Opinion ID: 2107726
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 8

Heading: trial court's inadequate daubert/schafersman i ruling

Text: Here, the trial court held a Daubert hearing to determine whether to admit Hamernik's opinions. At the hearing, both parties offered evidence on the admissibility of Hamernik's testimony, and the trial court took under advisement Zimmerman's motion to exclude the testimony. Before opening statements, the court told the parties: I am concerned because of the way Dr. Hamernik did [his analysis] was that he used simulation software to try to replicate the actual action in the accident, and the Court is told virtually nothing about the simulation software except that its name is HVE and it's software manufactured by General Dynamics, but its reliability I know nothing about. .... I am not satisfied that Dr. Hamernik is absolutely precluded from having sufficient basis to do this scientifically validly [sic] just because I don't know yet about this simulation software, whether it was reliable and whether it will accomplish some deficiencies that Dr. Hamernik had on inputs.... Although it's my suspicion that this simulation software was used and that is how he came up with the numbers that he did for things like the angle of the cars after the impact, the distance traveled after impact and so forth. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to exercise the discretion in [Neb. Evid. R.] 705, which requires that the expert disclose the underlying facts or data before I will allow his opinion. And some things that I am deficient in the underlying facts or data to make it scientific is any explanation about this software, how the simulations work, whether it's reliable and whether it's reliable enough information for Dr. Hamernik to fill in the variables that he is missing when he then seeks to reconstruct the accident. Some of those variables that he is missing is [sic], as a I said, what the angle the car was after impact, he's coming up with that from simulation software, in my opinion. Whether those will fill in the holes or not will just depend on his testimony at trial whether he'll be able to establish it. I am requiring that he give that underlying facts and data before I will allow his opinion. Later, the following exchange occurred between the parties' counsel and the court: [Counsel for Powell]: Okay. Just so I'm understanding the Court's ruling, [Hamernik] can come in and testify about the speeds, it's the forces that you are needing more information about? In other words, the fact that he has calculated ... Zimmerman going 30 miles an hour before she applied her brakes, the fact that he has calculated she was going 15 miles an hour at impact, those are fine opinions? THE COURT: I'm sure if you check, the 15-mile-an-hour impact comes from a myriad of assumptions through simulations that he ran, and he needs to establish that those simulations were both reliably done and can furnish sufficient reliable information for him to conclude what that speed was at impact, because my hunch is that he is simply taking some photographs and estimating crush from photographs to get the speed at impact, and that may not be sufficiently reliable. That certainly is not sufficiently reliable according to some of these reconstructionists, you would need more information than a photograph of one car to come up with all of that. .... THE COURT: I don't know how he's doing it. I know he did not explain it at the hearing. [Counsel for Powell]: You need for him to explain to you in more detail how he had done his calculations? THE COURT: No, explain to the jury. I'm going under [rule] 705, so I am requiring that he furnish to the jury, quote, the underlying facts and data, before I will let him give any opinions at all. I'm not precluding him from giving any opinions, I'm requiring that he'll have to establish the underlying facts and data to show that his opinion is scientifically valid and it's not just a product of a whole bunch of unreliable simulations. [Counsel for Zimmerman]: I just have a little question. You don't want the information outside the presence of the jury before? THE COURT: No, no, no. We've had plenty here. We spent almost a day and I still have no idea about this simulation software, not one word except the name. .... THE COURT: I think he's qualified as a witness, I'm not concerned about that, I'm concerned whether he had enough data to put into the formulas to get the conclusions he did. .... THE COURT: I'm not limiting his testimony, I'm just saying it's going to be done in a certain way. He'll just give his opinions and then go on, and in cross-examination to reveal its basis he'll have to establish the basis first, which is somewhat opposite from the way experts are allowed to testify many times. [Counsel for Powell]: Okay. THE COURT: If it doesn't work out to make it scientifically reliable ... you will be in the spot of having to tell the jury in opening you think you'll get those opinions in and discover you were not able to, I can't prejudge that. These pretrial discussions show that the court believed  and we think correctly  that it did not yet have enough information to determine whether Hamernik's opinions on the vehicles' speeds were admissible under Daubert/ Schafersman I . Specifically, the court expressed concern whether the HVE software was reliable and whether the manner in which Hamernik used it was reliable. The court, as we understand it, ruled that before Hamernik could offer his opinions at trial, Powell would have to establish the reliability of Hamernik's methodology. At trial, Hamernik gave the following explanation of the HVE program: There's software out there ... produced by ... Engineering Dynamics Corporation.... They've developed programs over the years to look at both energy and momentum for car crashes. This program was initially developed by ... the National Highway Transportation Safety Administration, but now has evolved over the years into a program that they call HVE, which stands for Human Vehicle Environment. This program matches the physics associated with a car crash and it models both energy and momentum simultaneously at the same time. When you use this program, you produce something called a simulation. It looks like an animation, but it's a simulation, actually how the two cars interact and move and the damage that will result. So I've checked my hand calculations with HVE. In fact, I ran HVE to get a ball park idea of how the cars would likely move, conducted hand calculations, then subsequent to that I've done complete simulations of this accident. .... [HVE] is state of the art. It was first released in 1992. Engineering Dynamics has been producing software for, I think, 25 years now. HVE is the latest and greatest of their software, it's well-validated. They've ran hundreds of tests that actually take cars and crash them at known speeds, measure the change in speed, the post-impact speeds and where the cars end up at rest. Their software matches all these values within 1 percent. It's a very scientific, very accurate program. You can recreate accidents with this program, but you cannot make it do whatever you want, you have to obey the law of physics. And the input will  in this accident, if you know how the cars roughly approach, you can calculate where the cars should end up, it will actually show you that. It will predict the damage, so you can modify the speeds until the damage matches and also that the cars end up where they're supposed to end up, roughly. .... ... You can't violate the laws of physics. This program takes in account the entire forces of the roadway, the locations of what we call the center of gravity.... HVE takes into account the location of the [center of gravity], the weights of the vehicle and the tire forces with the roadway and the stiffnesses or the strength of the vehicles so you can account for the deformation and the post-impact movement, and they all have to match in order to get the right solution. I cannot simply say that I want the car to end up here and this car ends up here, it won't do that unless I obey the laws of physics. Shortly after this testimony, Powell's counsel asked Hamernik what opinions he had reached as a result of his accident reconstruction. Zimmerman's counsel objected, and the court stated, Overruled. You may give your opinions. The transcript also contains a written order, noting that Zimmerman's  Daubert Motion was ... overruled in part. The record, however, contains only the court's conclusion; there is no analysis. The court should have explained why Hamernik's trial testimony was sufficient to show that HVE and the manner in which he used it were reliable. For example, if the court believed that HVE was reliable because Hamernik suggested that it was widely accepted as quality software within the engineering community, it should have said so. Because the court failed to explain its reasoning, we conclude that it abdicated its gatekeeping duty.