Junk Science excluded from Court. At least some courts put a stop to the charade of non-medical people getting certificates and then coming into the courtroom to say an injury "couldn't have" happened in a given automobile accident. Frye v. United States, 293 F. 1013 (D.C. Cir. 1923) requires generally that the science an expert's testimony is based on be well-recognized, in cases that would be controlled by that precedent. Based on that, a state court in Pinsker v. Cohen, Maricopa County Super. Ct., No. CV 95-12419, Sept. 22, 1997 excluded the testimony of a "biomechanist" on the low probability of injury in a low-impact car accident. The study on which the expert wished to based the conclusion that the probability of injury was "low" was not a broad-based study, that is, was readily subject to attack from a scientific standpoint.

   On the other hand, the patient's treating doctor may testify both as a fact witness on causation, as treating physician, and as an expert, said the court in White v. Hairston, 698 A.2d 471 (D.C. 1997). There, the appellate court reversed the lower court's ruling that the treating doctor could not be deemed an "expert" by the jury. Not only was the ruling unnecessary, the lower court's repeating twice that the treating doctor was not an "expert" unfairly diminished the treating doctor in the eyes of the jury. The lower court in that case, the appeals court said, had incorrectly assumed that it would be wrong to allow the treating doctor to testify both as a fact witness on causation, and as an expert witness.

Back to index for TheLegalPages

Contingent fee for injury cases =

No fee until case is won or settled!