Expert Witness Blog

Dr. Martin Williams has twenty years experience as an expert witness on the standard of care in therapist-patient sex and other ethics matters involving psychologists, clinical social workers, marriage and family therapists, and psychiatrists. In Therapist-Patient Sex Twenty Years Later: A View From the Courtroom, the psychology expert witness writes:

In the current era, the patient, like the therapist, is probably aware that sexual behavior in the context of psychotherapy is considered unacceptable. Patients are more sophisticated today. They have likely read newspaper or magazine articles about therapist-patient sex or heard discussions on television talk shows, and are aware of the low regard with which the psychotherapy professions greet this behavior. Because no scientific methods of survey research can possibly determine how many unreported cases of therapist-patient sex exist, the following is my own unsubstantiated speculation. Therapist-patient sex, when it occurs, is more likely to be reported today than in the earlier era because patients are more likely to know that it is a licensing violation. Nowadays, I suspect there are far fewer victims of this practice who, believing themselves to have been harmed by the sexual relationship, elect to go off and suffer in silence without filing a licensing complaint. For one thing, in California, any subsequent therapist who treats a victim and learns of a prior instance of therapist-patient sex is required by law to provide a pamphlet that describes courses of legal and professional action that are open to the victim.

In an unusual case about which I testified at a California Board of Psychology hearing, the female patient intended, for whatever psychological reason, to have a sexual relationship with her male psychologist. She was knowledgeable about the laws and actually went to an attorney and attempted to draw up papers that would make it impossible for her later to sue or file a licensing complaint. Her purpose in creating this document was to reassure her intended sex partner, her therapist, that he could proceed without fear of subsequent repercussions. She was unable to find an attorney who would draw up such papers and was apparently legally unable to waive those rights. Ultimately, the two did become sexually involved, and she did later file a licensing board complaint.

Dr. Martin Williams has twenty years experience as an expert witness on the standard of care in therapist-patient sex and other ethics matters involving psychologists, clinical social workers, marriage and family therapists, and psychiatrists. In Therapist-Patient Sex Twenty Years Later: A View From the Courtroom, the psychology expert witness writes:

Despite the current ethics and enforcement climate-a climate that can best be described as zero tolerance for sex with patients-cases of therapist patient sex still occur. But while the cases continue to arise, they are different in certain regards from the earlier cases that came to light in the 1970’s and 1980’s. What follows is a description of some differences I have observed in my own consulting practice between therapist-patient sex as it occurred in the earlier, more naive era (let’s say, before 1980) and the current era (let’s say after 1995). One caveat is that numerous types of sampling error and bias are built into any such first-person account. I hope to provide illustrative examples that might lead to further discussion, and I acknowledge this is by no means a scientific survey.

In the earlier era, the therapist could convince himself-the male pronoun is used intentionally because most of the offenders were men-that the sexual behavior might be a helpful part of treatment. I believe that some, if not most of the offenders, who pitched this line to their female patients, actually believed it themselves. They told their patients that the patients needed to open up to intimacy, needed to overcome their fears regarding their sexuality, needed to break out of their shells, needed to learn body-acceptance, trust and so on.

In March the Arizona Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of a 2005 law establishing minimum qualifications for medical liability expert witnesses who testify in. The court rejected arguments from the state trial bar that it was up to the courts — not lawmakers — to set rules governing expert witness testimony and that the statute violated the separation of powers between the legislature and the judiciary. The opinion states:

Although we maintain plenary power over procedural rules, we do not believe that power precludes the legislature from addressing what it believes to be a serious substantive problem — the effects on public health of increased medical malpractice insurance rates and the reluctance of qualified physicians to practice here — by effectively increasing the plaintiff’s burden of production in medical malpractice actions.

Amednews.com reports: “Because Arizona’s constitution prohibits any type of cap on damages in liability cases, “this is a very important decision for us,” said Chic Older, Arizona Medical Assn. executive vice president.

Marketing expert witness Glen Balzer is a widely published author on distributor and representative relationships and agreements, as well as sales organizations and commissions. Here he writes on traits of successful representative agreements.

Suppliers and manufacturers’ representatives often seek to gain advantage over their partners by incorporating a bias into the representative agreement favoring the author, placing the other party at a disadvantage. This technique rarely enjoys the benefits intended. The best agreements set balance as an objective between supplier and representative. If the relationship begins with a biased agreement, that bias works against development of a solid relationship. Since the agreement is the foundation of the partnership, it must flourish with words and phrases that elicit a spirit of trust and cooperation.

Each clause of a representative agreement should seek to strike a balance between the power of the supplier and the manufacturers’ representative. If there is a clause of indemnification protecting the supplier for a specific set of conditions, there should also be a clause protecting the representative on a different set of conditions. If there is a paragraph outlining the duties and obligations of the representative, there should also be a paragraph outlining the duties and obligations of the supplier. A unilateral phrase only works to the ultimate distrust of one party by the other. Distrust always works against development of the relationship and ultimately against sales, growth, and profits, the original purpose of the relationship and the agreement.

In Security Solutions for Strip Shopping Centers, author and security expert witness Karim H. Vellani discusses risks and solutions for strip shopping center security:

Conclusion

A crime analysis case study was recently completed by the author’s firm and is pending publication in the American Society for Industrial Security’s (A.S.I.S.) Security Business Practices Reference, Volume 6. The results of the case study indicated that a sizable return on investment was realized within a year of implementing a crime analysis program. The first year’s savings, or cost avoidance, was $9.2 million, or 41% of the security budget. This savings reflected a number of changes to the security program, but primarily constitutes the deployment of security personnel during higher risk times. There is another category of cost avoidance that cannot yet be measured. That category is generated by reducing crime and avoiding security litigation.