Legal Question in Personal Injury in Virginia

Re: Expert Witness

An expert witness is simply a witness which a court reocognizes as competent to offer testimony in a particular (usually specialized) area or on a particular subject matter.

The prefix neuro denotes nerves or nerve systems, eg. the brain, spinal cord, etc. A neurosurgeeon would be a surgeon whose speciality

would be operating on any of these body structures which are composed largely of nerves or nerve systems such as the ones referenced. Whereas the neuroopthamologist would, apparently, be a kind of neurologist whose specialty would be even more narrowly circumscribed to the area of nerves and nerve systems connected with the eye and its functions.

Re: Expert Witness

This is an interesting question, and this is one of the biggest reasons why "pro se" plaintiffs (without an attorney) often lose in court.

A "fact witness" is someone who simply testifies to what they saw, or heard, or know. "The light was red, when the car went flying through." That is simply a fact.

ANYTHING which requires some opinion or analysis or conclusion, however, requires an "expert witness." For example, "If the brakes were in good condition, the driver should have been able to stop in time and avoid the accident." Says who? That is not a fact that can be observed and testified about. That is an opinion (says the law). Actually it is an engineering and scientific conclusion based upon the laws of physics and the characteristics of cars. However, it takes an "expert" to testify to that, or you cannot introduce any such evidence into the trial.

Or: "It will cost $5000 to repaint the house because the contractor botched the job." Says who? The court will not allow such testimony, to establish the cost of repainting, unless you have an "expert witness" to express his educated OPINION as to how much money it will cost to repaint (how much time, how big the house is, whether painting certain areas are easy or hard, etc.)

An expert can be an expert without any training, because of simple experience. Someone who dropped out of high school but spent 8 years painting houses can testify as an expert on the cost of repainting a house after a contractor damaged it or botched the paint job. A high school dropout who repairs pianos can testify to the cost of repairing a piano after the moving company DROPPED it while moving it.

In your case (as little as we know about it), you probably need an expert to testify to CAUSATION as well as DAMAGES.

The plaintiff will say "the accident caused the damaged optic nerve." THe Defendant will say, hogwash, the optic nerve was already damaged or it was damaged independently from some other cause.

The plaintiff will say "the optic nerve will never recover." The defendant will say, hogwash, just wait a little while. How does the court know? It needs an expert.

The plaintiff will need an expert to testify that the accident was the CAUSE of the damaged optic nerve, and that the optic nerve was not damaged already before. (Medical records will help with that, but not totally.)

Technically, anyone with experience and/or training on optic nerves can be an expert.

Their title is irrelevant. What you need to ask is whether they have any training or experience in the causes of damage to optic nerves and whether optic nerves spontaneously heal themselves and how bad the damage is (what the effect is, to show damages).

The title is completely irrelevant. What matters is the person's experience and/or training on damaged optic nerves.