   
Experience
Overview
Click for a current CV.
- From Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania;
- M. A. and Ph. D. in experimental psychology;
- 36 years basic and applied experience;
- 90 publications and numerous presentations;
- Postdoctoral fellowships at Brown Univ. and Univ. Cal. Berkeley.
- Research grants from National Eye Institute, National Science Foundation, National Science and Engineering Research Committee, US Air Force Armstrong Aerospace Medicine Laboratory and others;
- Teaching experience includes vision & perception (undergraduate, graduate, optometry and medical students), experimental psychology (undergraduates), introductory psychology (undergraduates), psychology of motivation (undergraduates), statistics (undergraduates), applied behavior analysis (undergraduates), human factors (undergraduates), cognitive science (undergraduates) and others;
- Retained in over 240 cases;
- Over 90% of cases in the US: Alabama, Arkansas, British Columbia, California, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nevada, New Jersey, New York, Nevada, Ohio, Oklahoma, Ontario, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Texas, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, Wisconsin, West Virginia
- Case areas include personal injury, criminal, intellectual property, & consumer; and
- Cases split roughly 50-50 between defense and plaintiff;
Typical Cases
Road & Rail Accidents
Whether off lack of throttle steering caused caused a boating collision
Whether the reflective tape would make the truck more conspicuous;
Whether the driver should have seen the road construction worker;
Whether driver should have seen a pedestrian in time to avoid accident;
Whether driver could have seen rail-highway crossing warnings;
Whether driver's reaction time was reasonable;
Whether a driver should have seen road signs and signals;
Whether vision of older driver contributed pedestrian knock down;
Whether objects on car dashboard impaired vision;
Whether driver's visual impairment contributed a fatal traffic collision;
Whether driver should have seen trailer blocking roadway at night; and
Whether a driver properly controlled steering around a curve.
Product Defects
Whether lack of off-throttle steering caused a personal watercraft collision;
Whether failure to test restraint of child car seats contributed to a death; and
Whether design of a fast fryer appliance contributed to a severe burn.
Warning
Whether a drug label served as an adequate warning;
Whether the safety warning on a gun was adequate;
Whether beach signs were adequate warning;
Whether "no diving signs" would affect behavior;
Whether the dangers of asbestos were foreseeable;
Whether an auditory backup warning could have prevented a forklift accident;
Whether a warning could have prevented an industrial accident;
Whether the warning on lighter fluid was adequate; and
Whether a better helmet warning would have prevented a spinal injury.
Trip & fall
Whether lighting conditions contributed to a fall down stairs;
Whether an elderly woman could have been expected to avoid a trip and fall;
Whether pattern on stairs contributed to a fall;
Whether light was adequate for an elderly man to a avoid tripping on a curb; and
What factors contributed to a fall down a steep slope.
Intellectual Property
Whether the color of drug pills could be trademarked;
Whether colors used in plaintiff's tradedress were functional;
Whether packaging imitated tradedress of a competitor; and
Whether consumers will use context to avoid trademark and name confusion.
Criminal & Police
Whether an eyewitness could accurately identify a suspect seen in dim light;
Whether reaction time was sufficient to fire a rifle in fatal shooting;
Whether witness estimates of speed were reliable in a police chase;
Why a man congenital nystagmus flunked a sobriety test; and
Whether visibility was sufficient for police officers to perceive actions of a suspect in shooting.
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