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Excluding Unreliable Expert Testimony in Fire Cases

By Robert O. Lesley
October 30, 2006

Part One of a Two-Part Series

Fire cases, especially those involving appliances, present unique challenges because the lack of compelling physical evidence often permits ex-perts to give unreliable opinions concerning causation. Fire usually destroys evidence showing its cause, and many fire scenes contain multiple possible causes in the area of origin. Moreover, the area of origin can only be defined in the most general sense in most significant cases because there are no fire patterns indicating a specific point of origin. Many times, the likely area of origin is no smaller than a large portion of a particular room. Moreover, property owners are reluctant to reveal that they negligently started a fire, so they provide misleading information in some cases. In many fires, certain or even likely identification of any particular cause is simply not possible.

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