Mealey's Daubert : Mealey's : Legal News & Analysis

Mealey's Daubert

July 16, 2024
Judge Allows Expert To Opine If Speed Of Crash Supports Alleged Injuries

OMAHA, Neb. — A Nebraska federal judge on July 15 denied a couple’s motion to exclude testimony from an expert opining on the speed, impact, energy and severity of a collision, finding that the arguments for exclusion go to weight, not admissibility.
July 12, 2024
Acetaminophen Autism/ADHD MDL Judge Rejects Admissibility Of New Causation Expert

NEW YORK — A New York federal judge has granted a motion to exclude testimony from an expert opining that prenatal exposure to acetaminophen causes attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD); the expert was retained after the judge overseeing the multidistrict litigation in December found that previously named experts were inadmissible.
July 11, 2024
Magistrate Judge OKs Expert Testimony In Case Alleging Death Stemmed From Crash

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. — A federal magistrate judge in Florida agreed to limit certain opinions offered by a medical examiner in a wrongful death suit stemming from an overdose of opioid medication but found that his other testimony is admissible and further ruled that a rebuttal witness can testify on possible causes of a woman’s injuries.
July 11, 2024
Mineral Rights Owners: Defense Expert Lacks Methodology, Evidence Rules Not Met

COLUMBUS, Ohio — Mineral rights holders have filed a reply brief in Ohio federal court arguing that it should exclude the testimony of defense expert David M. Posner on grounds that he has “no discernible methodology and a limited factual basis for his opinions” and that the defendants failed to meet their burden of showing that it is more likely than not that Posner’s testimony will be admissible pursuant to Federal Rule of Evidence 702.
July 10, 2024
Mississippi Federal Judge Allows Experts’ Testimony In Insurance Coverage Dispute

NATCHEZ, Miss. — A federal judge in Mississippi denied an insurer’s motion to exclude two experts retained by a couple alleging that they were not adequately reimbursed for storm damage and refused to grant summary judgment after finding that material issues are in dispute.
July 10, 2024
Excluding Expert, Judge Grants Summary Judgment Against Class In ERISA Fees Suit

PITTSBURGH — Excluding an expert whose testimony has had mixed fates under Daubert v. Merrell Dow Pharmaceuticals challenges in other courts, a Pennsylvania federal judge ruled against a large class in granting summary judgment for PNC Financial Services Group Inc. and related defendants in an Employee Retirement Income Security Act suit over allegedly excessive record-keeping fees.
July 09, 2024
8th Circuit Affirms Ruling Finding Sleep Disorder Clinic Liable For FCA Violations

ST. LOUIS — The Eighth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals affirmed in part a district court’s ruling entering judgment in favor of a former employee of a sleep disorder clinic regarding his claims for False Claims Act (FCA) violations and related state law provisions as to the clinic’s overbilling of federal insurers and retaliation by firing him, finding that the lower court correctly rejected the “public disclosure defense” and did not abuse its discretion in admitting testimony pursuant to Daubert v. Merrell Dow Pharmaceuticals Inc. but that it erred in applying a punitive sanction that was “excessive.”
July 05, 2024
Causation Expert Found Unreliable By Wash. Federal Judge In Slip-And-Fall Suit

SEATTLE — Because a woman’s causation expert “is not an expert in analyzing surveillance video,” she cannot testify in a slip-and-fall lawsuit because her opinion on the exact moment a woman’s knee hit the ground is not reliable under Daubert v. Merrell Dow Pharmaceuticals Inc., a Washington federal judge held.
July 05, 2024
Texas Appeals Court: Biomechanical Engineer Testimony Properly Excluded

DALLAS — While Texas courts do allow biomechanical engineers to offer expert testimony in car accident cases, a trial court did not err in excluding an expert who did not offer any evidence that the injuries allegedly sustained in a crash were inconsistent with the physical forces created in the collision, a state appeals court ruled in affirming a $700,000 verdict.
July 05, 2024
Expert On Drug Testing Regulations Cannot Offer Legal Conclusions, Judge Says

PHILADELPHIA — An expert retained by a practicing Muslim who is suing Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority (SEPTA) for violating his constitutional rights by insisting that he drink water during Ramadan to undergo a drug test cannot offer legal conclusions, a federal judge in Pennsylvania ruled, limiting the expert’s testimony.
June 28, 2024
COMMENTARY: Courts Must, As Recently Reminded, Follow The Law In Rule 702 Expert Testimony Determinations

By Erin Sheley
July 02, 2024
9th Circuit Affirms Use Of Consumer Survey In Trademark Dispute

SAN FRANCISCO — A federal judge in California did not abuse discretion by admitting a likelihood-of-confusion survey as expert evidence in a jury trial that ultimately found no likelihood of confusion between two trademarks used by business financing companies, a panel of the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals held July 1, affirming the grant of final judgment in the defendant company’s favor.
June 27, 2024
Federal Judge: Both Parties’ Causation Experts Are Out In Boating Injury Case

NEW ORLEANS — Reports by dueling experts who offer opposite opinions on who is at fault for a boating accident “are deficient in identical ways,” a Louisiana federal judge ruled, granting both parties’ motions to exclude.
June 27, 2024
Deputies, Man Settle Excessive Force Claims After Judge Allows Expert Testimony

NEW ORLEANS — A Louisiana federal judge ordered that a case alleging excessive force by police be dismissed after being told that the parties had reached an agreement two days after ruling that an expert retained by the defendants could testify that the police deputies acted in accordance with policing standards and protocols.
June 26, 2024
Utah Appeals Court Orders New Trial After Finding Expert Wrongly Excluded

SALT LAKE CITY — An expert retained by a woman in a medical negligence suit in a Utah state court was wrongly excluded from offering an opinion on causation, a state appeals court ruled, reversing a grant of judgment as a matter of law and remanding for a new trial.
June 26, 2024
Special Master Rejects J&J’s Motion To Inspect Asbestos Expert’s Lab

TRENTON, N.J. — The special master in the New Jersey federal court multidistrict litigation involving Johnson & Johnson talc denied a motion to inspect asbestos expert William Longo’s lab, saying the “unprecedented” request seeks irrelevant information and would be unduly annoying.
June 25, 2024
Judge: Securities Class Claims Against Crypto Firm Barred By Repose Statute

SAN FRANCISCO — A federal judge in California largely granted a motion from an issuer of crypto tokens and its CEO to dismiss class action securities claims against them, finding that the lead investor plaintiff failed to show that the crypto token at issue was first offered after the cutoff date for a statute of repose in the Securities Act of 1933.
June 21, 2024
Summary Judgment Bid Fails In ERISA Row Focused On Fund Managers’ ESG Efforts

FORT WORTH, Texas — A bench trial is scheduled to start June 24 in a high-profile class action over environmental, social and governance (ESG) considerations and the purported proxy voting activism of investment management firms, with a Texas federal judge denying the defendants’ summary judgment motion on June 20.
June 21, 2024
Experts Can Testify In Car Accident Case; Arguments ‘Fodder For Cross-Examination’

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — An expert’s failure to consider certain data is not grounds for exclusion but “best presented on cross-examination and resolved by a jury,” a federal magistrate judge in New Mexico ruled, denying a motion to exclude filed in a case stemming from injuries from a car accident.
June 21, 2024
Asbestos Expert Warns: Employee Deposition Threatens His ‘Golden Years’

ATLANTA — A non-testifying employee of asbestos expert William Longo and his lab warned that a magistrate judge’s ruling denying a motion to quash an untimely and irrelevant subpoena would doom him to spending his “golden years” giving depositions in asbestos litigation across the country.
June 21, 2024
No Error In Expert’s Testimony In Fatal Arson Case, 10th Circuit Says

DENVER — The 10th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals affirmed a man’s conviction for two counts of second-degree murder and one count of arson in Oklahoma after finding that a trial court did not err in admitting expert testimony.
June 20, 2024
Parties Debate Allowing New Causation Expert In ASD-ADHD MDL

NEW YORK — Defendants facing lawsuits by parents in the acetaminophen autism spectrum disorder-attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ASD-ADHD) multidistrict litigation who allege that prenatal exposure to acetaminophen causes autism or ADHD say the parents’ arguments for allowing a new expert to testify are misplaced.
June 19, 2024
Expert On Standard Of Medical Care Of Inmates Excluded, W.Va. Federal Judge Says

CHARLESTON, W.Va. — A medical expert’s opinion that a detention center’s medical staff met the standard of care in their treatment of an inmate who suffered from opioid use disorder is inadmissible because the expert failed to base his conclusions on reliable principles or methods, a West Virginia federal judge found.
June 14, 2024
J&J Can Depose Asbestos Expert Longo’s Employee, Special Master Says

TRENTON, N.J. — Johnson & Johnson entities may depose the lab employee who performed the testing on which expert William Longo relies, the special master in New Jersey involved in the federal multidistrict litigation involving asbestos-talc claims said.
June 14, 2024
Trial Court Erred In Excluding Experts In Design Defect Case, 11th Circuit Says

ATLANTA — The 11th Circuit Court of Appeals held that a trial court “applied an incorrect legal standard in excluding portions of the experts’ testimony and that this error infected its summary judgment decision,” reversing and remanding a design defect and injury case stemming from a fall out of a climbing tree stand while hunting.