skipping that step can forfeit the issue on appeal.
How Much Legal Weight They Carry
The pattern instructions are advisory. They do not carry the force of law, and the Judicial Council’s authorization to publish them is not an endorsement of their accuracy in any particular case; substantive approval “must await case-by-case review by the Court.”1United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit. 11th Circuit Pattern Jury Instructions Binding authority comes from published opinions of the Eleventh Circuit and the Supreme Court. If a pattern instruction conflicts with a controlling appellate decision, the case law wins.
This matters in practice. Pattern instructions can lag behind new decisions, especially in areas of law that are moving. An attorney who reads a pattern instruction into a proposed charge without checking whether recent case law has shifted the standard is taking a real risk. Many instructions come with Committee Notes citing the appellate decisions the instruction rests on, which makes it easier to spot whether the underlying precedent still holds, but the notes themselves may not reflect the most recent rulings.
Even so, a trial court that follows a pattern instruction verbatim is on strong footing. Appellate courts recognize that these instructions reflect the Committee’s careful reading of circuit law, and a party challenging a pattern instruction has to show it misstates the current standard. Departing from the pattern language is not automatically error either. A judge who tailors an instruction to the facts and correctly states the law has done nothing wrong, even if the wording differs from the published model.
How Judges Actually Use Them
Toward the end of trial, each side submits proposed jury instructions, usually drawing from the pattern language and adjusting it to the facts of the case. The judge decides which instructions to give and crafts the final charge from the proposals.
Trial judges have broad discretion to tailor the pattern language. If the facts call for a nuance the pattern does not address, the judge can modify the wording. If a pattern instruction covers something not relevant to the case, the judge leaves it out. The constraint is that the final instructions must accurately state the controlling law of the circuit while remaining understandable to people who are not lawyers.
Preserving Instructional Errors for Appeal
A flawed jury instruction will not help you on appeal if you did not properly object at trial. The rules are strict and the consequences of missing the moment are severe.
Criminal Cases
Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 30 requires a party who objects to an instruction, or to the judge’s refusal to give a requested one, to state the specific objection and its grounds on the record before the jury retires to deliberate. The court must give you an opportunity to make the objection outside the jury’s hearing.5Legal Information Institute (LII). Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure Rule 30 – Jury Instructions
Failing to object in time generally bars appellate review. The narrow exception is plain error under Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 52(b), which lets an appellate court notice an unpreserved error that affects substantial rights. Plain error is a steep hill: the error must be obvious, it must have affected the outcome, and leaving it uncorrected must seriously undermine the fairness or integrity of the proceedings. It is not a safety net for attorneys who forgot to object.
Civil Cases
Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 51 is the civil counterpart. A party objecting to an instruction or the failure to give one must state the objection on the record, identify the specific problem, and explain the grounds. The objection is timely if made at the opportunity the court provides under Rule 51(b)(2), or promptly after the party learns that an instruction will be given or refused, if not previously informed.6Legal Information Institute (LII). Federal Rules of Civil Procedure Rule 51 – Instructions to the Jury; Objections; Preserving a Claim of Error
Rule 51 also allows plain error review of an unpreserved instructional error that is plain and affects substantial rights.6Legal Information Institute (LII). Federal Rules of Civil Procedure Rule 51 – Instructions to the Jury; Objections; Preserving a Claim of Error The exception is just as narrow on the civil side. The practical rule for both civil and criminal cases is the same: if you believe an instruction is wrong, object on the record before the jury begins deliberating, and be specific. A vague complaint that the instructions were unfair preserves nothing.