The National Association of Manufacturers, along with a coalition of industry groups, submitted an amicus brief supporting U.S. Supreme Court review in the case, focusing on a court’s responsibility to act as a “gatekeeper” and properly exclude unreliable expert testimony under the standard articulated by the U.S. Supreme Court in Daubert v. Merrell Dow Pharmaceuticals. The issue represents a split among the federal Circuit courts, which subjects litigants in different jurisdictions to unequal standards of justice.
In the years since the Daubert test was enunciated in a series of cases, courts have strayed from the original interpretation to a far more permissive and open standard. Under the Supreme Court’s holding in Daubert, the trial judge is to act as the “gatekeeper” in weighing whether evidence is sufficiently reliable to be admitted into evidence. However, as is evidenced in cases such as SQM North America, judges have increasingly allowed for ever more unfounded expert testimony on the premise that “vigorous expert testimony” at trial will sort the good from the bad. We argued that the Ninth Circuit’s “methodology-only” approach is an irresponsible abdication of the judge’s responsibility and contradicts the approach taken by other Circuits. Indeed, in the original Daubert case the Court said that the federal rules require close scrutiny of the factual foundation of expert testimony.
Unfortunately, on December 15, 2014, the Court declined to review this appeal.