A recent opinion of the US Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, Kopplin v. Wisconsin Central Limited, http://media.ca7.uscourts.gov/cgi-bin/rssExec.pl?Submit=Display&Path=Y2019/D02-01/C:17-3602:J:Sykes:aut:T:fnOp:N:2286594:S:0, is an excellent reminder that a case can fail without a well-chosen and properly prepared expert witness.
Many states require the plaintiff’s expert in a medical malpractice case to be board certified in the same specialty as the defendant. The dire consequence of an attorney’s failure to meet this requirement precisely was recently demonstrated in Shadrick v. Grana (https://acis.alabama.gov/displaydocs.cfm?no=907441&event=5BT0M4P9Y).
