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A Symmes Township, OH, man was sentenced Monday to 180 days in jail for street racing and aggravated vehicular homicide in a Clermont County crash that took the life of a friend riding in his hot-rod car. Purcell’s car was going 70 to 90 mph at the time of the fatal wreck, according to an accident reconstruction expert witness.

Dustin Purcell, 21, had faced up to five years in prison when sentenced by Judge Victor M. Haddad of Common Pleas Court. The prosecution recommended that he be put on probation for five years with the understanding he would speak to kids about the risks of reckless driving. The souped-up 1992 Honda Civic LX driven by Purcell ran off the right side of the narrow, two-lane road, hit a ditch and flipped over three times about 12:22 a.m.

For more, see cincinnati.com.

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All lawsuits filed in federal court against Pfizer over alleged side effects of Chantix, their popular smoking cessation treatment, have been centralized for pretrial litigation before U.S. District Judge Inge Prytz Johnson in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Alabama as part of a multidistrict litigation (MDL). The cases involve similar allegations that Pfizer failed to adequately research their medication or warn about the risk of suicide from Chantix or other psychological side effects.

Experts, including neuropsychology expert witnesses, must be designated by April 2011 and May 2011, for the Plaintiffs and Defendants respectively, with expert depositions set to begin in July 2011 and conclude by October 3, 2011. Motions practice on general causation and liability will then occur through the end of 2011, with case specific expert discovery not permitted to begin until after the Court decides the issues that are generally applicable to cases in the litigation.

For more, see aboutlawsuits.com.

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In July 2008, plaintiff Ted Slaughter filed a medical malpractice lawsuit claiming he was not promptly treated by the Beaumont Bone & Joint Institute after cutting his left hand in a circular saw. Slaughter alleges the delay led to the amputation of his right index finger. On March 4, justices seated on the Texas Ninth District Court of Appeals issued a memorandum opinion that partially reversed the lower courts ruling which kept several Beaumont Bone & Joint employees trapped in the ongoing litigation.

The clinic, in its appellate brief, argued that the “trial court abused its discretion in failing to dismiss (Slaughter’s) claims of direct negligence … when these claims were not (thoroughly) discussed in any expert report.” Conversely, Slaughter argued the appellate court lacks jurisdiction over the matter and claimed the medical malpractice expert witness report does not have to conform to Texas civil law since “no new claims were made in the amended petition.”

For more, see Southeast Texas Recordhttp://www.setexasrecord.com/.

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Medical expert witness and Chief Editor of web-based eMedicine Dr. Erik Schraga would like legal professionals and experts to know that eMedicine offers continually updated clinical reference information which may prove useful in cases they are working on. The following excerpt on cardiology provides information on pulmonary embolism medicolegal pitfalls.

Medicolegal Pitfalls

Pulmonary embolism (PE) is an extremely common disorder. It presents with nonspecific clinical features and requires specialized investigations for confirmation of diagnosis. Therefore, many patients die from unrecognized pulmonary embolism. The other common pitfalls are as follows:

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At The National Association of Social Workers (NASW) website, Carolyn I. Polowy, JD and law clerk Joel Gilbertson, write on Social Workers as Expert Witnesses:

Courts of law rely upon information offered in evidence as the basis for decisions rendered. Evidence comes in many forms, including photographs, recordings, devices, forensic evidence, documents, and individual testimony. Oral testimony by witnesses is, however, often the major source of evidence at a trial.

Witnesses who testify as experts play an important role in interpreting data, explaining complex material, and drawing knowledgeable inferences based upon their training and experience. Social workers are called to testify as expert witnesses on a variety of subjects. This Law Note discusses the role of the expert witness and reviews case law confirming the role of social workers as expert witnesses in a variety of settings.

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In Tough Question Requires Equally Tough Answers franchising expert witness Steven Belmonte, President and C.E.O., Hospitality Solutions LLC, asks the questions: “Are product upgrades and renovations really needed during hard economic times?”

I believe most of the major franchise companies have, to a degree (and some more than others), backed off from mandating expensive upgrades until the economy is on a strong upswing. Franchisors are realizing that in today’s economic environment, such a mandate is onerous simply because their franchisees simply can’t afford, or perhaps don’t need, certain upgrades. I applaud this mandate-backoff by the franchise giants-it makes good business sense. However, this backoff policy should be rescinded once it is obvious that the recovery is a sure thing.

It’s hard to crystal-ball such a thing, but now that things may be looking better on Wall Street-if not on Main Street-perhaps it is time to at least begin thinking about upgrades and renovations. The earlier they can be done, the sooner owners and operators will be able to reap the benefit of higher levels of customer satisfaction, repeat business and renewed customer loyalty.

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Emergency medicine expert witness and Chief Editor of web-based eMedicine Dr. Erik Schraga would like legal professionals and experts to know that eMedicine offers continually updated clinical reference information which may prove useful in cases they are working on. The following excerpt on cardiology provides information on aortic stenosis medicolegal pitfalls.

Medicolegal Pitfalls

* Patients with severe valvular AS should receive appropriate counseling regarding their conditions, including restriction of physical activity and the need for surgery, if appropriate. Physicians should document these points in patients’ records.

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In Tough Question Requires Equally Tough Answers, hospitality expert witness Steven Belmonte, President and C.E.O., Hospitality Solutions LLC, asks the questions: “Are product upgrades and renovations really needed during hard economic times?”

I mentioned earlier that there are two answers to the question, “Is renovation viable in a tough economy, and is it a smart thing to do.” Here’s the second answer, and it differs from the first in that it relates to hotels that do not need to be upgraded.

In my humble opinion, owners and operators whose properties are in order and competitive in their marketplace should defer major improvements until the economic recovery is well under way. In these tough economic times, I advocate taking a hard look at every line item on your profit-and-loss statement. Put everything out for competitive bid, whether it is to technology vendors, linen companies, insurance firms, f&b suppliers, you name it. All too often, managers get comfortable dealing with one company-but you’d be amazed at the money you can save by inviting competitive bidding for services and products on a regular basis. It’s a great way to increase cash flow without affecting customer service.

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In August 2009 the Justice Department accused three men of stealing account information for more than 130 million credit and debit card numbers. Networking expert witness Ivan Zatkovich, principal consultant for the security firm E-Comp Consultants, had this to say on the credit card fraud case.

In this particular case, they hacked in to a payment gateway system, which is actually a central hub for processing millions of credit card transactions specifically for outlets like 7-Eleven and supermarket outlets like Hannaford Brothers supermarkets.

I think it’s a matter of diligence in terms of data security for the companies that run payment gateway systems. In fact, Heartland Payment Systems was cited in 2007 for being out of compliance with data security and were just reinstated last year by Visa after meeting compliance and as recently as this year they’ve been touting themselves as a leader in data security. Which turns out not the be case.

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In Daubert: Very Convoluted, Usually Confusing to Many, Nevertheless Elegant, Armand Rossetti writes that it is the expert witness in the first instance, and not the court as gatekeeper, who is the judge of what resources to choose to assist her in forming an opinion. It is the expert who will initially filter out prejudicial information as being irrelevant. The Court then uses Rule 703 to assure the reliability of evidence by vetting the bases that forms an expert’s testimony.

Let’s take environmental asbestos infiltration an example, the fact that an air sampling study is an associational (or case) study affecting a few subjects, rather than a higher evidence based epidemiological study that affects several hundred subjects should not bar an expert from using the case study to inform her opinion about the dangers of asbestos release in the environment. The fact that a single case study published in a peer reviewed journal fails to establish causation under a Rule 703 review should go to the weight that the jury will give such evidence, but it does not mean that an expert cannot eventually rely upon it in part to form an ultimate opinion.

Of course, if a single case study were the only source of evidence, then the court might be reasonable in immediately performing a Rule 702 analysis to disqualify the entire testimony. However, the fact that an expert has relied upon several case studies to form an opinion, and has not used even one single epidemiological study should not in itself disqualify that expert’s testimony.

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