Expert Witness Blog

In OSHA Standards Changing: The standard that gave workers the right to know, now gives them the right to understand construction site expert witness William Gulya, Jr., President & CEO, Middlesex Trenching Company, writes:

As an Expert in OSHA safety standards, regulations and compliance, it is vital I keep up with the most current trends and changes that are proposed and implemented. The Occupational Safety and Health Administration’s (OSHA) main principle to date has been that employees have the “right to know” about the hazardous chemicals they work with. It is my understanding that OSHA is now implementing a newly revised Hazard Communication Standard to be consistent with the Globally Harmonized System of Classification and Labeling of Chemicals (GHS). Therefore, effective December 1, 2013 OSHA is requiring that employees have the “right to understand,” and the employer must provide proof of this “understanding” to those employees.

Up to now employers training their employees regarding the knowledge of the materials they work with has been enough. Companies provided their employees with hazardous chemical training and then tested them on their knowledge of this training, which method satisfied the federal requirements. Starting December 2013, one-time testing of the employees’ understanding will not be enough. The employer will be responsible for showing proof that their hazardous chemical training is clearly achieving this compliance.

Child sexual assault expert witnesses may consult regarding sexual misconduct, sexual molestation, and child sexual abuse. Child Abuse Pediatrics & Forensic Medicine Experts explain the Child Abuse Pediatrician’s Role.

The child abuse pediatrician’s clinical role is to provide objective, comprehensive, evidence-based and patient centered care for children and adolescents with suspected sexual abuse, physical abuse, neglect or unexpected child fatalities. Child abuse is a serious medical diagnosis requiring careful and comprehensive evaluations in addition to consideration of collaborative input from protective and investigative sources. In order to diagnose child abuse, it is imperative to consider alternative medical, accidental, or birth related diagnoses and use evidence-based standards when generating opinions.

Here are some helpful resources:

Environmental expert witnesses may write reports and testify on environmental forensics, environmental health and safety, and environmental impact studies, EPA regulation, water pollution and more. The State Department released the Keystone XL pipeline environmental review last month and the report forecast that the project would have minimal environmental impact. This week the inspector general found that the review was not biased and was handled properly. The project would connect tar sands oil in Canada to refineries in Texas.

The proposed Keystone XL project consists of a 875-mile long pipeline and related facilities to transport up to 830,000 barrels per day of crude oil from Alberta, Canada and the Bakken Shale Formation in Montana. The pipeline would cross the U.S. border near Morgan, Montana and continue through Montana, South Dakota, and Nebraska where it would connect to existing pipeline facilities near Steele City, Nebraska, for onward delivery to Cushing, Oklahoma, and the Gulf Coast area.

On February 26, 2014, the Dept. of State issued:

Securities expert witnesses may consult and testify on securities regulation, securities fraud, and the securities industry. This month the SEC charged Wall Street traders Thomas Gonnella and Ryan King with a fraudulent “parking” scheme in which one trader temporarily placed securities in the other’s trading book. Gonnella arranged for King, who worked at a different firm, to purchase several securities with the understanding that Gonnella would repurchase them at a profit for King’s firm.

The alleged round-trip trades caused Gonnella’s firm to lose approximately $174,000. The SEC’s Enforcement Division alleges that after Gonnella’s supervisor began inquiring about the trades, Gonnella and King took steps to evade detection by interposing an interdealer broker in subsequent transactions and communicating by cell phone to avoid having conversations recorded by their firms. Gonnella and King were eventually fired by their firms for the misconduct.

SEC Press Release 2014-24 …King, who has cooperated with the SEC investigation, agreed to settle the charges by disgorging his profits and being barred from the securities industry. Any additional financial penalties will be determined at a later date. The Enforcement Division’s litigation against Gonnella continues in a proceeding before an administrative law judge.

In recent years, psychiatrists have been asked to consult on security clearance eligibility. In The Psychiatrist in the Security Clearance Process, psychiatry expert witness Brian Crowley, MD, DLFAPA, writes:

Psychiatrists are asked to participate in the security clearance process in either of two ways….

In the second scenario, a psychiatrist is asked to perform an independent psychiatric evaluation for an individual he has not met, addressing the issue of eligibility to obtain or to hold a security clearance. The evaluation may be requested either by a government agency or by an individual; in the latter case, he/she is usually represented by an attorney. Such an evaluation should be performed by a psychiatrist with considerable experience working at the interface of psychiatry and the law. While this is a forensic psychiatric procedure, in my view it does not require that the psychiatrist has taken a forensic fellowship – when I started working at the psychiatry/law interface there were no such fellowships – but it does take one who has deep knowledge and appreciation for how the law undergirds all psychiatric practice.

Hazardous waste expert witnesses may write reports and testify on hazardous waste sites, the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA), and hazardous waste mapping. In the news, whistle-blower Donna Busche was fired from her position as manager of environmental and nuclear safety at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation waste treatment plant construction site. Hanford, located on the Columbia River in the state of Washington, ranks as the most polluted nuclear weapons production site in the US. The Columbia is the fourth largest river in the United States and drains into the Pacific. Hanford was a top secret project in the 1940s with the task of building the atomic bomb. Decades of plutonium production for US nuclear weapons have resulted in cleanup costs estimated at $2B/year. (Below is a Hanford exposure map,)

Ms. Busche worked for URS Corp., which is assisting in building a $12B plant to convert nuclear waste into glass but construction of the plant itself has been stopped due to safety concerns. Busche and others have filed complaints with the federal government over design and safety of the facility.

At http://www.whistleblowers.gov/, the US Department of Labor describes whistleblower protection programs.