Opinion ID: 1389134
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Testimony of Ambassador White and Professor Karl

Text: Carranza argues that the district court abused its discretion in allowing two of plaintiffs' expert witnesses, Robert White, former U.S. Ambassador to El Salvador, and Professor Terry Karl, the former Director of the Center of Latin American Studies at Stanford University, to testify. Carranza objects to several statements made by both experts as highly inflammatory and based on inadmissible hearsay. Experts may base their testimony on inadmissible facts of a type reasonably relied upon by experts in the particular field. FED. R. EVID. 703. Ambassador White's testimony was based on intelligence gathered by himself, his staff, and other government agents. Furthermore, Ambassador White was listed, without objection by Carranza, in the joint pretrial order as an expert witness. Professor Karl testified as to the levels of violence in El Salvador during the period of military control. Professor Karl relied upon interviews, commission reports (including the Truth Commission Report), documentary research, and field research to form her opinions. See, e.g., Katt v. City of New York, 151 F.Supp.2d 313, 356-57 (S.D.N.Y.2001) (noting that interviews, commission reports, research articles, scholarly journals, books, and newspaper articles are the types of data reasonably relied upon by social science experts). Carranza also contends that the district court improperly admitted testimony by Professor Karl. Carranza claims that Professor Karl should not have been permitted to testify about military procedures and command responsibility because she has never served in a military organization and she was never identified as a military expert. Professor Karl's report contains a lengthy discussion of her opinions about Salvadoran military structure and Carranza's command responsibility. In her report, Professor Karl discusses her credentials as an expert in the politics of Latin America including: the military strategies of both the Salvadoran military and security forces and the armed opposition, the command structure of the Salvadoran military, the corruption of the Salvadoran military and security forces, and the practice of death squads. The district court did not abuse its discretion in allowing the jury to determine the weight to be given to the testimony of Professor Karl and Ambassador White.