Nursing Home Rape Victim’s Claim Gets New Life on Appeal

Our law firm did not participate in this case.

The plaintiff, an elderly woman who suffered from severe dementia, was living in a nursing home and a male patient sexually assaulted her. She died 13 months later without ever being able to describe the assault or its effect on her.

She sued the nursing home for negligence and violation of Washington’s Vulnerable Adult Statute.

The Estate retained a psychiatric nurse, to testify about implicit and explicit memory, conditioned fear response, rape trauma syndrome, and compounded rape trauma syndrome.

The trial court excluded the expert testimony because not recognized by the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders IV.

To be admissible, new scientific evidence must satisfy the standard for admissibility under Frye, as well as ER 702. A Frye analysis need not be undertaken, however, with respect to evidence that does not involve new methods of proof or new scientific principles from which conclusions are drawn.

Experts may testify regarding “scientific, technical, or other specialized knowledge” if the testimony “will assist the trier of fact to understand the evidence or to determine a fact in issue.” Expert testimony is helpful if it concerns matters beyond the common knowledge of the average layperson and does not mislead the jury.

The Court reviewed Washington cases and cases from other jurisdictions allowing expert testimony rape trauma syndrome. At issue in these cases was whether expert testimony was admissible to prove, with a reasonable degree of certainty or medical probability, that the plaintiff was exhibiting symptoms attributable to the rape he or she had experienced. The Court noted that “this is all that is required in a civil case”.

No witness may express an opinion that is a conclusion of law or that tells the jury what result to reach. On any other issue, however, ER 704 explicitly provides that “[t]estimony in the form of an opinion or inferences otherwise admissible is not objectionable because it embraces an ultimate issue to be decided by the trier of fact.” The prohibition on “ultimate facts” testimony does not prevent an expert from testifying as to the ultimate factual issue of causation.

The case was remanded to the trial court.

See Carlton v. Stonebridge Memory Care, No. 36797-1-II, PUBLISHED OPINION.

Posted in Washington Personal Injury Law and tagged .