Court Opinion

ID: 9759119
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 00:06:24.277874+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T10:14:32.986831
License: Public Domain

LONG, J.,
concurring
I concur in the majority’s disposition of this case. Plainly, the prosecutor’s unwarranted comment that defense experts may have “shaded their testimony” in the hope of future employment had the capacity to poison the jury’s verdict, which essentially depended on its assessment of conflicting expert testimony.
I am also in full accord with the majority’s reference of the larger issue of paid experts in criminal cases to the Model Charge Committee to address the fairness of the present instruction on expert fees in criminal cases in light of the fact that it “may tip the scales in favor of the credibility of the State’s witnesses who, *190although unpaid, may have an equal or greater interest in the outcome than do defense witnesses because they are often employed by a law enforcement agency involved in the prosecution.” Ante at 189, 770 A.2d at 274.
In my view, the entire notion of allowing jurors to consider the amount paid to an expert as bearing on credibility needs rethinking. Indeed, it is the fact of payment, not the amount, that is the counterweight to a jury’s natural conclusion that a witness employed by the State or one of its subdivisions is an interested party. Once the fact of payment to the defense expert is revealed, the playing field is leveled.
At that point, a unitary instruction tailored specifically to the vast majority of criminal cases in which the State’s expert is “unpaid” and defense expert “paid” should be given. The instruction should include, among other things, an explanation of the practical reasons why the State is not required to resort to paid experts; that the defense generally does not have aeeess to a stable of “unpaid” witnesses; and that payment of experts by the defense is simply part of the business of trying a ease.
Further, the Committee should revisit the following language in the Model Charge: “You are instructed that the amount of the expert witness’s fee is a matter which you may consider as possibly affecting the credibility, interest, bias, or partisanship of the "witness.” Model Jury Charges (Criminal), “Expert Testimony” (September 15, 2000). The logical nexus between a legitimate and reasonable expert’s fee and the truthfulness of the expert is questionable. Indeed, a huge expert’s fee that might seem shocking and suspicious to jurors can be entirely legitimate if it is generated by the amount of time and effort expended on a particularly difficult project. I see no reason why a jury should be factoring the size of an expert’s fee into its credibility call unless there is evidence that the rate is not reasonable and customary for an expert of the sort; that the hours expended are inflated; or that the size of the fee evidences that it is in exchange for the substance of the opinion and not the work underlying it.
*191I would leave it to the Model Charge Committee to debate those issues and, if necessary, to develop a procedure for determining if and when the amount of a fee becomes relevant. The crucial point is that it is not relevant in every case.
Chief Justice PORITZ joins in this opinion.
For reversal and remandment — Chief Justice PORITZ and Justices STEIN, COLEMAN, LONG, VERNIERO, LaVECCHIA and ZAZZALI — 7.
Opposed — None.