The Michigan Court of Appeals has thrown out a jury’s guilty verdict and granted a new trial after determining that a doctor’s testimony went beyond the scope of what doctors may testify about in criminal sexual conduct cases. The Crime A minor child accused Ryan William Cole, 37, of sexually assaulting her three times in […]

After being diagnosed with a pelvic organ prolapse, Charlotte Salinero elected to have an abdominal sacrocolpopexy, a procedure that uses a graft to support the top of the vagina. The surgery was performed by Dr. Jaime Sepulveda in 2012. While the patient’s own tissue can be used as a graft, it is common to perform […]

The Colorado Court of Appeals relied on a New Yorker cartoon to illustrate the issue it confronted in People v. Battigalli-Ansell. The cartoon features a dog at a keyboard telling another dog, “on the internet, no one knows you’re a dog.” The internet site Omegle is essentially a chat room. The site connects users randomly […]

Medical experts can play a significant role in diagnosing child abuse. As medical science has evolved, however, the judicial system has come to realize that expert testimony about whether an injury or death was caused by abuse can be problematic. Medical experts are not present when an injury occurred and have no firsthand knowledge of […]

After a case is removed from state court to federal court, the federal rules of evidence apply. A federal appellate decision regarding a lawsuit that was filed in Massachusetts makes clear that lawyers cannot expect to be rescued by reliance on state rules when they fail to make the expert witness disclosure required by federal […]