Mealey's Daubert
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August 01, 2025
Mass. Federal Judge Says Expert Can Testify In Dispute Over Rental Car Coverage
BOSTON — A Massachusetts federal judge has ruled that an expert retained by policyholders suing their insurers for prematurely terminating their rental car benefits can testify, finding that he is admissible under Federal Rule of Evidence 702 and that any potential bias goes to the weight or the credibility of his testimony.
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August 01, 2025
AFFF Defendants: Plaintiffs’ Experts Are Inadmissible Under Rule Of Evidence
CHARLESTON, S.C. — The defendants in the multidistrict litigation (MDL) for the firefighting agent aqueous film forming foam (AFFF) filed a reply brief in South Carolina federal court on July 31 arguing that the court should exclude the opinions of three of the plaintiffs’ experts in three cases in the MDL because they are inadmissible under Federal Rule of Evidence 702.
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July 30, 2025
College Tennis Player Class Certified In Suit Challenging NCAA Prize Money Rules
WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. — A federal judge in North Carolina denied motions to exclude opinions from two experts and certified a class of college tennis players challenging the National Collegiate Athletic Association’s rules that limit the amount of prize money Division I players can accept when they win noncollegiate tennis tournaments.
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July 30, 2025
Federal Circuit Orders New Trial On Validity, Damages In Lighting Patent Fight
WASHINGTON, D.C. — A federal judge in Texas wrongly prevented a defendant lighting company from presenting evidence of the invalidity of a plaintiff patent holder’s lighting patents, a Federal Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel held, finding that the error makes a new trial on invalidity and damages necessary.
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July 29, 2025
Experts Featured In Mealey's Daubert Report
Entries are in alphabetical order of the expert in each area of expert testimony. Experts appeared in the January, February, March, April, May, June and July 2025 issues of Mealey’s Daubert Report.
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July 29, 2025
Series Of Motions To Exclude Experts In Pelvic Mesh Case Denied By Ky. Federal Judge
LEXINGTON, Ky. — The Kentucky federal judge presiding over a long-running case against a pelvic mesh manufacturer denied four separate motions to exclude experts filed by the manufacturer and a woman who says she was injured by the mesh, most recently ruling that the woman’s expert can opine on whether Ethicon Inc. met industry standards.
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July 28, 2025
‘Sensitive Skin’ Mislabeling Class Action Was Properly Certified, 9th Circuit Says
SAN FRANCISCO — The Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals on July 25 affirmed a court’s certification of a class action against Johnson & Johnson Consumer Inc. (J&J) for allegedly misrepresenting the benefits of a sensitive skin care product in violation of California’s unfair competition law (UCL) and other laws, finding that the lower court properly certified the class based on the plaintiff’s damages expert and the likelihood of making classwide liability findings.
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July 22, 2025
Suit Over Allegedly Outdated Pension Assumptions Mostly Survives Summary Judgment
SAN FRANCISCO — A putative class action challenging the use of allegedly outdated assumptions to calculate annuities for married pension plan participants is proceeding toward a bench trial after a California federal judge mostly denied the defendants’ motion for summary judgment and denied their motion to exclude the plaintiffs’ expert.
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July 18, 2025
6th Circuit Affirms Hip Implant Device Manufacturer’s Summary Judgment Award
CINCINNATI — A lower court properly granted a manufacturer of a hip implant device summary judgment after finding that a man’s expert witnesses to support his claim that the device was defective were properly excluded under Federal Rule of Evidence 702 and Daubert v. Merrell Dow Pharmaceuticals Inc., the Sixth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals held.
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July 18, 2025
D.C. Appeals Court: Expert Testimony Was Not Needed For Slip-And-Fall Case
WASHINGTON, D.C. — A District of Columbia appeals court on July 17 held that “a lay juror could determine, from their common knowledge and everyday experience, whether” a janitorial company “exercised reasonable care in warning passersby of the hazard caused by the wet floor,” reversing a decision by a lower court that failure to present expert testimony was fatal to a woman’s case.
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July 17, 2025
Expert Who Testified On Intimate Partner Violence In Assault Case Properly Admitted
CONCORD, N.H. — A New Hampshire trial court did not abuse its discretion in allowing an expert to testify about intimate partner violence in a criminal case, the state Supreme Court said, finding that the testimony met the state’s admissibility standards.
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July 17, 2025
Judge: Police Procedure Expert Can Testify For Comedian Alleging Wrongful Arrest
MIAMI — A federal judge in Florida denied a police officer’s motion to exclude a police practices expert from testifying for a comedian, who alleges that he was wrongfully arrested, based on assurances from the comedian that the expert will opine on whether the officer violated professional standards and will not offer legal conclusions.
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July 16, 2025
5th Circuit: Causation Experts In Deepwater Horizon Case Properly Excluded
NEW ORLEANS — A Mississippi federal court did not err in awarding summary judgment to BP Exploration & Production and its affiliate after finding that a man’s experts retained to opine on how his injuries were connected to exposure to chemicals during remediation activities following the Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill were inadmissible, the Fifth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals held.
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July 16, 2025
Judge Issues Sweeping Order On Expert Witnesses In Lead Smelter Litigation Saga
ST. LOUIS — A federal judge in Missouri has issued an order on multiple motions to exclude filed by both the plaintiffs and the defendants, ruling that portions of expert testimony are excluded in a long-running lawsuit brought by Catholic clergywomen and Peruvian children who allege they have been injured by a lead smelter operated by an American company in Peru.
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July 15, 2025
Delaware Supreme Court Says Expert Testimony Improperly Admitted In Zantac Case
WILMINGTON, Del. — A lower court “erred in adopting a standard that favored or presumed the admissibility of expert testimony,” the Delaware Supreme Court ruled in an interlocutory appeal, finding that the trial court was wrong to deny a series of motions to exclude testimony from experts who opined that Zantac containing ranitidine can cause 10 types of cancer.
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July 15, 2025
Judge Limits Some Experts In Case Alleging Defective Gas Container Caused Fire
PENSACOLA, Fla. — A federal judge in Florida agreed to limit testimony from certain experts retained by a woman who alleges that a faulty gas container caused a gas vapor to ignite, causing serious burn injuries.
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July 15, 2025
Dental Expert Can Testify For Government On Dentist’s Prescribing Practices
TULSA, Okla. — An Oklahoma federal judge rejected arguments from a dentist accused of violating the Controlled Substances Act (CSA) that testimony from an expert retained by the government is inadmissible under Federal Rule of Evidence 702.
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July 11, 2025
1 Expert In, Another Excluded In Case Filed By Former Inmate Over Medical Care
CHICAGO — An Illinois judge ruled on a pair of motions to exclude expert testimony in a case filed by a former inmate who alleges that the deliberate indifference by the staff at a correctional center caused him to suffer permanent liver damage.
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July 11, 2025
Expert Cannot Opine That Man Suffered From Sexsomnia During Alleged Rape
WILMINGTON, Del. — A sleep medicine expert cannot testify that a man accused of rape suffers from sexsomnia, a form of parasomnia, and had no conscious awareness or control of the alleged conduct, a Delaware judge ruled, noting that the ruling was an issue of first impression in the state.
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July 10, 2025
Ky. Federal Judge Denies Series Of Motions To Exclude Experts In Pelvic Mesh Case
LEXINGTON, Ky. — The Kentucky federal judge presiding over a long-running case against a pelvic mesh manufacturer denied three separate motions to exclude experts filed by the manufacturer and a woman who says she was injured by the mesh.
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July 10, 2025
Wash. Federal Judge Rules Experts Can Testify For Worker In FELA Injury Case
TACOMA, Wash. — Experts retained by a man who says he was injured after years of strenuous work on the railroad can testify, a Washington federal judge ruled, rejecting the railroad’s arguments that the expert’s testimony is inadmissible under Federal Rule of Evidence 702 and Daubert v. Merrell Dow Pharmaceuticals Inc.
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July 10, 2025
District Court Properly Excluded Portions Of Expert Witness Testimony, Panel Says
ATLANTA — A district court did not err in excluding portions of an expert’s witness testimony because the expert witness’s opinions on the cause of the insured’s water and mold damages and the insurer’s alleged bad faith conduct were not disclosed before the insurer’s deposition of the expert witness as required under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 26(a)(2)(B), the 11th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals said July 9 in affirming the district court’s ruling.
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July 09, 2025
Device Maker Tells High Court Shortened Discovery Timeline Tainted Patent Trial
WASHINGTON, D.C. — A medical product company tells the U.S. Supreme Court that a North Carolina federal court violated its due process rights by changing both the time to trial and the time for discovery in a patent infringement case for which the Federal Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals has already ordered a new trial.
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July 08, 2025
Expert’s Exclusion Dooms Design Defect Case Alleging Faulty Blender Exploded
NEWARK, N.J. — A New Jersey federal judge granted a motion to exclude an expert’s testimony in a woman’s case alleging that a defectively designed blender exploded and caused injuries, further ruling that without expert testimony to prove causation, the manufacturer is entitled to summary judgment.
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July 08, 2025
Ga. Appeals Court Upholds Decision To Exclude Experts As Unreliable In Mold Case
ATLANTA — A Georgia trial court did not abuse its discretion in finding that an expert in a lawsuit alleging injuries caused by mold exposure could not testify because the proposed testimony was unreliable, a Georgia appeals court said.