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In The Social Worker as an Expert Witness in Suspected Child Abuse Cases: A Primer for Beginners, LeRoy Schultz offers guidelines to the social services expert witness:

Before the cross exam, in your pretrial conference with your attorney, you will have discussed the weakest points in your testimony. Ask for directions from your attorney on how to handle these. Be prepared for intense scrutiny of your information, argue well, but not emotionally. The intent of the opposing attorney is to discredit you. Expect denigration and sarcasm but stay calm and professional. You can be discredited in front of the jury by:

1. Lack of licensing or evidence of falsification of credentials.

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In Cheaper Medicines Not Always Better, medical expert Peter Pitts, President, Center for Medicine in the Public Interest and former associate FDA commissioner writes:

There are several reasons such a policy hurts our health system. For one, it is an assault on the relationship between physicians and patients. When a doctor decides on a treatment, he is employing years of medical experience and weighing countless factors, like the patient’s age, diet, and lifestyle. Patients, meanwhile, trust that the doctor knows best.

When it’s possible for a health care bureaucrat to override the decision of a trained medical professional, this valuable association between a patient and his doctor breaks down. A patient is no longer under the care of single medical expert, but is now being treated by faceless organization looking to cut corners.

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The nursing expert witness may often be a Legal Nurse Consultant. Here, the American Association of Legal Nurse Consultants answers:

What Does a Legal Nurse Consultant Do?

# Acts as a liaison with attorneys, physicians and clients # Educates attorneys regarding medical facts and issues relating to a case or claim # Researches applicable literature and evidence to determine the merits of a case # Reviews and analyzes documents and compares them to the allegations # Summarizes medical literature # Screens for record tampering # Defines and evaluates the standards of care practices # Evaluates the possible breach of duty on the part of the healthcare practitioner or facility # Prepares witness and exhibit lists

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In Expert Witness – A Valuable Asset, William Gulya, Jr., construction expert witness and President & CEO, Middlesex Trenching Company, writes:

As in any profession, there are good and bad experts. An attorney should always talk with a prospective expert to obtain a sense of his or her demeanor, character, and experience in their field of expertise. One of the most common questions faced by experts from opposing legal council is “Mr. Expert, have you ever personally performed or supervised this type of task?” The ideal response would be “Yes, I have.” There are three types of experts — those with book knowledge only, those with hands-on field experience only, and those with both. Those experts who possess both book knowledge and hands-on experience in their field of expertise are the most desirable and sought after because they can answer “Yes.”

The most crucial component provided to the attorney is the expert’s report. After days of hearing conflicting testimony during trial, it is in large part the expert’s report that jurors will turn to for clarification. It must be neat, professional, properly formatted, grammatically correct, and organized. The report must present the facts of the case in a clear and concise manner and include a summary of the expert’s opinion to which laypersons and jurors will relate.

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The National Ground Water Association is offering the two-day course, “Guidelines for Groundwater Legal Consultation,” April 15-16 in Denver, Colorado. The course will introduce individuals to what is involved in being a groundwater expert witness – writing an opinion statement, grasping legal terminology, preparing for testimony, and setting up administrative benchmarks.

NGWA, a nonprofit organization comprised of more than 13,000 U.S. and international groundwater professionals – contractors, equipment manufacturers, suppliers, scientists, and engineers – is dedicated to advancing groundwater knowledge. NGWA’s vision is to be the leading groundwater association that advocates the responsible development, management, and use of water.

For more, see wateronline.com

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In a $242 million lawsuit VirnetX alleges Microsoft’s Office Communicator and other products infringed upon its patents on technology for automatic and secure virtual private networks, or VPNs. On March 17th, Microsoft attorney Matthew Powers, of Weil Gotshal & Manges, cross-examined computers expert witness Mark T. Jones, an electrical and computer engineering professor at Virginia Tech who testified in favor of VirnetX.

The Scotts Valley, Calif., company of 12 employees alleges Microsoft infringed two of its patents – Nos. 6,502,135 and 7,188,180 – on technology for secure and automatic virtual private networks, or VPNs. In its defense, Microsoft is arguing that the patents are invalid largely because the technology was obvious – in this sense, a legal term – and that Microsoft’s Windows XP, Windows Vista, Office Live Communicator and other products did not infringe.

For more, see seattlepi.com.

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In Cheaper Medicines Not Always Better, medical expert Peter Pitts, President, Center for Medicine in the Public Interest and former associate FDA commissioner writes:

Yet some policies that are gaining popularity are weakening the doctor-patient relationship by putting treatment decisions in the hands of third parties.

Chief among these schemes is “step therapy.” Also called “fail first,” this is a policy that is sometimes adopted by insurers and government health programs to save money on pharmaceuticals. It forces patients to try cheaper alternatives to a prescribed drug before they are permitted to get the medicine that their physicians ordered.

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The nursing expert witness may often be a Legal Nurse Consultant. Here, the American Association of Legal Nurse Consultants answers what makes a Legal Nurse Consultant distinct:

As licensed registered nurses, legal nurse consultants bring specialized health care education and clinical experience to the medically related issues of the litigation process. This education and experience distinguishes legal nurse consultants from paralegals and legal assistants and provides the foundation for the legal nurse consultant’s ability to recognize, interpret and analyze all relevant medically related information in a claim or case.

The primary role of the legal nurse consultant is to evaluate, analyze, and render informed opinions on the delivery of health care and the resulting outcomes. For over 20 years, legal nurse consultants have acted as collaborators and strategists, offering support in medically-related litigation and other medical-legal matters.

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In Expert Witness – A Valuable Asset, William Gulya, Jr., construction expert witness and President & CEO, Middlesex Trenching Company, writes:

A case in point, an attorney in New Jersey, had a case in which his client suggested utilizing an expert. The attorney indicated to his client that it was not necessary, citing cost as the major factor. At trial, the testimony of three of the attorney’s key witnesses was rejected or restricted. The judge based his decision on the hearsay rule and restricted witnesses’ testimony to only those reports, tests or documents they alone prepared.

In the end, the evidence the attorney was able to get on the record was so limited that the case he had intended to present was non-existent. Had the attorney hired an expert witness, the hearsay rule would not have applied and the attorney would have been able to present the case as he intended. Notwithstanding the validity or invalidity of the judge’s ruling, he made the ruling at trial just the same. Now the case will go to the appellate division. In hindsight, the attorney’s decision to not bring on an expert compromised his case, upset his client and will not save his client any money. What his decision did do was to put the outcome of his case in jeopardy.

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Logging expert witnesses may opine on illegal logging and the trade in illegal timber.

Illegal logging and the international trade in illegally logged timber is a major problem for many timber-producing countries in the developing world. It causes environmental damage, costs governments billions of dollars in lost revenue, promotes corruption, undermines the rule of law and good governance and funds armed conflict. It retards sustainable development in some of the poorest countries of the world. Consumer countries contribute to these problems by importing timber and wood products without ensuring that they are legally sourced. In recent years, however, producer and consumer countries alike have paid increasing attention to illegal logging.

Excerpted from illegallogginginfo.