Child Justice Files Amicus Brief In The Highest Court Of Maryland Arguing Courts Must Be Allowed To Exclude Expert Opinions Based On Junk Data

The Maryland Court of Special Appeals recently ruled in a published opinion that trial court judges cannot exclude expert opinions that are based on bad data—they can only look at an expert’s methodology. That would be a terrible precedent for Child Justice’s clients, who often deal with so-called experts who arrive at a conclusion based on junk data.

So, Child Justice lawyers and Child Justice Board Member, Dave Dorey, filed an amicus curiae brief in the Court of Appeals supporting a petition for certiorari that would overturn this bad opinion. CJI discussed not only how the opinion was wrong as a matter of law, but also how if it was law in the past, it would have directly harmed two of our clients—one of whom would still have supervised and limited visitation with her children (based on old data), and another of whom would have had worse results at trial and likely would have lost her federal security clearance and employment.

If the petition is granted, CJI intends to file another amicus curiae brief on the merits. This and our other recent and ongoing appellate work demonstrate that CJI continues to build its reputation as a trusted voice helping make the law in Maryland to the benefit of children.

Read our brief here.