Expert witness testimony might have torpedoed $1.7M award
Court papers suggest a $1.75 million jury award in a sexual abuse lawsuit was vacated by a judge because of questions raised about a key witness’ credibility.
U.S. District Judge Richard Kopf dismissed the verdict and award in response to a motion to vacate them from Friedman Law Offices, the firm that represented the woman alleging the abuse.
Herb Friedman, one of the lawyers who represented the woman, this week said he could not comment on the motion, filed late last year.
Lincoln attorney Allen Tate, one of the attorneys representing the defendant, a former Lincoln pastor, also declined comment.
But in court papers filed last year, Tate called into question the trial testimony of Dr. Daniel Brown, the Harvard faculty member who testified as an expert witness on the medical phenomenon of repressed memory.
Tate and a co-consul wrote that three experts in psychology and psychiatry reviewed Brown’s testimony and a report he prepared. The experts concluded, among other things, Brown misrepresented the degree of “general acceptance” within the relevant scientific community of the repressed memory hypothesis.
Brown also mis-stated the theory’s error rate, according to the papers. Error rate can determine the reliability of a scientific field.
“The newly discovered evidence establishes that Dr. Brown, either intentionally or through reckless indifference to the truth, mis-stated the existence of an error rate relating to” the hypothesis, Tate wrote.
A federal jury returned the verdict against the former pastor, Gordon Vella, in May.
The woman, identified as “Anonymous” in court records, said in a 2004 lawsuit Vella sexually abused her from about 1978 to 1984.
According to the lawsuit, Vella was a pastor at Fellowship Baptist Church from 1979 to 1981 and pastor at New Hope Baptist from 1981 to 1984. The woman said she repressed memories of the sexual abuse until 2003, when she underwent counseling, the lawsuit said.
Vella, who was living in Michigan at the time of the trial, was represented at the time by a Chicago attorney. Tate and co-consul Krista Kester began representing Vella sometime after the trial. Vella could not be reached for comment this week.
Last month, the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals granted Vella’s motion to dismiss his appeal of the trial results.
Reach Clarence Mabin at cmabin@journalstar.com or 473-7234.
U.S. District Judge Richard Kopf dismissed the verdict and award in response to a motion to vacate them from Friedman Law Offices, the firm that represented the woman alleging the abuse.
Herb Friedman, one of the lawyers who represented the woman, this week said he could not comment on the motion, filed late last year.
Lincoln attorney Allen Tate, one of the attorneys representing the defendant, a former Lincoln pastor, also declined comment.
But in court papers filed last year, Tate called into question the trial testimony of Dr. Daniel Brown, the Harvard faculty member who testified as an expert witness on the medical phenomenon of repressed memory.
Tate and a co-consul wrote that three experts in psychology and psychiatry reviewed Brown’s testimony and a report he prepared. The experts concluded, among other things, Brown misrepresented the degree of “general acceptance” within the relevant scientific community of the repressed memory hypothesis.
Brown also mis-stated the theory’s error rate, according to the papers. Error rate can determine the reliability of a scientific field.
“The newly discovered evidence establishes that Dr. Brown, either intentionally or through reckless indifference to the truth, mis-stated the existence of an error rate relating to” the hypothesis, Tate wrote.
A federal jury returned the verdict against the former pastor, Gordon Vella, in May.
The woman, identified as “Anonymous” in court records, said in a 2004 lawsuit Vella sexually abused her from about 1978 to 1984.
According to the lawsuit, Vella was a pastor at Fellowship Baptist Church from 1979 to 1981 and pastor at New Hope Baptist from 1981 to 1984. The woman said she repressed memories of the sexual abuse until 2003, when she underwent counseling, the lawsuit said.
Vella, who was living in Michigan at the time of the trial, was represented at the time by a Chicago attorney. Tate and co-consul Krista Kester began representing Vella sometime after the trial. Vella could not be reached for comment this week.
Last month, the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals granted Vella’s motion to dismiss his appeal of the trial results.
Reach Clarence Mabin at cmabin@journalstar.com or 473-7234.
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