Admissible Expert Testimony Kenneth Fields v. the State of California

As the field of life care planning expands in scope and becomes the pivotal point in the evaluation of litigated damages, so does the attempt by opposing counsel to disqualify the life care planning testimony. According to Weed’s (2006) Life Care Planning in Light of Daubert & Kumho: Courts are cautious entities and do not quickly accept new ideas. Life care planning is a young profession and one that is unfamiliar to many judges. Thus, before the gatekeeper will allow (a life care planning expert) to testify, he or she must receive enough information to be convinced that (the) testimony satisfies Daubert, Du Pont and any local guidelines. (p. 15) In the matter of Kenneth Fields v. The State of California, et al (2011), the defendant continually objected to the life care planning opinions being expressed, based upon an argument of “inadmissible hearsay evidence”. The definition of hearsay evidence is “evidence based on what someone has told the witness and not on direct knowledge”. (WordNet A Lexical Database for English) The trial judge, in the Fifth Appellate District in the State of California, initially ruled in favor of the opposing counsel’s objections; however, he allowed both parties a chance to submit legal briefs on the issue, before completely excluding the testimony. Plaintiff ’s attorney, Douglas L. Gordon, of Miles, Sears & Eanni in Fresno, CA, submitted a trial brief regarding “Admissible Expert Testimony”, based on published standards of care in life care planning, along with case law, or lack thereof, that successfully overturned the trial judge’s initial decision. Thus the life care planning testimony was allowed to proceed.