SCIT Order on Michigan Experts

An excerpt:

Legal scholars have suggested a variety of solutions to the problems associated with evaluating historical testimony, including the use of neutral, court-appointed experts; requiring the judge, or a special master, to evaluate the primary source data personally; and eliminating the “reliability” prong of the Daubert test. See Maxine D. Goodman,Slipping Through the Gate: Trusting Daubert and Trial Procedures to Reveal the ‘Pseudo-Historian’ Expert Witness and to Enable the Reliable Historian Expert Witness–Troubling Lessons from Holocaust-Related Trials, 60 Baylor L. Rev. 824, 861-73 (2008). Perhaps some of those solutions would provide for more nuanced and reliable historical testimony. In this case, however, a neutral expert was not requested or appointed, the demands of the Court’s docket make independent primary-source research impracticable, and development of a new test for admissibility of historical testimony seems unnecessary. More importantly, the expert opinions provided, while perhaps flawed in some respects, are reasonably reliable and will be helpful in determining the ultimate issue in this case. Consequently, they are admissible under Rule 702, and will be considered and weighed appropriately.