Court Opinion

ID: 9744631
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 22:10:48.90253+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:24:50.612577
License: Public Domain

JUSTICE HARRISON, dissenting: I am puzzled by the majority’s repeated characterization of this case as involving a "technical” violation of Rule 220 (134 Ill. 2d R. 220). (See 158 Ill. 2d at 376, 382, 383.) Although Rule 220 is technical in nature, plaintiffs’ failure to disclose their replacement expert within the required time cannot be dismissed as a mere "technicality.” Rather, it is a violation of one of the rule’s core substantive provisions. The whole purpose of the rule, as the majority recognizes, is to eliminate the problem of the undisclosed expert witness by establishing a uniform, but not inflexible, framework for the disclosure of such witnesses and their opinions. (134 Ill. 2d R. 220, Committee Comments, at 179-80.) To this end, the rule establishes specific deadlines by which disclosure must be made. There is no dispute that plaintiffs did not meet those deadlines here. The penalty for missing the mandatory deadlines is clear and definite. Rule 220(b)(1) states unambiguously that "[flailure to make the disclosure required by this rule or to comply with the discovery contemplated herein will result in disqualification of the expert as a witness.” (Emphasis added.) (134 Ill. 2d R. 220(b)(1).) The word "will,” when used in this context, is a mandatory directive. (See 134 Ill. 2d R. 220, Committee Comments, at 181 (rule provides for a "mandatory and exclusionary cutoff”).) This court acknowledged as much in its recent decision in Uhrhan v. Union Pacific R.R. Co. (1993), 155 Ill. 2d 537, 543, when it held that the otherwise "mandatory disqualification of the expert witness” was not required because the plaintiff there had waived his Rule 220 objection. In contrast to the general provisions of Rule 219(c) (134 Ill. 2d R. 219(c)), no other sanctions are available. (Phelps v. O’Malley (1987), 159 Ill. App. 3d 214, 224.) If the rule is violated, failure of the trial court to exclude the expert’s testimony is reversible error. Wakeford v. Rodehouse Restaurants of Missouri, Inc. (1991), 223 Ill. App. 3d 31, 42, aff’d (1992), 154 Ill. 2d 543. The majority is justifiably upset about the harshness of applying Rule 220’s mandatory disqualification provision to the facts of this case. This is clearly not the sort of situation the court had in mind when it promulgated the rule. In my view, however, the proper solution is for the court to admit that the rule is flawed and to revise or abolish it in accordance with the procedures we have established for that purpose. By instead professing that the rule does not mean what it plainly says, the court today does nothing but destabilize the law. At a minimum, our rules should provide certainty and consistency for those who must avail themselves of the courts. If we make the construction of those rules turn on the equities of each particular case, even that is lost. What, then, is the point of having rules at all?