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The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee heard expert witness testimony in an attempt to find causes behind record-high gasoline prices. Oil and gas expert witnesses described years of a lack of investment in refinery capacity as a primary factor in rising prices.

Deutsche Bank’s Paul Sankey, oil and gas production expert witness, said years of oil companies losing money led to many companies neglecting refinery investment. A contributing factor was the Texas City explosion, which caused other refiners to operate more cautiously and with less capacity. As the Associated Press reports, last year also saw the temporary shutdown of production at Prudhoe Bay due to maintenance problems.

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A Des Moines mother alleges that her young daughter was being sexually abused by the child’s father. Pictures led the mother’s expert witness to conclude with 99.9 percent certainty that there had been abuse.

As reported in the DesMoines Register, the mother called the child-abuse hot line and began taking the child for weekly therapy sessions. The state’s child-abuse specialist examined the child and found no signs of sexual abuse, though child sexual abuse experts say lascivious acts don’t necessarily leave physical evidence.

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Expert witnesses will be questioned by a three-member arbitration panel in the Floyd Landis hearing to determine if the cyclist used banned synthetic testosterone during the Tour de France. Performance Enhancing Drug Experts will answer questions from arbitrators and the opposing party. Cycling Experts are also expected to testfiy.

Landis could be banned for two years from cycling competitions and stripped of his title, something that’s never happened in the Tour’s 104-year history. CBS2.com expects that Landis’ lawyers to argue that major mistakes were made in the tests that came up positive for synthetic testosterone.

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Naples gastroenterologist Dr. Michael Marks is named in a medical malpractice wrongful death suit involving Judith Dill’s death on April 25, 2003. Expert witness Dr. Ciaran P. Kelly testified that Judith Dill’s condition was caused by a post-operative ileus, which acts like a blockage because it prevents passage of intestinal contents. Gastroenterologist expert Dr. Kelly said Marks should never have ordered a bowel preparation, magnesium citrate, because Judith Dill hadn’t eaten in eight days.

Naples Daily News reports that Dr. Marks performed an endoscopy on April 9 and on April 12, the colonoscopy. During the colonoscopy, Dill vomited violently, aspirating her vomit, which went into her lungs, later causing infection and death on April 25, 2003.

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Peter Braunstein admits to his attack on a a former colleague at Fairchild Publications in October of 2005 but has pleaded not guilty, blaming his actions on undiagnosed schizophrenia. Dr. Monte Buchsbaum, expert witness and professor of psychiatry at Mt. Sinai School of Medicine, said that images of the activity in Braunstein’s brain were consistent with a diagnosis of schizophrenia.

As reported at CourtTVnew.com, the alleged deficiency is crucial to the success of Braunstein’s defense strategy, which requires that a jury find he was incapable of conscious decision-making the day of the attack. Braunstein’s lawyers are expected to call another schizophrenia expert witness to corroborate Buchsbaum’s claim by making a clinical diagnosis of schizophrenia.

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Vermont is the first state to go to trial over California’s greenhouse gas limits. The 16-day trial ended after expert witnesses gave testimony regarding fuel economy and greenhouse gas emmissions. The state’s automobile expert witness, K.G. Duleep, testified that car companies already have the technology to improve fuel economy sufficient to meet the 2016 standards.

Conversely, the automakers’ fuel economy expert witness gave testimony that fuel economy could not be improved sufficiently by 2016 to meet California’s greenhouse gas emissions limits. According to The Burlington Free Press, the judge allowed the two sides 30 days to file post-trial briefs with no indication on when he will issue a decision.

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Despite it being a departmental requirement, Jackson Police Department records show that almost one in six officers did not receive a qualifying score at the department’s firing range last year. Eighty of the 488 Jackson officers received no qualifying score because they didn’t take the test.

Charles Key, a veteran of the Baltimore Police Department and an expert witness on police training, was shocked at how many Jackson police officers were not graded on their firearms proficiency. Mr. Key told The Clarion Ledger, “That’s absurd. That’s insane. You don’t even know whether they can put holes in paper,” he said. “That’s so far below modern police standards that you must not even have state standards.” Key also testifies as an expert witness in use-of-force lawsuits, and warns that not having an adequate training program endangers the public and leaves police departments open for costly lawsuits.

The Jackson Police Department has been sued in the past over training issues such as high-speed pursuit training and civil rights issues. Departments across the nation have had their training regimens picked apart in lawsuits over the use of deadly force.

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Juan Luna and his alleged accomplice Jim Degorski are charged with killing seven people in the Palatine Brown’s Chicken and Pasta murders 14 years ago. However, DNA expert Karl Reich told jurors DNA found at the crime scene can not be scientifically matched to Luna because of mishandling and inadequate testing. “You have to handle (the evidence) properly in order to get the right results … in order to have faith in those results,” Reich said.

The DNA match was based on nine points, but Reich said a 13-point match would have been more thorough and that as many as 1 million people in the U.S. could match those same nine points. As reported in the Daily Herald, a bird expert tesified on Monday regarding chicken bones from the crime scene.

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Idaho District Judge James Michaud has dismissed lewd conduct and rape charges against defendant Leo Ray Hunsaker because of unnecessary delays in prosecuting the defendant, and issues with subpoenas of expert witnesses. The judge concluded that both the state and the defense had improperly subpoenaed DNA expert witnesses in the case.

The Bonner County Daily Bee reports that defendant Hunsaker, 39, was charged with engaging in lewd conduct with a girl in July 2002, when she was between the ages of 11 and 12. Hunsaker was also accused of raping the girl in 2004 and 2005, when she was 13- and 14-years old. Hunsaker pleaded not guilty to the charges.

As the case neared its sixth trial setting, both the prosecution and defense told the court key prosecution and defense witnesses would not be available to testify, which prompted the dismissal with prejudice.

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According to aviation expert witness Robert Lemieux, Mark Tayfel, a pilot who crash-landed a twin-engine plane on a busy road after running out of fuel should be commended, not treated as a criminal. According to the Canadian Press, Tayfel is charged with criminal negligence causing death, four counts of criminal negligence causing bodily harm and dangerous operation of an aircraft. Tayfel and five passengers survived with various injuries, while an elderly U.S. fisherman died several weeks later in hospital.

“Most people walked away from that accident. He did his job until the bitter end,” said Lemieux.