Design (General) Expert Witnesses: 22

Dr. Adam K. Aleksander, PhD, PE, CSP, has over 40 years of experience in the areas of Mechanical Engineering, Human Factors, and Safety Engineering. He combines both academic credentials and active work in industry to provide a grounded perspective in Product Liability, Industrial Incidents, Warnings, and OSHA related issues. He is also a VP of an Energy Services firm, with over 35 overseas assignments related to forensic services, power utility issues, and equipment failures.

Dr. Aleksander has been a practicing engineer since 1972, focusing his Manufacturing, Consulting and Forensic investigations on Problem Definition and Root Cause Analysis of complex problems in confidential issues. His firm has experience encompassing an enormous variety of claims, from large $45 million dollar dam claims, to environmental clean-up claims, to small road construction claims. His litigation services often involve reconstruction, perception reaction studies, warnings, equipment operation, mechanical failures, industrial accidents, skiing, and bicycling injuries.

As an Expert Witness, Dr. Aleksander has worked with many clients, including plaintiff's and defendant's attorneys, both civil and criminal, attorneys representing corporations, corporations in the power utility area, and corporations that produce products. His services are also available to insurance executives with complex claims issues that involve industrial or utility related losses. Dr. Aleksander has been retained over 125 times in a wide range of technical investigations.

Litigation Expertise:

• Product Liability - Design, Manufacturing and Marketing Defects, Involving Damage, Injury or Fatality
• Equipment Failures - Proximal Cause of Failure with Contributing Factors
• Human Factors, Visibility, Ergonomics, and General Research Issues - Product Usability, Warnings, Instructions, Perception, Reaction Time, Visibility and Conspicuity Issues
• Construction, OSHA, and Safety Engineering - Regulatory and Safety Issues
• Industrial Projects
• Power Utility - Service and Equipment Failures

View Dr. Aleksander's Consulting Profile.

Henry Chamberlain has 50 years of experience in the Glass Industry. His expertise includes just about all aspects of glass from engineering design, manufacturing, strengthening, testing, quality control, installation, fractography, and failure analysis of glass and glazing systems. His experience ranges from automotive, architectural, and industrial glass applications to glass consumer products.

Mr. Chamberlain has held numerous leadership positions in professional associations and is a well-respected expert within the glass industry community. Since 1996, he has contributed to many different publications and given lectures and presentations on glass.

Areas of Specialization:

• Computational modeling for structural and thermal design optimization of glazing systems. Mr. Chamberlain was one of the first group of ten people certified by the National Fenestration Rating Council to serve as the "Individual-in-Responsible-Charge" of a laboratory accredited by NFRC to issue product ratings
• Design, quality control, and testing of glass parts and glazing systems for demanding architectural and industrial applications
• Angle specific spectral models for optimization of the optical properties of fenestration systems
• Process control and quality control in the manufacture and fabrication of glass, with emphasis on insulating and laminating technology and the measurement and control of stress during annealing, toughening or bending processes
• Fracture mechanics of glass
• Specialized spectrophotometric polariscopes, instrumentation used to detect and analyze defects in glass products, and other optical instruments

Litigation Support - Mr. Chamberlain provides expert Forensic Glass and Glazing litigation support. His expertise includes analysis of inclusions and defects, fractographic analysis, stress analysis, and expert opinion regarding glazing system design and glazing methods. Mr. Chamberlain's services are available to counsel representing both plaintiff and defendant.

Areas of Expertise:

Glazing System Design Glass Failure Analysis Fractography Finite Element Analysis (FEA) Optics & Acoustics

Energy Efficiency Process Control Glass Testing Glass Codes & standards Glass Safety

View Henry Chamberlain's Consulting Profile.

Gabriele Goldaper has over 45 years experience in the Fashion, Garment, Textile Industry, as a retailer, manufacturer, consultant, and college instructor. Ms. Goldaper is a perceptive and articulate Expert Witness who has been involved in more than150+ Apparel Industry Legal Disputes. She has been deposed and testified in bench and jury trials and arbitrations, for both defendants and plaintiffs.

Ms. Goldaper has owned her own clothing manufacturing company and has held key executive positions in major public and private companies in Southern California. She has been a Management Consultant to over 200 new, failing or growing apparel companies, and completed assignments for USAID in Romania, Egypt, El Salvador, Moscow, Thailand and Bulgaria as an apparel expert.

Ms. Goldaper is a 30-year member of the faculty at the Fashion Institute of Design and Merchandising.

Areas of Expertise Include:

• Copyright Infringement and Trademark Cases
• Opinions on Originality and Substantial Similarity
• Fabric/Print Design, and Origin Issues
• Garment Construction and Design issues
• Customs, Practices and Operations of Clothing Business
• Financial Conditions, Valuations and Financial Matters
• Issues with Manufacturing Contractors/Factories: Domestic and Off-Shore
• Wholesale Distribution to Retailers and Internet Sales
• Quality Standards/Specifications used in Production of Garments

View Consulting Profile.

Karl R. Leinsing, MSME, PE, President of ATech Designs, Inc., is a Professional Mechanical Engineer who specializes in Medical Device Product Development from concept to production. Mr. Leinsing has been granted over 34 patents (needle free IV valves, laparoscopic devices, needlescopic devices, suture lockers, catheters, mitral valve repair devices, knitting machines) and excels in solving the most complicated problems and design challenges. His company has a fully equipped medical lab with calibrated measurement and test equipment and all is fully documented with high quality reports with pictures and video to provide credible results and easy to understand compelling data.

The winner of five design awards, Mr. Leinsing is recognized as one of the top 100 medical device professionals in the nation by MD&DI. For dedication to his industry, he was made the 2014 Chairman of the Medical Device and Manufacturing Conference in Anaheim, CA. Mr. Leinsing has also been acknowledged for his work in a publication by Life Magazine. Mr. Leinsing offers litigation support services to the legal community. He has extensive experience with Patent and Product Liability cases including report writing, depositions, and testimony.

Areas of Expertise:

Intravenous (IV) Systems & Disposables Hernia Repair Endometrial Ablation Laparoscopic Instruments Injection Ports Catheters Heart Valve Repair / Replacement Subcutaneous Ports

Bed Rails Cervical Screws Syringes, pen injectors, auto-injectors IV / Insulin Pumps Glucose Monitors Peritoneal Dialysis Pumps Abdominal Aortic Aneurysm (AAA) Repair Sleep Apnea Devices (CPAP)

View Karl Leinsing's Consulting Profile.

Rob Wallace has unique expertise in Trademark, Trade Dress, Copyright, Brand Identity and Package Design Infringement. For 35+ years, Rob ran one of the nation's top Brand Identity Strategy and Package Design Resources providing global branding expertise to Fortune 500 companies in virtually all CPG categories. His clients include P&G, Nestle, Pepsico, Unilever, Kraft, Colgate, The Home Depot, Brown-Foreman, Novartis, J&J and more than 50 market leading companies. Manhattan-based, Rob has been an expert witness for important litigation involving:

• Likelihood of Consumer Confusion
• Secondary Meaning
• Brand Valuation & Dilution
• Package Graphic/Structural Design
• Product Design
• Branding Industry Best Practices
• False/ Deceptive Advertising
• Corrective Advertising
• and all brand related issues.

Rob has commissioned literally hundreds of consumer surveys and is uniquely qualified to determine the results of all research. He has worked for attorneys on both the plaintiff and defense sides of his cases. He is effective and efficient with the average project report requiring between 10 and 12 hours.

Bonneau Dickson, P.E. is a sanitary engineer with forty years of experience in all aspects of potable water, wastewater and stormwater design and construction management.  He has provided forensic sanitary engineering expertise and served as an expert witness for 25 years.  He has been deposed approximately 100 times and has testified in trials, arbitrations or mediations more than a dozen times.  He has worked both in the U.S, and abroad.

Mr. Dickson has designed approximately 300 water, wastewater, and stormwater projects. Has been resident engineer or otherwise participated in the construction phase of approximately 20 water and wastewater projects. Mr. Dickson has both project management and general management experience as project manager on approximately 175 projects. Mr. Dickson served as forensic technical consultant or expert witness on more than 100 cases. With his decades of experience, he understands not only the engineering aspects, but also the financial, managerial, political, and personal aspects of legal issues. Mr. Dickson's expert services include succinct reports with explanations of complex engineering matters in layman’s language. 

Areas of Expertise:

Sewage Overflows Wastewater Facilities Design Wastewater Facilities Planning Septic Systems Water Facilities Design

Water Facilities Planning Standard of Care Stormwater Facilities Design Stormwater Facilities Planning PCE Contamination

Education - BS Civil Engineering, GA Tech; MS Sanitary Engineering, GA Tech; MA Sanitary Engineering, Harvard University; Master Of Business Administration, Harvard University View Bonneau Dickson's Consulting Profile.

James Caylor, PE, is an independent consulting Mechanical Engineer specializing in NH₃ and CO₂ Refrigeration Systems used in process and cold storage applications. Clients have included Leprino  Foods, Safeway, Dreyer’s, Tyson, ConAgra, Unilever, Nestlé, Imperial Irrigation District, Lineage Logistics, and Grupo Kuo (Kekén).

Background Information - Mr. Caylor's first 15 years in the refrigeration business were spent as a service and startup technician, including a UA steamfitter apprenticeship, 11 years in the industrial field and the final 8 years self-employed as Caylor Refrigeration. He then returned to college and graduated from Arizona State University in 2000 with a BSME. 

Mr. Caylor worked as a project engineer for two design/build contractors and became a PE before moving to Tyson Foods’ corporate design group in 2005. He joined Jacobs Engineering’s Food and Beverage Group in Fort Worth in 2007, finished in 2013 as Deputy Director in charge of all refrigeration projects and opened his own consulting firm in 2014.

Litigation Support - Mr. Caylor has been retained in seven expert witness cases, including one completed and two more scheduled  depositions. Two of these are currently preparing for trial and one for arbitration. Disputes tend to fall into one of three categories:  

Component Function - System Design / Installation/ Operation - Regulatory Compliance

Mr. Caylor has also consulted for lawyers representing a food processing firm facing EPA citations at multiple plants. His forensic analysis services are available to attorneys representing plaintiff and defendant and include site review, thorough reporting, depositions, and trial testimony as needed.

Areas of Expertise:

System Design and Design Review (owner’s agent) Mechanical Code Review (IIAR, IFC/IMC, ASME B31.5, ASHRAE Std 15) Operational analysis Industrial Process Refrigeration Cold Storage

Ammonia Carbon Dioxide Piping Insulation OSHA / EPA

View James Caylor's Consulting Profile.

Robert C. Hoffman Jr, PE, CFEI, is a licensed Professional Engineer certified as a Fire and Explosion Investigator. With 30 years of experience, the primary focus of his knowledge is a deep understanding and application of all aspects of Product Safety for the Consumer Goods Industry.

Background Experience: For 27 years, Mr. Hoffman worked with the Whirlpool Corporation in various roles. He served the company as a Drum Sub-System Design/Development Engineer, a Laundry Product Approval Engineer, and Dryer Platform Structures Sub-System Leader and Engineer. His final position with the company before retirement was Principal Engineer, a position he served in for 8 years. 

Mr. Hoffman's primary areas of specialization are Heat / Combustion Containment strategies, and Electrical System Design strategies in expected customer abnormal use.  His involvement in field investigation evaluations and product liability support allow him to understand how products react in the field and produce both relevance safety tests and design solutions.

Litigation Support: Mr. Hoffman works as an expert witness with clients needing to understand if a product in the field has some type of design or manufacturing defect, as well as clients needing support to defend their product against a potential field hazard allegation. His background in statistics and presentation of data allows him to take complex situations and break the information down into simple, yet accurate assessments of the situation.

Mr. Hoffman's services include product failure mode and effects analysis, root cause investigations, thorough reporting, depositions, and trial testimony as needed.

Areas of Expertise:

Product Safety / Appliance Safety Product Fire Hazard Electric Shock Lacerations Suffocation

Contact Burn Hazards  Warning Labels Faulted Components Clothes Dryer Fire Containment Code Evaluation

View Robert C. Hoffman's Consulting Profile.

James Rappoport, AIA, NCARB is Principal and Architect of Record at Daroff Design Inc. + DDI Architects PC, a full service Planning, Architectural & Interior Design practice founded in 1973 and specializing in ground-up, renovation and historic adaptive reuse projects for office facilities, hotels, resorts, restaurants, meeting, conference and training facilities, aviation terminals and entertainment projects throughout the USA and Internationally.

Mr. Rappoport has successfully provided technical consultation, expert witness opinions, affidavits, certificates of merit, depositions, mediation presentations, testimony and trial support in more than 190 legal cases, engaged by both defendants' and plaintiffs' legal teams.

Areas of Expertise:

Architecture Architectural Codes / Design & Standards Architectural Design Architectural Practice ADA - Accessibility Compliance ADA - Accessibility Design Building Codes & Ordinances Construction & Architecture Construction Claims Construction Disputes Facility Programming Furniture, Fixtures, & Equipment Specifications Furniture, Fixtures, & Equipment Failures

Hotel & Resort Design & Planning Interior Design & Planning Office Building Design & Planning Owner – Architect Agreements Owner – Contractor Agreements Professional Liability (Architecture & Design) Project Planning Slip – Fall Accident (Causes) Site Assessment & Development Site Planning & Design Standard of Care (Architecture & Design) Urban Design Urban Development & Planning

View James Rappoport's Consulting Profile.

James Parker has over 35 years of relevant industry experience specializing in Electronic Security Systems & Sensors, Electronics R&D, and New Product Development. He has in-depth knowledge of electronic product design in both Wired and Wireless Technologies and outstanding knowledge of Environmental and False Alarm Immunity. Products, such as alarm systems, that Mr. Parker led the design of, have an installed base in the millions. 

Litigation Support - Mr. Parker provides Patent Litigation support to counsel representing both Plaintiff and Defense and is experienced with civil liability, criminal and patent litigation, including Inter Partes Reviews (IPRs). He has the ability to explain complex technical material in a straight forward manner. Mr. Parker's past clients include Cravath, Swaine & Moore LLP, Weil, Gotshal & Manges LLP, Fish & Richardson PC, Alarm.com, 2GIG Technologies, and Nest Labs. His services are available nationally and internationally. 

Areas of Expertise:

Electronic Security Security Systems Burglar Alarm Systems Intrusion Detection Motion Detection Wireless Alarm Systems Wired Alarm Systems Occupancy Detection Systems Premises Security Residential and Commercial Security Inter Partes Reviews (IPRs)

Research and Development Engineering Management New Product Development Electronic Engineering Embedded Systems Alarm Control Panels PIR (Passive Infra-Red) Motion Detection uW (Microwave) Doppler Motion Detection Solar LED Flood Lights (Patio to Street Level) Patent Litigation Intellectual Property

Background - Mr. Parker is the Past Vice President of Engineering for Digital Security Controls Ltd. (DSC), a leading global manufacturer of electronic security systems and components with sales exceeding $400 million annually. He is currently the President at EE-Systems Group Inc. Canada (R&D) where he is responsible for overseeing new product and business development. A prolific inventor, Mr. Parker has been granted over 25 unique patents with approximately 100 patent documents published worldwide. 

View James Parker's Consulting Profile.

Highly Qualified Retail Accident Expert. Involved with many High Profile Retail Injury Cases Top 40 Retail Industry Leader ( DDI Magazine ) and Top 50 Retail Design Firm ( VMSD Magazine ) 2016 Slip, Trip, Fall & Safety Expert Witness of the Year - Corporate America Journal Expert for Retail accidents, slip and fall, display defects, construction issues, ADA and local codes. A 35 year veteran in the Retail Industry for all venues of Retail and Product Vendors, Product Showrooms, Display Design and manufacturing able to determine the cause and effect leading to accidents occurring inside and outside of stores. Other areas of expertise include Arena design, Furniture design, Office design, Product showroom design, licensing and branding agreements and product, display design, merchandising and product presentation. Review CV on website including two degrees in Architecture, Industry awards in Store and Display design, contributing editor of trade magazines, featured company at industry trade show "Store of the Future" area, high profile projects and clients. Extremely capable to cut to the chase, find relevant facts about the accident often not thought of by the attorney representing the Plaintiff or the Defendant. Over 30 cases handled in the last three years while maintaining the highly successful Retail Design Business.

View Jerry Birnbach's Consulting Profile.

Harvey C. Voris’ entire engineering career has been devoted to the Fitness Industry. He has over 35 years of Fitness Equipment Design experience and has been issued 7 U.S. utility patents. Mr. Voris has a Bachelors of Science in Engineering from UCLA with a specialization in Bio Structural Mechanics. 

Mr. Voris' Masters in Engineering is from Cal State Long Beach where he specialized in Fatigue and Failure Analysis. He has spent 21 years devoted to the development and promotion of safety standards for the fitness industry. Mr. Voris has authored numerous standards and has chaired the ASTM committee devoted to fitness standards development since 1995. 

Litigation Support - Mr. Voris provides engineering analysis and accident reconstruction related to consumer and fitness products and facilities. His services are available to attorneys representing both plaintiff and defense. With 35 years of experience, a biomechanics background, and extensive experience in design and product testing, Mr. Voris speaks with authority on the following critical issues:

Product Liability - Patent Development - Patent Infringement - Facility Risk Management - Standards Compliance

View Harvey Voris' Consulting Profile.

Brian Silowash, PE, CEM is the Owner and Founder of Innovative Design Engineering of America, LLC, a multi-discipline design and consulting engineering firm serving Manufacturing and Heavy Industry. A Certified Energy Manager, he has over 35 years of practical experience in Engineering Design and Construction.

Disciplines: Structural - Mechanical - Piping - HVAC - Electrical - Process Control

Background Experience: Mr. Silowash's experience has included plant layout, machine design, infrastructure for large steel mills, air pollution control (baghouses, scrubbers), waste-water treatment, recovery boiler rebuilds, Greenfield and Brownfield Sites, and energy conservation strategies. Industries served include Food and Beverage, Pulp and Paper, Chemicals, Metals, Glass, Manufacturing, and Industrial Insurance Claims.

Mr. Silowash lectures at Point Park University’s MS in Engineering Management program, and has taught an Environmental Engineering course at Point Park as an Adjunct Professor. He is the author of Piping Systems Manual, published by McGraw-Hill in 2010, a practical guide offering comprehensive information on piping design, installation, repair, codes, and specifications.

Litigation Support: Mr. Silowash offers legal services to attorneys representing plaintiff and defendant. His services include site review, thorough reporting, depositions, and trial testimony as needed. He is registered as a Professional Engineer in Pennsylvania, Georgia, Alabama, Florida, California, New York, and Ohio.

Areas of Expertise:

Industrial Piping Facilities Engineering Industrial Infrastructure Mechanical Process Equipment Construction Documents Damage Assessments following Disasters Contract Disputes Piping Systems Fall Protection

Building Codes Piping Codes Steel Production Pulp & Paper Heavy Industry Chemical Plants Engineer Disputes Errors & Omissions OSHA

Food Service & Restaurant Design Consultant. I have been involved in the design of restaurants and commercial kitchens for over 10 years. I have personally designed over 125 restaurants including front of house and back kitchen design, including project management. I have a B.A. in interior design. I have worked on projects throughout the United States and Phillipines, and Honduras.

Over the last 2 years I have owned my own company which has provided complete construction drawings for over 30 restaurants ranging from 1,500 sq. ft. to over 3,000 sq. ft. I have also been retained by architects and business owners to provide coordination drawings for commercial kitchen design for over 35 projects ranging in size from 1,000 sq. ft to 5,000 sq. ft. I have also worked on franchise restaurant projects for McDonalds, Chevy's Mexican Restaurant, Jamba Juice, Tahoe Joe's, Taxi's Hamburgers.

Rudolph P. Frizzi, PE, GE, D.GE is a Civil Engineer with over 25 years of extensive practical Foundation and Geotechnical Engineering experience. Mr. Frizzi has extensive project management experience throughout the United States and internationally, with particular emphasis on:

• Foundation Design and Construction in Urban Areas
• Large Scale Land and Waterfront Public and Private Development Projects

Mr. Frizzi has obtained extensive field, office supervision, and project management experience including soil and rock sampling and in-situ testing; monitoring pre , during, and post-construction with state-of-the-art geotechnical instrumentation; nondestructive testing; aqueous and sub-aqueous inspections and investigations; and heavy construction which has contributed to his practical approach to geotechnical problem solving. In addition to his "engineer of record" experience, Mr. Frizzi has provided expert geotechnical consultation and trial testimony on over 50 excavation and foundation litigation cases throughout the United States and internationally. His services are available to attorneys for Plaintiff and Defense.

Areas of Forensic Expertise:

• Foundations for Stadiums, Arenas, High-Rise Structures in Urban Areas
• Embankment and Dam Stability
• Large-scale Land and Waterfront / Marine Structures and Development
• Shallow and Deep Foundation Systems
• Soft and Hard Rock Treatment
• Earthwork
• Ground Improvement of Waste Fills
• Temporary and Permanent Lateral Support Systems for Deep Excavations
• Geotechnical Instrumentation and Vibration Monitoring
• Construction Dewatering

View Rudolph Frizzi's Consulting Profile.