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It's not clear from the complaint if he's being threatened with legal action because he's voiced his opinion, or because he prepared testimony as an expert witn

It's not clear from the complaint if he's being threatened with legal action because he's voiced his opinion, or because he prepared testimony as an expert witness concerning engineering in a trial. Given that the case cites numerous times he gave his opinion in "public and quasi-judicial" fora without mentioning reprimand, it seems like it's the latter. That's doesn't sound like a first amendment violation. Truth is not the only bar to clear in legal testimony.

brudgers 5y ago
Public hearings for real estate development approval are commonly quasi-judicial. It would be unsurprising if that was the context because it is a context in which other participants would have concerns over unqualified persons holding themselves out as experts. It is also a context in which it is easy to collect evidence. It is worth distinguishing that engineers are regulated because their opinions carry legal weight. They carry legal weight because the truth is difficult to determine and even experts (i.e engineers) can’t readily determine it absolutely (hence safety factors). The safety valve for engineering opinion’s weight is engineers are personally liable for errors in judgment (no corporate protection).
Closi 5y ago
I don’t see why someone needs to be licensed to provide expert opinion (even in court). It’s just the job of the other side to discredit the expert witness. Engineering licences are really meant to protect unqualified people making bad designs which get made and produce safety/quality issues - their purpose isn’t to work out who should be able to say what. They are about making sure something physical gets built correctly according to code. The idea that someone could see a safety issue related to the engineering of something and wouldn’t be able to raise it (in either a casual or legal setting) because they don’t have a licence is clearly absurd.
- staticman2 5y ago
  The obvious reason you might want him to have a license to speak in court is if he's blatently lying in court about engineering you can revoke the license after a legal proceeding and no longer have a paid liar as a tool for attorneys to hire to decieve the judge and jury.
  - gopiandcode 5y ago
    If the expert witness were lying, wouldn't that be perjury, and doesn't that come with its own legal repercussions?
    - staticman2 5y ago
      Sure, in theory lying can have legal consequences, but only if you can prove the person is intentionally lying. To take away the license you'd only have to prove they are stating things no qualified engineer would say. Suppose, for example, an engineer testified that bricks should never be used in housing because in his professional opinion bricks cause cancer. His source is a blog post as reliable as a supermarket tabloid. How do you prove he's intentionally lying, rather than just insane or confused or stupid? By making it a license issue instead, you at least move the goal as to whether his statements meet some minimum standard of professional expectations or care. This is all just hypothetical, in practice I don't know to what extent these license authorities are supervising engineers. But ideally I'd like an engineer to at least have some pressure to remain honest when they testify in court.

brudgers 5y ago

Public hearings for real estate development approval are commonly quasi-judicial. It would be unsurprising if that was the context because it is a context in which other participants would have concerns over unqualified persons holding themselves out as experts. It is also a context in which it is easy to collect evidence. It is worth distinguishing that engineers are regulated because their opinions carry legal weight. They carry legal weight because the truth is difficult to determine and even experts (i.e engineers) can’t readily determine it absolutely (hence safety factors). The safety valve for engineering opinion’s weight is engineers are personally liable for errors in judgment (no corporate protection).

Closi 5y ago

I don’t see why someone needs to be licensed to provide expert opinion (even in court). It’s just the job of the other side to discredit the expert witness. Engineering licences are really meant to protect unqualified people making bad designs which get made and produce safety/quality issues - their purpose isn’t to work out who should be able to say what. They are about making sure something physical gets built correctly according to code. The idea that someone could see a safety issue related to the engineering of something and wouldn’t be able to raise it (in either a casual or legal setting) because they don’t have a licence is clearly absurd.

staticman2 5y ago
The obvious reason you might want him to have a license to speak in court is if he's blatently lying in court about engineering you can revoke the license after a legal proceeding and no longer have a paid liar as a tool for attorneys to hire to decieve the judge and jury.
- gopiandcode 5y ago
  If the expert witness were lying, wouldn't that be perjury, and doesn't that come with its own legal repercussions?
  - staticman2 5y ago
    Sure, in theory lying can have legal consequences, but only if you can prove the person is intentionally lying. To take away the license you'd only have to prove they are stating things no qualified engineer would say. Suppose, for example, an engineer testified that bricks should never be used in housing because in his professional opinion bricks cause cancer. His source is a blog post as reliable as a supermarket tabloid. How do you prove he's intentionally lying, rather than just insane or confused or stupid? By making it a license issue instead, you at least move the goal as to whether his statements meet some minimum standard of professional expectations or care. This is all just hypothetical, in practice I don't know to what extent these license authorities are supervising engineers. But ideally I'd like an engineer to at least have some pressure to remain honest when they testify in court.