Washington Case Law Case
Under Washington case law, plaintiffs are required to prove causation with expert testimony if alleged injury involves obscure medical factors. [cite]. The trickier question is whether the expert needs to demonstrate a direct causal link between the alleged injuries and the negligent act or if the expert merely must demonstrate that the plaintiff’s injuries are of a type that can be caused by the negligent act. Washington courts have come down on both sides of this question.
I. Plaintiffs are Required to Present Expert Testimony for Obscure Injuries
The Dickenses’ will likely have to present expert testimony to demonstrate a sufficient causal link between their injuries and the pipeline leak. Washington courts have repeatedly held that …show more content…
Staton, 58 Wash. 2d 879, 886 (1961) (citations omitted). In addition, this “expert testimony must be based on facts in the case, not speculation or conjecture.” Melville v. State, 115 Wash. 2d 34, 41 (1990). For example, in Miller v. Station, the Washington Supreme Court held that the plaintiff failed to establish the element of causation because the expert’s general statements regarding plaintiff’s injuries had “not been related by the expert witness to the instant case.” Id. at 886. The expert witness in Miller merely stated that, in general, nervousness is one of the contributing factors to a stomach ulcer, but the expert failed to tie plaintiff’s alleged nervousness to her stomach ulcer. …show more content…
In Gifford v. Mateka, an unreported case from out of Division III, the defendants moved for summary judgment, in part, because they claimed the statements of one of the plaintiff’s experts, a toxicologist, were insufficient since he was not qualified to give medical opinions. No. 25886-2, 2001 WL 819067, at *4 (Wash. Ct. App. 2001). The court held that the toxicologist “was qualified to link exposure to mold with the type of respiratory and other harm [plaintiff] alleged in her complaint.” Id. The court also held that although the case involved obscure matters beyond the comprehension of a lay juror, “it does not follow that only testimony by a medical doctor can suffice.” In fact, the court held that “given the particular source of harm alleged in the complaint—mold—the expertise of a toxicologist was required to clarify an obscure factors.”
I. Plaintiffs are Required to Present Expert Testimony for Obscure Injuries
The Dickenses’ will likely have to present expert testimony to demonstrate a sufficient causal link between their injuries and the pipeline leak. Washington courts have repeatedly held that …show more content…
Staton, 58 Wash. 2d 879, 886 (1961) (citations omitted). In addition, this “expert testimony must be based on facts in the case, not speculation or conjecture.” Melville v. State, 115 Wash. 2d 34, 41 (1990). For example, in Miller v. Station, the Washington Supreme Court held that the plaintiff failed to establish the element of causation because the expert’s general statements regarding plaintiff’s injuries had “not been related by the expert witness to the instant case.” Id. at 886. The expert witness in Miller merely stated that, in general, nervousness is one of the contributing factors to a stomach ulcer, but the expert failed to tie plaintiff’s alleged nervousness to her stomach ulcer. …show more content…
In Gifford v. Mateka, an unreported case from out of Division III, the defendants moved for summary judgment, in part, because they claimed the statements of one of the plaintiff’s experts, a toxicologist, were insufficient since he was not qualified to give medical opinions. No. 25886-2, 2001 WL 819067, at *4 (Wash. Ct. App. 2001). The court held that the toxicologist “was qualified to link exposure to mold with the type of respiratory and other harm [plaintiff] alleged in her complaint.” Id. The court also held that although the case involved obscure matters beyond the comprehension of a lay juror, “it does not follow that only testimony by a medical doctor can suffice.” In fact, the court held that “given the particular source of harm alleged in the complaint—mold—the expertise of a toxicologist was required to clarify an obscure factors.”