Exam 11: Hearsay

The first major decision to apply the Daubert standard. The court required experts to tie their assessment of data to known scientific conclusions, based on research or studies. If they cannot, the court reasoned that there would be no comparison for the jury to assess and the experts' testimony would not be helpful to the jury.

After the Federal Rules of Evidence were adopted, many courts began to refine the Frye "general acceptance" test to also ensure that the scientific testing was reliable and that the results were relevant.

The landmark 1993 decision that unanimously rejected the Frye test as a basis for determining the admissibility of scientific expert testimony and established a new standard based on the Relevancy Test and Federal Rule 702.

Of these five factors, the Court identified which one as "essential," saying that it is "what distinguishes science from other fields of human inquiry?" The court indicated that the other factors, although "pertinent," Were more "flexible" In their "consideration."

In 1999, this U.S. Supreme Court case addressed the question of whether Daubert applied to other "experts" who were not scientists, but whose expertise or testing involved technical or specialized knowledge.

For over seventy years, the accepted standard for this scientific evidence and testing was called the Frye test, or:

The Daubert decision changed the law for determining scientific evidence in not only all of the federal courts, but many of the state courts as well.

Which of the following questions are important in determining scientific evidence and testing issues?

Which of the following is not correct about the conclusions of the Daubert Court?

Scientific evidence has a highly technical basis but a lay witness with specialized knowledge can assist the trier of fact to better understand it.

According to Daubert, to determine if testimony is based on scientific or technical knowledge, the trial judge needs first to conduct a "preliminary assessment of whether the reasoning or methodology underlying the testimony is scientifically valid" and then assess "whether that reasoning or methodology properly can be applied to the facts in issue." To help with this, the Court listed five "considerations" That might be examined, including all of the following, except:

The 1923 landmark case where a federal circuit court held that the results of a "scientific test" could be admitted if the test had "gained general acceptance in the particular field in which it belongs."

The Kumho decision examined the language in Rule 702 underlying the Daubert decision and found that the wording made no distinction between "scientific" knowledge and "technical" or "other specialized" knowledge.

Prior to Daubert, abuse of discretion was the standard of review applied by appellate courts in reviewing a trial court's decision to admit or exclude expert testimony.

The Frye test is no longer used in any courts.

The Relevancy test, which began being increasingly used by federal courts in the late 1980s-early 1990s, weighed the probative value of scientific testing against the test's potential for prejudice.

The Kumho decision decided that Daubert does not apply its reliability standard to all scientific, technical, or "other specialized" matters within its scope.

In 1997, the issue of whether abuse of discretion would remain as the standard for appellate review was resolved when the Supreme Court in this case determined that it would.

The Daubert Court held that the trial judge was to act as a "gatekeeper" with the responsibility of "ensuring that an expert's testimony both rests on a reliable foundation and is relevant to the task at hand."

One of the unanswered questions left by the Daubert decision was whether it pertained to to other "experts" who were not scientists, but whose expertise or testing involved technical or specialized knowledge.