Earlier this month, the Supreme Court declined to hear an appeal from the Ninth Circuit’s decision in Lytle v. Nutramax Laboratories, Inc. affirming the certification of a class of owners of elderly dogs, alleging that the...more
New Amendment Reiterates and Reinforces the Existing Standard for Admissibility of Expert Testimony - On December 1, 2023, the United States Supreme Court adopted the Rules Committee’s proposed Amendment to the Federal...more
In December of 2023, Federal Rule of Evidence 702 was amended. This provision is commonly known as the Daubert standard. The Advisory Comments state the amendment is only intended to clarify the standard and promote...more
On December 1, 2023, amendments to Federal Rule of Evidence (FRE) 702 geared toward emphasizing and explaining the responsibility of the judge as a “gatekeeper” for expert testimony took effect. On December 18, 2023, one of...more
Recent Amendments to the Rules Governing Admissibility of Expert Testimony in Federal Rule of Evidence 702 - In litigation, everything ultimately boils down to proof; that is, how the parties prove their claims and defenses....more
Last year, we previewed impending changes to the federal rule that governs the admissibility of expert testimony: Federal Rule of Evidence (FRE) 702. Since our last blog post on this topic, Congress and the U.S. Supreme Court...more
Harris Beach attorneys Abbie Eliasberg Fuchs, Bradley M. Wanner and Daniel R. Strecker review and analyze key judicial holdings and legal developments in New York, the federal arena and across the country that have affected...more
In Smith v. Spectrum Brands, Inc., 2022 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 142262, the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania (District Court) considered whether the plaintiffs’ liability expert met the...more
Just a decade ago, it was still an open question whether parties could challenge the admissibility of expert testimony in class certification proceedings. The United States Supreme Court recognized the issue in Wal-Mart...more
New changes to Federal Rule of Evidence 702 will clarify the courts’ responsibility to determine the admissibility of expert testimony. Forthcoming amendments to FRE 702 will promote uniformity in application of the Rule...more
There has been much discussion recently about how Rule 702 is in need of a tune-up to better guide district courts’ gatekeeping. More about that soon. But a case now pending before the Supreme Court, Monsanto Company v....more
At Class Certification Stage, Non-Expert Evidence Must Be Reliable, but Not Necessarily Admissible: As the Supreme Court explained 40 years ago in General Telephone Co. of Southwest v. Falcon, 457 U.S. 147, 161 (1982),...more
On January 22, 2021, the Fifth Circuit vacated certification of a putative class action against chemical manufacturer Arkema Inc., holding that courts must conduct a full Daubert analysis when expert testimony is relevant to...more
In a decision that narrows the path to class certification in federal court, the Fifth Circuit has held that a plaintiff must clear the Daubert hurdle when expert evidence is relevant to the decision of a federal court to...more
Many subrogation claims involving fire losses rely heavily on expert testimony. Expert testimony is admissible under Federal Rule of Evidence 702 if it is both relevant and reliable. In Daubert v. Merrell Dow Pharmaceuticals,...more
Expectations were high in the class action world for the Supreme Court’s recent decision in Tyson Foods, Inc. v. Bouaphakeo. At first blush, however, Tyson seems to be neither the test case nor the blockbuster decision that...more
On March 22, 2016, the Supreme Court issued a decision permitting class plaintiffs to rely on "representative" or "sample" evidence to satisfy the prerequisites to class certification and certain elements of their claims. ...more
The United States Supreme Court recently ruled in Tyson Foods, Inc. v. Bouaphakeo, No. 14-1146, --- S. Ct. ---, 2016 WL 1092414 (U.S. Mar. 22, 2016), as to when a plaintiff may use statistical sampling in seeking to certify a...more
While the Supreme Court in Tyson Foods, Inc. v. Bouaphakeo dashed employers’ hopes that the Court would broadly preclude statistical evidence and severely limit wage and hour class actions in a fashion similar to its...more
In Tyson Foods, Inc. v. Bouaphakeo, 577 U.S. __ (2016), the Supreme Court considered whether a case could proceed as a class action under Rule 23(b)(3) when the plaintiffs relied upon statistical, representative evidence to...more
As my colleague, Katherine Kayatta, alluded to in her detailed post earlier this week, much of the initial commentary on the Supreme Court’s Tyson Foods decision has been to the effect that the decision may crack open the...more
As I’ve done in past years, this post and the next one will summarize some takeaways I gleaned from this year’s DRI Class Action Seminar. Impact of Dart Cherokee: Nowell Berreth, who argued this case in the Supreme...more
This month we look at part three of our three part series on Class Actions. In part three, Robert Rachal and M. Todd Mobley address the role of experts in class certification post Wal-Mart and Comcast and how to use and...more
The outcome of civil litigation often hinges upon the ability of litigants to rely upon or exclude public records and reports and, in particular, opinions contained in them. Federal Rule of Evidence 803(8) (“Rule 803(8)” or...more
The U.S. Supreme Court recently ruled in Comcast Corp. v. Behrend, 2013 WL 1222646 (U.S. Mar. 27, 2013) that, in order to obtain class certification, plaintiffs carry the burden of establishing not only that they have proof...more