A U.S. Senate Special Committee on Aging agreed that doctors must partake in continuing medical education throughout their careers but how to fund that education and whether it should be sponsored by pharmaceutical and device companies is at issue. Medical expert witnesses expressed a wide variety of opinions at the…
Jurors in El Paso, TX, acquitted Guillermo Nieto of murder in the 1999 death of his new bride, Sheila Westphal. He had met her a year before on the Internet and was accused of burying her body in his yard. The DNA expert witness could not confirm that a bone…
In Positive Trend for Defendants in Product Liability, Nick Rees of PublicNuisanceWire.com writes: Defendants in product liability cases have seen laws and statutes change and morph as the Supreme Court and other venues have interpreted laws and created precedents. Jim Beck, of counsel at Dechert LLP in the mass torts…
Bridgeport, CT, attorney Richard Meehan Jr. describes testifying as an expert witness “no easy thing to endure.” I agreed to testify at the request of a young lawyer who I had trained some years back. The experience was enlightening. I realized how difficult it is when you, as a witness,…
In Analysis and Testing In Accident Reconstruction, accident reconstruction expert witnesses at Technology Associates explain the nature of engineering analysis: Thus, in the absence of reliable injury-data based on relevant accident records, the subject danger can be evaluated only by analysis and not by testing. Similar reasoning can be applied…
The danger of falling arises when the unsuspecting climber shifts his center of gravity, causing the ladder’s elevated rear leg, to impact the ground. This is likely to occur when the user lifts one foot while stepping from one level to the next or shifts his weight while working. When…
Seat belt and airbag expert witnesses at Technology Associates describe “whiplash”: Testing has shown that the maximum loading to a rear-ended car was amplified about two and a half times when it reached the heads of the occupants. The testing also revealed that this occurred about a fourth of a…
The ABA Commission on Mental and Physical Disability Law and the ABA Criminal Justice Section announces a new publication Criminal Mental Health and Disability Law, Evidence and Testimony: A Comprehensive Reference Manual for Lawyers, Judges and Criminal Justice Professionals. The new criminal mental health/disability law book is the most comprehensive…
Robert Rigg, associate professor and director of the Criminal Defense Program at Drake University Law School in Des Moines, says that “Jurors don’t like the insanity defense.” In fact, only a few cases in the state have succeeded with an insanity or diminished-capacity defense, according to Rigg, who has worked…
In Analysis and Testing In Accident Reconstruction, accident reconstruction expert witnesses at Technology Associates explain the nature of engineering analysis: Straightforward as the above reasoning is (see 7/16/09 blog entry), it nevertheless constitutes a valid (though simple) example of engineering analysis. Now let us consider what it would take to…