Expert shopping explained

Expert shopping or witness shopping or expert mining is the practice of finding an authority on a given subject whose professional opinion is skewed toward the answer that the searching party already prefers. In civil and criminal litigation, expert shopping occurs when, having received an unfavourable opinion from one expert, a litigant seeks opinions from one or more other experts, until he finds an expert whose opinion is favourable to his case. Expert shopping may result in a battle of the experts.

An expert witness can be paid to testify in favor of one side of the case. In this case, the expert witnesses on each side may have totally different opinions. This use is well-known use.

Certain news media have been accused of "expert shopping" in relation to their news reports.

History

Expert shopping in litigation began in the nineteenth century.

References

• Jonah B Gelbach, "Expert Mining and Required Disclosure" (2014) 81 University of Chicago Law Review 131
• Mark Thomas, "Expert Shopping: Appeals Adducing Fresh Evidence in Diminished Responsibility Cases" (2020) 84 The Journal of Criminal Law 249
• Pamela Louise Johnston, "Court-Appointed Scientific Expert Witnesses: Unfettering Expertise" (1987) 2 High Technology Law Journal 249
• Mark James, "Closing Down", The New Law Journal, No 7266, 30 March 2007
• Catherine Urquhart and Johnathan Payne, "Closing Down Sale", The New Law Journal, No 7459, 31 March 2011
• Chris Pamplin, "Buyer Beware: The Hazards of Expert Shopping" (2022) The New Law Journal, No 7974, 8 April 2022, p 19
• Judith Hopper, "Replacing experts and the risks of expert shopping", Local Government Lawyer, 19 May 2023
• John Hyde, "Judge rejects 'expert shopping' accusation and allows a sub", The Law Society Gazette, 5 April 2023
• Déirdre Dwyer. The Judicial Assessment of Expert Evidence. Cambridge University Press. 2008. Pages 171, 177, 284, 310, 356 to 358 and 369.
• Paul Roberts and Michael Stockdale (eds). Forensic Science Evidence and Expert Witness Testimony. Edward Elgar. 2018. Pages 13, 221 and 222.
• Artur Appazov. Expert Evidence and International Criminal Justice. Springer. 2016. Pages 69 and 77.
• Robert Horne and John Mullen. The Expert Witness in Construction. Wiley & Sons. 2013. Pages 27 and 163.
• Richard Glover. Murphy on Evidence. Fifteenth Edition. Oxford University Press. 2017. Pages 624 and 625.
• Adrian Keane and Paul McKeown. The Modern Law of Evidence. Fourteenth Edition. Oxford University Press. 2022. Page 682.
• Lena Walhberg and Christian Dahlman. "The Role of the Expert Witness". Philosophical Foundations of Evidence Law. Oxford University Press. 2021. Page 55.
• Stuart Sime. A Practical Approach to Civil Procedure. Twenty-fifth Edition. Oxford University Press. 2022. Page 389.
• Paula Loughlin and Stephen Gerlis. "Disclosure of Expert's Report". Civil Procedure. Second Edition. Cavendish Publishing. 2004.
• Bankim Thanki (ed). The Law of Privilege. Second Edition. Oxford University Press. 2011. Pages 169 and 170.
• Nigel Poole. Clinical Negligence Made Clear. Bath Publishing. 2019. Pages 180 and 237.