GORDON KEENE VELLA. - On Point News

is presumed to have been aware of that “disagreement” during the period leading up to and
during the trial last April. For that very reason, the Court was entitled to rely upon Dr. Brown’s
testimony as being truthful and complete, without “word-smithing” or material omission.
Regrettably, the Court’s reliance was misplaced and, as discussed at length below,
numerous misstatements and omissions were offered, including a number that went directly to
the heart of the admissibility of Dr. Brown’s expert testimony under Daubert, and all of which
impaired the integrity of the judicial process in this case in such a manner as to warrant relief
from the judgment.
A. Dr. Brown Misrepresented the Known Error Rate Applicable To His
Hypothesis Of Repressed Memory.
The most glaring misrepresentation in the record below is Dr. Brown’s assertion of an
error rate applicable to his hypothesis of repressed memory. Perhaps in response to the fact that
Dr. Brown has been excluded from testifying in other cases as a result, at least in part, of being
unable to articulate an error rate, 5 Plaintiff’s counsel asked Dr. Brown in the initial stages of his
testimony to explain the term “error rate” and to provide the error rate applicable to his
“science.” (Tr. Vol. 1, 43:1 - 44:5-6.) Dr. Brown’s response both “misrepresents the nature of
error rate and provides a series of statistics that falsely give the impression of scientific
precision.” (Pope Decl. 31.) The relevant portions of the exchange are set forth here:
A. Would you explain what a base rate of dissociative amnesia would
be?
Q. A base rate is after you factor out the error rate in science . . . .
5
(See Barden Decl. 33) (citing State of N.H. v. Hungerford, 697 A.2d 916 (N.H. 1997); State
of R.I. v. Quattrocchi, No P92-3759, 1999 WL 284882 (R.I. Super. Ct. Apr. 26, 1999); and State
of N.H. v. Bourgelais, No. 02-S-2834 line 3 (N.H. Super. Ct. Apr. 4, 2005).
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