The U.S. District Court, W.D. Virginia dealt with a federal tort claims act case – a podiatrist, Bonk, treated the plaintiff with surgery for an injured ankle which resulted in an amputation of the leg below the knee. The U.S. hired Wirt, a registered nurse and certified life care planner to rebut the plaintiff’s physician [...]
By Steven Babitsky, Esq. The defense organization Lawyers for Civil Justice has urged that the advisory committee on evidence rules and its subcommittee on rule 702 amendments the “reform” of a Daubert Enforcement. Specifically, this powerful and influential group called for the following: We urge you to move forward with an amendment to rule 702 [...]
Nadine Nasser Donovan, Esq. Steven Babitsky, Esq. What is the pyramid problem? Many forensic accounting firms whose employees act as expert witnesses suffer from a serious “pyramid problem.” This is a term we at SEAK Inc. use to describe a company which has many accountants performing expert witness work, yet just a select few [...]
Expert witnesses who are to be deposed in challenging cases should consider studying the style of opposing counsel. Expert witnesses of all disciplines, from accident reconstruction to wound care should go beyond looking at counsel’s webpage and maybe a few of her publications. Expert witnesses, with the assistance of retaining counsel, should obtain deposition transcripts/videos [...]
Steven Babitsky, Esq. Many successful expert witnesses have viable and profitable businesses. The desire to “keep at it” often prevents experts from forming a viable succession plan. In fact, well thought out succession plans often enable expert witnesses to continue working, be more selective in their assignments, and provide income when they do decide to [...]
By Steven Babitsky, Esq. Expert witnesses of all specialties are facing an increasing numbers of Daubert challenges. The admissibility rate varies by area of expertise. Physicians, when testifying in certain areas, have approximately a 50% exclusion rate with many financial experts (fraud 52% and intellectual property 51%) a little higher.[1] What can and should expert [...]
It doesn't say inflatable, but it says this other word...I can't think of a synonym for inflatable, but another word for inflatable and that means...a person who's skilled in the art, again, POSA, would know that that was inflatable, and so it's disclosing that, and it's disclosing that it's orange even though it [...]
Excerpted from SEAK's Course: How to Excel as an Expert Witness in Patent Cases: Special Techniques Okay, let's talk about direct examination. We have, like, an hour left. One of the things that I noted when I was doing research for this course...I looked at a survey that Law 360 did, which [...]
Excerpted from SEAK's Course: How to Excel as an Expert Witness in Patent Cases: Special Techniques On the prior art side, this is where I find experts to be very helpful, would be what was, if we go back in time to the relevant invention date of, like, say, 1998, what other [...]
Excerpted from SEAK's Course: How to Excel as an Expert Witness in Patent Cases: Special Techniques Now there's a doctrine of equivalents and this is something we're experts are called upon quite a bit and this is a really tricky area of the law. So it's doctrine of equivalents or DOE as [...]