Expert Witness Blog

Certified Professional Agronomist Dale Softley serves as an agricultural expert witness in agricultural fraud cases. He describes his forensic agronomist job as being “like ‘CSI’, but for plants.” The Softleys test soil, stems, or anything they can find to solve problems that include why crops are not growing, how plants became diseased or any other conditions farmers and their insurance companies want explained. Softley states:

Forensic agronomy normally is used to investigate issues over damage to crop or soil by a second or third party, such as chemical drift, livestock invasion, range fires, water drainage obstructions, and a host of other events.

Production problems pertaining to the loss of yield, including hail are covered by specific policies, and are adjusted by specialized personal. Once in a while someone can slip things past these adjusters and they need some expertise to help solve problems.

In Mold Claims: Recognizing What Is Real and Dealing With the Current Excessive Fears and Claims, pollution expert witness Ronald E. Gots, MD, Ph.D.writes:

RISK DECISION PROCESS

As noted in the introduction, true health risks are generally minimal in most mold contamination situations. Exceptions may rarely exist, i.e., if contamination is extensive,

Certified Professional Agronomist Dale Softley serves as an agricultural expert witness in agricultural fraud cases. In Forensic Agronomy, a new tool to solve old problems, Softley describes forensic agronomy:

Forensic agronomy is the using of agronomic procedures to measure and verify facts pertaining to agricultural claims or losses. Once facts have been quantified and documented there is reduced room for argument, and the emotion of that issue is minimized for the case.

Agronomy is the general study or science of crop production that includes a large number of subtopics such as: genetics, fertility, soil, chemicals, range and grassland management,

In Mold Claims: Recognizing What Is Real and Dealing With the Current Excessive Fears and Claims, pollution expert witness Ronald E. Gots, MD, Ph.D.writes:

Outdoor levels of mold spores in parts of the country (i.e., St. Louis in summer) are routinely 50,000 m3.5 People are being told to evacuate homes which have 5% of those levels. The term “toxic” mold makes no sense.6 Almost all molds can make mycotoxins including Alternaria, one of the most common outdoor molds and always considered “non-toxic” or benign by environmental consultants. One of the reasons for this strange and vast discord between health realities and health perceptions is the lack of medical expert voices in the fray. Instead, the din of “indoor air” experts and “air quality experts,” few of whom have any medical expertise and even fewer of whom have read thoroughly the scientific literature, has coopted this field. Some fringe physicians have also jumped into this arena. The growing interest in testing and finding problems rivals Anderson’s interest in keeping Enron healthy. Thus, they are neither expert, nor impartial.

When the new junior high in Waterford Maine opened for the first time, a teacher observed that the ceiling was deflected and that dust was coming from the ceiling. The school was evacuated and a short time later the roof to collapsed. Wood products expert witness Rubin M. Zallen, P.E., determined that drifting snow increased the snow load and caused the collapse. In his report, Zallen offered these definitions:

The allowable load is also called the safe load; it is the ultimate load divided by an appropriate safety factor. The ultimate load itself may be a collapse load or may be a yield load beyond which excessive deflections would render the member unusable.

Dead load is the weight of the building components.

In Mold Claims: Recognizing What Is Real and Dealing With the Current Excessive Fears and Claims, pollution expert witness Ronald E. Gots, MD, Ph.D.writes:

The recent mold frenzy is the strangest environmental claims issue that I have seen in thirty years of toxicological and environmental litigation consulting. Why? Mold is a natural living material and is essential for life. It has neither become more prevalent than it was twenty years ago; nor is there much additional support for any new adverse health effects despite thousands of active claims alleging the contrary. Most of the allegations in this arena are based upon substantial misinformation, so often repeated that they have garnered an aura of certitude. Among the misinformation: mold and mold toxins in the indoor environment are not known to cause brain damage,1 immunological disorders, bleeding lungs in newborns,2,3 fibromyalgia, attention deficit disorder, cancer or chronic fatigue syndrome. The alleged chronic disorder of “fungal syndrome”4 or “bioaerosal disease” are neither accepted in the medical community, nor known to exist.

Pesticides expert witness Allan Snyder; ACGIH, AIHA, SPCI writes on treatment and control of termites:

Treatment and control techniques vary depending on the species causing an infestation.

Multiple colonies of the same species of termite or more than one species of termite can infest a building.

In Using Marketing, Business & Competitive Research to Win Cases, Don E. Smith, marketing expert witness and President of American Consulting Group, Inc. explains that marketing research is a powerful tool that helps lawyers win cases.

Areas that benefit from marketing research:

Advertising effectiveness