Opinion ID: 790925
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Admission of Dawson's Testimony

Text: 35 a) The challenged testimony 36 The portion of Dawson's testimony most relevant to this appeal pertains to his opinion purporting to explain and justify — despite the uncontroverted medical evidence that Muirhead's bullet struck Nimely in the back — Muirhead's and McCarthy's statements that, prior to being shot, Nimely faced Muirhead with an aimed weapon. 10 In an expert report disclosed prior to trial, Dawson stated: 37 What is likely here is that we have an Officer mentally prepared for quick action given the circumstances of this night, and with gun already in hand, who is able to react so quickly to a threatening move by the plaintiff that he is able to fire while the plaintiff is still turning rather than after he has completed his turn ... [sic] In these kinds of situations such things happen so quickly, and such motions are so fast, that the turning momentum of Mr. Nimely would almost immediately complete the turn even though the shot had already been fired. An instant after the shot had been fired Mr. Nimely would be facing Officer Muirhead, but the two are so nearly summarily simultaneous that it later would be remembered as, he was facing me and I fired rather than, I fired and then he was facing me. 38 Nimely moved in limine, before trial, to exclude Dawson's opinion concerning Muirhead's and McCarthy's abilities to perceive the correct sequence of events surrounding Nimely's shooting. Nimely's motion argued, among other things, that the opinion was unsupported by scientific evidence, beyond the scope of Dawson's expertise, and not the proper subject of expert testimony. The district court granted Nimely's motion to the extent that it raised a straight question of how far this qualified expert can go in testifying about things that are too speculative. And unless previously permitted after hearing outside the presence of the jury, the doctor may not testify and should be instructed not to testify concerning anything within Officer Muirhead's mind just before the shooting. 39 Dawson's trial testimony began with a summary of his own conclusion, consistent with that of Nimely's medical experts, that Nimely was injured by a bullet that entered the left side of his back and, as it moved to the right, struck his spinal cord. Then, the following direct examination was conducted by defense counsel: 40 Q: Now, Doctor Dawson, did you also review the deposition testimony of Police Officers Muirhead and McCarthy? 41 A: Yes. 42 Q: Was there testimony about what Mr. Nimely was doing at the time Sergeant Muirhead thought he shot him consistent with your findings? 43 .... 44 A: Well, yes and no. There was testimony that Mr. Nimely was turning, but taken literally, the testimony wasn't consistent with the facts because the literal testimony was that the officer felt that he shot directly in front of the chest of Mr. Nimely but he did say that Mr. Nimely was in the process of turning, so in effect my analysis considered both of those aspects and realized they could basically be synthesized in something reasonable. 45 Q: In doing your analysis, in light of — what you described as the entrance and exit wound and trajectory of the bullet, did you consider that the police officer who said that he shot him straight in the chest wasn't telling the truth? 46 A: That certainly is one of the considerations that goes through your mind, is perhaps the officer is simply lying about the incident. I considered that possibility and — but fairly quickly rejected it as being the less likely of the things that happened. 47 Q: Why did you reject it? 48 Mr. Kelton: Objection, your Honor. 49 The Court: Overruled. You may answer. 50 A: Well, I rejected it because, you know, in — it's generally an acceptable concept that police officers aren't going to discharge their weapons — 51 Mr. Kelton: Judge, I object to what is an acceptable concept of what police officers will do. 52 The Court: Overruled. The witness is explaining his answer. He may complete it. 53 A: Thank you, Judge. What it boils down to is police officers don't discharge weapons lightly because the discharge of a weapon creates all kinds of problems. 54 Mr. Kelton: I object to this. This is improper. I object. 55 The Court: I heard your objection. I overruled it. You may continue with your answer. 56 A: Thank you. It causes problems of criminal litigation, civil litigation, et cetera. The other thing is, it's reasonable to infer that a police officer is going to know that whenever a discharge does occur, there is going to be a big investigation and that will include forensic examination of wounds, so it didn't make much sense to me that the police officer would say that the person was shot in the front if it would be obvious to the police officer that an investigation would be done and that would show the person was shot in the back. 57 Mr. Kelton: Judge, for the record, once again, I object. This is pure argument. 58 Next, and still on direct, Dawson testified as to what conclusion he was led to, in light of his judgment that Muirhead and McCarthy's version of events was credible: 59 Q: So can you describe the scenario of what you arrived at with respect to taking into account the entrance and exit wounds and the trajectory of the bullet? 60 A: Well, what I arrived at is, I — looking at that trajectory, looking at the deposition testimony, it became pretty immediately clear to me that the whole thing would be consistent if Mr. Nimely were turning very quickly at the time he was shot, what would basically happen is that the illusion would be created — 61 Mr. Kelton: Objection, Judge. Objection. We have spoken about this before. 62 The Court: Overruled. Continue. 63 A: Quickly — a person shot quickly — during a quick turn would create, if you will, an optical illusion of — that the person was facing you at the time he was shot. 64 On cross-examination, Nimely's attorney questioned Dawson extensively regarding his misperception hypothesis, as well as Dawson's initial supposition that Muirhead and McCarthy's account of Nimely's physical motions was truthful. Throughout the cross-examination, Dawson repeated that it was his opinion that Muirhead and McCarthy were not lying: 65 Q: Rather than accepting the proposition that Officer Muirhead and his partner, Officer McCarthy, may have both been untruthful in their description of the shooting, you're accepting a proposition that both Officer Muirhead and Officer McCarthy had the same optical illusion at the same moment? 66 A: Well, they're obviously not the same optical illusion because they're viewing the incident from two different angles, but what I would say is the difference in timing of when the shot is fired in the two scenarios we're talking about is so minuscule, in my judgment it would not be surprising that both officers would make the same misperception because it almost requires a slow motion video to see the difference, and I rejected the idea that they were lying because it would be such an easily disproved lie. 67 .... 68 Q: What you have given this jury is the only explanation that you could come up which would result in an explanation as to why these officers weren't telling a lie when they both suggested that Mr. Nimely turned and faced Officer Muirhead when he shot him, isn't that true? 69 .... 70 A: Well, it's — the way you are phrasing it, it sounds like my number one objective when I analyze a case like this it to prove that the officers weren't lying. That's one of those things I couldn't care less, one way or another. But I have to consider is it likely they are lying or isn't it, and after I put all the facts together, I came up with exactly the scenario I have described here and that scenario happens as a by-product to include that under those circumstances I think the officers would have been telling the truth as they perceived it. 71 (emphasis added) 72 The admission of the above testimony was erroneous in several crucial respects, and requires the granting of a new trial. 73 b) The Admissibility of Expert Testimony 74 The admissibility of expert testimony in the federal courts is governed principally by Rule 702 of the Federal Rules of Evidence: 75 If scientific, technical, or other specialized knowledge will assist the trier of fact to understand the evidence or to determine a fact in issue, a witness qualified as an expert by knowledge, skill, experience, training, or education, may testify thereto in the form of an opinion or otherwise, if (1) the testimony is based upon sufficient facts or data, (2) the testimony is the product of reliable principles and methods, and (3) the witness has applied the principles and methods reliably to the facts of the case. 76 Fed.R.Evid. 702. It is a well-accepted principle that Rule 702 embodies a liberal standard of admissibility for expert opinions, representing a departure from the previously widely followed, and more restrictive, standard of Frye v. United States, 293 F. 1013, 1014 (D.C.Cir.1923). See, e.g., Daubert v. Merrell Dow Pharmaceuticals, Inc., 509 U.S. 579, 588, 113 S.Ct. 2786, 125 L.Ed.2d 469 (1993) (holding that the Frye test of general acceptance in the scientific community was superceded by the Federal Rules); Amorgianos v. Nat'l R.R. Passenger Corp., 303 F.3d 256, 265 (2d Cir.2002) (observing departure, under Federal Rule, from the Frye standard). The shift under the Federal Rules to a more permissive approach to expert testimony, however, did not represent an abdication of the screening function traditionally played by trial judges. To the contrary, as Daubert explained, Rule 702 governs the district court's responsibility to ensure that any and all scientific testimony or evidence admitted is not only relevant, but reliable. Daubert, 509 U.S. at 589, 113 S.Ct. 2786. In Kumho Tire Co. v. Carmichael, 526 U.S. 137, 152, 119 S.Ct. 1167, 143 L.Ed.2d 238 (1999), the Court clarified that, whether a witness's area of expertise was technical, scientific, or more generally experience-based, Rule 702 required the district court to fulfill the gatekeeping function of mak[ing] certain that an expert, whether basing testimony upon professional studies or personal experience, employs in the courtroom the same level of intellectual rigor that characterizes the practice of an expert in the relevant field. 11 77 Daubert enumerated a list of factors that, while not constituting a definitive checklist or test, a district court might consider in evaluating whether a proffered expert opinion has the required indicia of scientific reliability: whether a theory or technique had been and could be tested, whether it had been subjected to peer review, what its error rate was, and whether scientific standards existed to govern the theory or technique's application or operation. See Daubert, 509 U.S. at 593-94, 113 S.Ct. 2786. In addition to setting forth these criteria for testing an expert's methodology, the Supreme Court has also stated that reliability within the meaning of Rule 702 requires a sufficiently rigorous analytical connection between that methodology and the expert's conclusions. [N]othing in either Daubert or the Federal Rules of Evidence requires a district court to admit opinion evidence which is connected to existing data only by the ipse dixit of the expert. A court may conclude that there is simply too great an analytical gap between the data and the opinion proffered. General Electric Co. v. Joiner, 522 U.S. 136, 146, 118 S.Ct. 512, 139 L.Ed.2d 508 (1997). Thus, we have previously stated that when an expert opinion is based on data, a methodology, or studies that are simply inadequate to support the conclusions reached, Daubert and Rule 702 mandate the exclusion of that unreliable opinion testimony. Amorgianos, 303 F.3d at 266. 78 Even after determining that a witness is qualified as an expert to testify as to a particular matter, Fed.R.Evid. 702, and that the opinion is based upon reliable data and methodology, Rule 702 requires the district court to make a third inquiry: whether the expert's testimony (as to a particular matter) will assist the trier of fact. We have consistently held, in that respect, that expert testimony that usurp[s] either the role of the trial judge in instructing the jury as to the applicable law or the role of the jury in applying that law to the facts before it, United States v. Bilzerian, 926 F.2d 1285, 1294 (2d Cir.1991), by definition does not aid the jury in making a decision; rather, it undertakes to tell the jury what result to reach, and thus attempts to substitute the expert's judgment for the jury's, United States v. Duncan, 42 F.3d 97, 101 (2d Cir.1994). 79 In addition to the requirements of Rule 702, expert testimony is subject to Rule 403, and may be excluded if its probative value is substantially outweighed by the danger of unfair prejudice, confusion of the issues, or misleading the jury. Fed.R.Evid. 403. Indeed, the Supreme Court, echoed by members of our own court, has noted the uniquely important role that Rule 403 has to play in a district court's scrutiny of expert testimony, given the unique weight such evidence may have in a jury's deliberations. See, e.g., Daubert, 509 U.S. at 595, 113 S.Ct. 2786 (`Expert evidence can be both powerful and quite misleading because of the difficulty in evaluating it. Because of this risk, the judge in weighing possible prejudice against probative force under Rule 403 of the present rules exercises more control over experts than over lay witnesses.' (quoting Jack B. Weinstein, Rule 702 of the Federal Rules of Evidence Is Sound; It Should Not Be Amended, 138 F.R.D. 631, 632 (1991))); United States v. Young, 745 F.2d 733, 766 (2d Cir.1984) (Newman, J., concurring) (noting that the very breadth of the discretion accorded trial judges in admitting [the expert opinion of a detective testifying as to the criminal nature of a defendant's activities] under Rules 702 and 403 should cause them to give the matter more, rather than less, scrutiny. A trial judge should not routinely admit opinions of the sort at issue here and should weigh carefully the risk of prejudice.). 80 We turn, then, to the question of whether Dawson's statements that, in essence, he believed Muirhead and McCarthy to have been truthful in their account of the seconds preceding Muirhead's shooting, as well as Dawson's explanation for the discrepancy between the uncontroverted facts and Muirhead and McCarthy's description of what they saw, were properly admitted. 12 81 c) Dawson's Testimony Concerning the Officers' Credibility 82 It is a well-recognized principle of our trial system that determining the weight and credibility of [a witness's] testimony.... belongs to the jury, who are presumed to be fitted for it by their natural intelligence and their practical knowledge of men and the ways of men.... Aetna Life Ins. Co. v. Ward, 140 U.S. 76, 88, 11 S.Ct. 720, 35 L.Ed. 371 (1891); see also United States v. Scop, 846 F.2d 135, 142 (2d Cir.1988) (The credibility of witnesses is exclusively for the determination by the jury, and witnesses may not opine as to the credibility of the testimony of other witnesses at the trial.  (internal citation omitted and emphasis added)). Thus, this court, echoed by our sister circuits, has consistently held that expert opinions that constitute evaluations of witness credibility, even when such evaluations are rooted in scientific or technical expertise, are inadmissible under Rule 702. See, e.g., United States v. Lumpkin, 192 F.3d 280, 289 (2d Cir.1999); Scop, 846 F.2d at 142-43; see also, e.g., United States v. Charley, 189 F.3d 1251, 1267 (10th Cir.1999); Westcott v. Crinklaw, 68 F.3d 1073, 1076-77 (8th Cir.1995). 83 Viewed in this light, and against the backdrop of the legal principles governing the admissibility of expert testimony more broadly, we do not believe that Dawson's testimony presents a close case. His direct testimony stated that he rejected the possibility that Muirhead and McCarthy had lied, and explained various reasons why police officers have no incentive to give false statements in excessive force cases. On cross-examination Dawson reiterated his conclusion that the police officers were telling the truth as they perceived it. Even assuming that Dawson, based upon his experience or expertise, was qualified to render an opinion as to the tendencies of police officers to lie or to tell the truth in investigations of the sort at issue here (an assumption of which we are highly dubious), his statements essentially instructed the jury as to an ultimate determination that was exclusively within its province, namely, the credibility of Muirhead and McCarthy. Such testimony does not assist the trier of fact, Fed.R.Evid. 702, but rather undertakes to tell the jury what result to reach, and attempts to substitute the expert's judgment for the jury's, Duncan, 42 F.3d at 101. The trial judge erred, in the face of Nimely's strenuous objections, in not striking Dawson's statements. 84 We also believe that the credibility assessments to which Dawson was allowed to testify should have been excluded by the trial court under Rule 403. We have, in other factual contexts, disapproved of the practice of expert witnesses basing their conclusions on the in-court testimony of fact witnesses, out of concern that such expert testimony may improperly bolster the account given by the fact witnesses. See, e.g., United States v. Dukagjini, 326 F.3d 45, 53 (2d Cir.2003); United States v. Cruz, 981 F.2d 659, 663 (2d Cir.1992). Dawson's testimony went at least one step further, in that it commented directly, under the guise of expert opinion, on the credibility of trial testimony from crucial fact witnesses. Indeed, Dawson was permitted not only to state his belief that the officers were not lying, but also to give to the jury a series of rationales for that belief. 85 It is beyond question that issues of credibility, and, in particular, the question of whether Muirhead and McCarthy, on the one hand, or Nimely and Collier, on the other, were the more believable witnesses, lay at the heart of this trial. Moreover, the other medical evidence and eyewitness testimony presented at trial called substantially into question the truthfulness of Muirhead and McCarthy's version of events, thus placing the officers' credibility very much at issue. Under such circumstances, we think it was an abuse of the district court's substantial discretion in such matters to determine that Dawson's vouching for Muirhead's and McCarthy's veracity — even were it otherwise admissible — was not prejudicial, confusing, and misleading to the jury within the meaning of Rule 403. 86 d) Dawson's Misperception Hypothesis 87 We also find that the district court failed to exercise its Rule 702 gatekeeping function in allowing Dawson to expound his misperception hypothesis at all. According to Dawson's own direct testimony, he developed the misperception hypothesis as a means of reconciling the uncontroverted medical evidence — that Nimely was shot in the back — with the contrary deposition testimony from Muirhead and McCarthy that Dawson had decided had to be true. Indeed, as Dawson conceded on cross-examination, the medical data that he analyzed were susceptible of numerous interpretations, including that Muirhead shot Nimely in the back as Nimely was attempting to get up from the ground in order to continue running. Dawson's misperception hypothesis, however, was elevated ... from possibility to probability based on what the officer said and whether [Dawson] assessed that it was likely that they were lying about what they said. 88 Dawson's personal view of the officers' credibility is simply not a sufficiently reliable ground on which to base the conclusion that Muirhead and McCarthy experienced an optical illusion. That such a methodology could not even begin to satisfy any of Daubert 's criteria for assessing the scientific reliability of an opinion, see Daubert, 509 U.S. at 593-94, 113 S.Ct. 2786, only scratches the surface of its shortcomings. 13 Dawson's analytical move from Muirhead and McCarthy's version of events to the misperception hypothesis, was, by his own testimony, driven by the need to find a way of explaining the admitted facts in light of his own instinct that the officers were not lying. Such a leap is the essence of unverifiable subjectivity, amounting to the sort of ipse dixit connection between methodology and conclusion that the district court has the duty to exclude under Rule 702. Cf. Amorgianos, 303 F.3d at 265-66; Scop, 846 F.2d at 142. 14 89 e) Harmlessness and Rule 59 Analysis 90 Of course, our holding that the district court abused its discretion in allowing Dawson to testify both as to Muirhead's and McCarthy's credibility, and as to the misperception hypothesis, does not, without more, resolve the inquiry with respect to Nimely's new trial motion. Such errors are reversible only if they rendered the jury's verdict contrary to the interests of substantial justice. Fed.R.Civ.P. 61. To order a new trial we must find that the introduction of inadmissible evidence was a clear abuse of discretion and was so clearly prejudicial to the outcome of the trial that we are convinced that the jury has reached a seriously erroneous result or that the verdict is a miscarriage of justice. Luciano v. Olsten Corp., 110 F.3d 210, 217 (2d Cir.1997) (internal quotations omitted and emphasis added). 91 Nevertheless, as we have previously stated, we are `especially loath to regard any error as harmless in a close case, since in such a case even the smallest error may have been enough to tilt the balance.' Hester v. BIC Corp. 225 F.3d 178, 185 (2d Cir.2000) (quoting United States v. Colombo, 909 F.2d 711, 714 (2d Cir.1990)). Here, we are faced not simply with a close case —although, indeed, our review of the trial record shows that the evidence was highly contested and that the jury could readily have come out the opposite way — but, more importantly, a case in which witness credibility was the central issue. Dawson's misperception hypothesis was the primary vehicle through which the defense sought to convince the jury of what otherwise seemed a factual impossibility: that Muirhead and McCarthy truthfully testified that Nimely was shot in the chest, notwithstanding the uncontested medical evidence that Nimely was shot in the back. The prejudice that flowed to Nimely from the erroneous admission of this testimony was magnified when Dawson was permitted to offer expert conclusions regarding the tendency of police officers in general, and Muirhead and McCarthy in particular, not to lie in excessive force investigations. Because there is a distinct possibility that, absent the errors — perhaps individually, and certainly cumulatively — the jury would not have reached the verdict that it did, the prejudice caused by them rendered the verdict a miscarriage of justice, Munafo, 381 F.3d at 105 (internal quotation marks omitted). Therefore, a new trial must be ordered. 15