Insurance Dispute Lawyer Blog
Years after Hurricane Rita, which hit in September 2005, those who have had their homes damaged are still dealing with cleaning up the wreckage and rebuilding. Litigation involving insurance companies is still particularly prominent. One couple from Lake Charles, Louisiana knows about this type of litigation all too well.
The couple had homeowners insurance through State Farm and made a claim for damage to their home as result of the storm. State Farm paid them for the damages and they began to rebuild. However, after the claims were settled, the couple found that significant damage to the home’s rafters in the attic. An adjuster came right over and paid the couple for damage to three windows. The rafters, on the other hand, were a different question. There was a separation between the center beam and the rafters that connected to the center beam to support the roof; the center beam was essential to the strength and integrity of the home’s overall structure. State Farm explained that the couple needed to have the opinion of an engineer to support their claim for damage to the rafters.
In Louisiana, like many other states, lay people are generally not allowed to offer their opinions at trial. Instead, they are supposed to supply facts and the jury or judge is supposed to provide their opinion, resulting in the outcome of the trial. The witness should not substitute their opinion for that of the factfinder. However, if the witness is certified as an expert in a particular area, then they can give their opinion to the court.
Testimony of expert witnesses is particularly useful in highly technical trials. For example, if an individual is suing for a personal injury, it may be helpful to have a doctor come in to explain the injury and state how he or she thinks the plaintiff acquired the injury. If you can only acquire the injury a certain way, then the fact finder should know that information so they can provide an accurate final verdict.
In this case, the couple had their contractor come in to testify. Their contractor built the home and testified as to his opinion of how the damage occurred. He was a valuable witness because he could tell the judge that when he built the home, the center beam and rafters were not separated as they are now. He explained that if they were separated like that, then the house would not have been up to code and the couple could not have lived there.
The couple also employed an engineer to testify at the trial regarding the cause of the split in the rafters. The engineer looked at the house after the storm and, using his experience, explained that only extremely high winds could have created that kind of damage in the time between when the house was built and shortly after Hurricane Rita hit. He also stated that the home’s structure would have continued to get worse if the attic frame was not properly restored.
State Farm argued that the contractor was not an appropriate expert because he was not trained to be an expert regarding causation of the movement in the rafters. Because he was not an engineer, he could not compute the effect of the wind speed on the house nearly as well as an engineer could. However, State Farm did not like the engineer that the couple used either. In fact, they argued, the contractor did not even use the correct wind speed when he calculated the effect of the wind, so his testimony should be entirely discredited.
The court determined that both the contractor’s and the engineer’s testimony would remain in evidence. First, it concluded that the contractor was not retained as an expert for the trial, so he did not need to be qualified as an expert. Instead, he spoke about the before and after affects regarding the rafters. Louisiana law allows witnesses who are not experts to testify about their inferences and opinions if they are “rationally based upon the perception of the witness and helpful to a clear understanding of [the] testimony or determination of the fact at issue.” In addition, the court kept the engineer’s testimony because they determined that even though he had used the incorrect wind speed in his calculations, the correct wind speed would not have changed the outcome of his opinion.
Witnesses can make or break a case, and expert witnesses are particularly important to explain technical concepts that the average person may not understand. Those technical concepts are usually essential to the case.
The Berniard Law Firm understands the importance of witnesses and strives to use only the best experts and witnesses available. If you are considering legal action, but are concerned about the technical aspects of your case, contact The Berniard Law Firm today, and we will be happy to help.