Linguistics Expert Witnesses: 5

Margaret M. van Naerssen, PhD, (Applied Linguistics - language development and sociolinguistics) is an Expert in Second Language Development and Language Assessment, as well as Language in Social Contexts. Since 1997, she has done consultant work in forensic contexts, focusing primarily on cases involving non-native English speakers.

Dr. van Naerssen brings her over 50 years of world-wide experience (US and 47 other countries) to legal cases involving non-native English speakers. She has strong language skills in Portuguese and Spanish, and range of functional skills in Dutch, French, Mandarin Chinese, Japanese, and some exposure to German, Malay, Cantonese, Russian, Samoan, Arabic, and Urdu. This gives her valuable insights on what it is like to be a non-native speaker and to function in different cultures. She has also specialized in workplace and professional communications especially in science and technology.

Since the early 1990s she has also been an English language specialist in short-term assignments through the US Department of State, the US Agency for International Development, the Asia Foundation, and the US Fulbright Commission. Assignments have been in South America, Asia, North Africa, and two independent consultancies in Taiwan and a consultancy in northern France. 

Dr. van Naerssen has taken a semester-long citizens' police academy course. She's made presentations at the FBI Academy, at a Florida Association of Defense Lawyers CLE, and at The Smithsonian Institute in a forensic sciences series. She was also was opening plenary speaker at a Pennsylvania State Trial Judges Conference. 

Litigation Support: 

Dr. van Naerssen has primarily consulted and testified in Forensic Linguistic cases involving non-native English speakers. She’s worked with both defense and prosecution primarily in criminal cases including murder, rape, drugs, money laundering, telecom fraud, robbery, illegal arrests, coercive interrogations, terrorist conspiracy, and violations of the Federal Individual Disabilities Act. Civil cases have included contract and plain language guidelines, slander, and medical malpractice.  

Dr. van Naerssen has worked primarily on cases in Daubert jurisdictions with one Frye exception, a state hearing in Pennsylvania. Her other 7 state cases (Daubert) have been in Florida, Illinois, New Hampshire, Ohio, Oregon, Tennessee, and Virginia (mixed Daubert & Frye). 

Federal cases in which she has provided expert support have been in the US District Court jurisdictions of Western District of Oklahoma, Eastern District of Pennsylvania, District of Southern California, Southern District of New York, District Court in Waco, Texas, and the District Court of Hawai’i. Three federal cases also involved the US Military, two of which proceeded to hearings and then to one testimony in a court martial trial (US Navy:  San Diego and Great Lakes). Another federal case involved the US Department of Labor.

Dr. van Naerssen has testified in 5 federal courts, in hearings, depositions stipulated by judge, and in bench trials. 

Robert A. Leonard, PhD, is a Linguistics and Language Analysis Expert with decades of experience in his field. Dr. Leonard is a Fulbright Fellow, Fellow of the Faculty of Columbia University, named Forensic Linguist of the Year by the GSFL, Teacher of the Year at Hofstra University, and Distinguished Faculty Lecturer at Hofstra. He founded and directs a fully accredited graduate program in Forensic Linguistics at Hofstra where he is a fully tenured Professor.

Experience: Dr. Leonard has been hired by the FBI Behavioral Analysis Unit, Canadian criminal profilers, RCMP, Danish police, British special intelligence units, US JTTF, and many others to work on linguistic cases.

Leonard was Apple's linguist in their trademark battles against both Amazon and Microsoft. In the Federal Southern District of NY in the $14 billion Chevron-Donziger case (Chevron Corp. v. Donziger, 11-cv-00691) District Court Judge Kaplan “fully credit[ed]” his analysis when he testified before him in 2013. 

Litigation Support: Dr. Leonard provides expert analysis of Language Evidence. He has been qualified as an Expert in Linguistics, under Frye and under Daubert, in 14 States and six Federal Districts: in State Courts in Arizona, California, Colorado, Florida, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Montana, New Jersey, New York, Nevada, Oregon, Pennsylvania, and South Carolina, in numerous U.S. District Courts, and he has testified before World Bank ICSID Tribunals in Washington, DC, and Paris.

Dr. Leonard has consulted on hundreds and hundreds of cases. He has been retained by both defendants and prosecutors to consult and/or testify in criminal cases involving murder, espionage, and other felonies, and he has consulted and/or testified for both plaintiffs and defendants in civil cases involving trademarks, plagiarism, libel, malpractice, and the meaning of contracts.

Areas of Linguistic Application:

View Dr. Leonard's Consulting Profile.

Paul T. Fogle, Ph.D., CCC-SLP, has been a Speech-Language Pathologist since 1971, working extensively in acute, subacute, and convalescent hospitals. He has maintained a private practice since 1980, specializing in children and adults with neurological disorders, stuttering, voice disorders, and cleft lip and palate.

Background Experience: Dr. Fogle was a university professor for 35 years (now Professor Emeritus), teaching primarily graduate courses in Neurology and Neuropathologies of Adults and Children, Swallowing Disorders / Dysphagia, Gerontology, Voice Disorders, Cleft Lip and Palate, and Counseling Skills for Speech-Language Pathologists. He has made almost 150 presentations at state, national, and international conventions and conferences, and has presented all-day seminars and workshops on a variety of topics in cities throughout the U.S. and in several foreign countries.

Dr. Fogle has authored or co-authored five textbooks (currently working on his sixth, Traumatic Brain Injury in Infants, Children, and Adolescents) and four therapy manuals that are used in universities, hospitals, rehabilitation centers, and clinics throughout the U.S. and other English-speaking countries.

Litigation Support: Dr. Fogle has worked as an expert witness for either plaintiff or defense on over 30 medical-legal cases and a few criminal cases. He has provided testimony in at least 15 depositions and a few court trials. He has attended trainings and seminars provided by attorneys and judges on writing IME reports and testifying in depositions and court trials. Dr. Fogle is available for telephone consultations and conferences, reviewing documents, and testifying in depositions and court trials. He will travel as needed.

With broad education, training, and experience, Dr. Fogle has the unique ability to work with a great variety of speech, language, cognitive, and swallowing disorders of children and adults, from neonatal intensive care units (NICU) to the last moments of life, and in numerous settings (schools, hospitals - [acute, subacute, convalescent], rehabilitation centers, clinics, and private practice).

Dr. Fogle has considerable expertise in reviewing large amounts of medical-legal documents (depositions, physician and hospital reports, educational records, and other documents), testifying in depositions, and some expertise in testifying in court trials. Of particular interest to him are challenging cases involving a neurological disorder, attention deficit disorder, stuttering, voice disorder, or cleft lip and palate. His cases have also included criminal, in which the person currently has or has had the need for services of a speech-language pathologist.

Areas of Expertise

View Dr. Fogle's Consulting Profile.

Reasoning, Inc. provides expert testimony for trademarks, defamation, authorship attribution, and communicative malpractice related to faulty tests and surveys. Reasoning is a group of doctoral-level linguists and logicians with superior understanding of all aspects of language. We do linguistic and logical analyses of publications, newspapers, books, letters, interviews, advertisements, manuals, contracts--to identify meanings, inferences, innuendoes, bias, actual malice, damage to reputation, similarity to other documents, copyright infringement, plagiarism, breach of contract, authorship, and fraud.

As a specialist in educational testing, Dr. Habick provides expert testimony on educational practices related to fairness, bias, psychometrics, and flawed test questions or testing programs. He provides Linguistic Analysis of news reports and other communications and in the assessment of Violations of Legal, Ethical, and Professional Standards.

Dr. Habick testified as an expert witness in linguistics in the U.S. District Court, Trenton, in The United States of America v. Tyshon Bey. Dr. Habick performed linguistic analyses on defamation and trademark cases for Pisanelli-Bice, Las Vegas; Shumaker, Loop & Kendrick, Tampa; Seed Intellectual Property Law Group, Seattle, and Perkins Coie, Seattle.

Reasoning, Inc. also provided expert testimony on unfair testing, grading, and educational practices for Seals v. State of Mississippi et al.

Areas of Expertise:

Professional Affiliations
American Dialect Society (ADS)
International Association of Forensic Linguists (IAFL)

Michael T. Motley, Ph.D. has over thirty-five years of experience in the fields of Communication & Psycholinguistics. Dr. Motley serves as an expert witness for opinions on the  clarity, lack of clarity, and most likely interpretation of common messages such as  warning labels, instructions, advertising, contracts, waivers, and so forth. He has served on over 30 cases; about 2/3 for plaintiff and 1/3 for defense. Dr. Motley is a Professor Emeritus of Communication at the University of California at Davis. He has authored almost 200 books, articles, and research papers in communication and psycholinguistics. He has won eighteen excellence awards for his research and was recognized as among the "Top 1%" of communication scholars of the 1970's, 1980's, and 1990's. Areas of Expertise:

• Communication Messages: Meaning, Ambiguity, Likely and Alternate Interpretations, Communicative Intention
• Adequacy/Inadequacy of Messages: Product Warnings, Instructions, Waivers, Advertisements
• Male / Female Misunderstandings: Sexual Consent/Resistance, Date Rape

Services Offered:

• Expert testimony & Consultation
• Opinion on Adequacy of Communication Messages
• Opinion on Likely Consumer Interpretation of Warnings, Instructions, Advertising
• Opinion on Likely Intrepretation of Sexual Resistance/Consent Messages and Behaviors
• Social-scientific testing of expert opinion (his and others')

View Consulting Profile.