Veterinary surgeon, Jeremy Stattersfield, has been guiding courts on veterinary medicine since 1981. He told us how he got into the Expert Witness world; what motivates him; and shares his observations and advice for Experts from all professions.
I'd been qualified as a vet for three months when I wrote my first Expert Report.
I was doing locum work in Norfolk when an RSPCA inspector walked in with a dog which we believed had been starved. I managed to put a Report together and it went through as a starvation case. I didn’t end up in the witness box on that occasion, which is probably a good thing as I’d had no formal training as an Expert Witness at that point!
I’ve always balanced clinical work with Expert Witness work.
More often than not, at the beginning of a busy evening of consultations, the RSPCA would phone up and ask whether somebody could come and have a look at a case. It’s something I’m very committed to, so the answer was always yes – and I’d work out the logistics afterwards.
All of my work is about making animals better.
I could be stitching a wound up, stopping a dog having unwanted litters by neutering them, or moving them to a situation where their life will be better. That is the goal of what I’m doing.
My bread and butter is the Animal Welfare Act 2006.
Before that was introduced, there was only the Protection of Animals Act 1911. It only really dealt with suffering – not welfare – so it was only in very extreme cases that you could prosecute.
With the Animal Welfare Act, we can do more. It means that we can get animals out of a situation where the owner, not necessarily through any malice, is failing.
I also work with the Hunting Act and Wildlife and Countryside Act. I see animals being kept in captivity by wildlife rehabilitators that should not be being kept in captivity.
Most of my cases come via the RSPCA.
Those are the easier cases in many ways, because the RSPCA inspectors are usually very experienced. I also work with local councils and the police.
Quite commonly, the police will go in to find drugs or because of domestic abuse and they’ll find an animal they regard as suffering or neglected. Under the Police and Criminal Evidence Act Section 19, they’re able to take the animal out of the situation as evidence.
Expert Witnesses have to take an impartial view and try to find the reality of what was intended.
My veterinary work has always paid the bills: I don’t do Expert Witness work for the money. My concern is for the welfare of the animal, not the pay check. It means I can be truly independent as an Expert Witness and there are no conflicts of interest, because my job doesn’t depend on the outcome of any cases.
I'm unlike a lot of Expert Witnesses.
Often, I'm also a witness of fact and a professional witness [a person who has a professional qualification and has some direct professional involvement in the facts of the case].
So I’m not just reviewing evidence given to me – I’m usually directly involved, on the ground, collecting and consolidating evidence and combining my findings with the findings of others investigating the case.
It means I that approach my report in two halves: I note the clinical and other onsite findings and also produce an interpretation for the court.
While a vet can say the animal is in pain and give it a painkiller, they can't say the suffering was unnecessary. That’s where my Expert Witness role kicks in.
Being an Expert Witness means taking in all the facts.
I will be involved in a case where there are multiple knocks on doors at one moment and animals may be spread over a large area and will go to different vets. There used to be a lack of standardised paperwork, so I’d be trying to persuade multiple vet surgeons to all follow the same process.
I've since produced paperwork which covers that, to try and help everyone complete the same forms so that we have something present in court that is consistent across the board.
I go to court every two to three months.
The main advice I would give to anybody being cross-examined is: take a bag with you and leave your ego in it at the door!
Ultimately, the court process is about achieving what is fair. I make sure I keep a mental image of an animal in the case to maintain my composure, my clarity and my patience. That's really important.
When it comes to being cross-examined, I use the old phrase: fail to prepare and you prepare to fail.
I never ever say, “because I think so”. That does seem to be a pit that many Experts fall into. I always have research papers to back up what I'm saying and I list papers as references.
I've never been appointed as a Single Joint Expert.
The number of Experts for the defence seems to have gone down in the last few years, perhaps because fewer experts are willing to act for the defence. I’m asked to produce a joint statement with the opposing Expert Witness, usually by direction from the judge, once every couple of years. I think if you're concise and fair with your statement, there is less to argue.
I actually prefer it when there's an Expert Witness for the other side.
You can prepare a joint statement and you can sit on a Zoom call and you can agree on what you agree and differ on what you disagree with. I think it’s a very positive step forward and it’s really helped, because it avoids Google Doctor trying to cross-examine me!
I try to keep a balance being appointed by the prosecution and the defence.
It's actually very hard to achieve because when I'm approached by the defence, I obviously look at the evidence impartially and my Report may not be in line with their expectations.
One of the common things with defence Experts in the veterinary world would be to try and pick on detail – like pointing out that a charge has been brought under the wrong section, even when an animal’s welfare is at risk – which is a fair legal method. But I would find that hard to do. I like to focus on the actual, central issues.
I would always criticize anybody acting as an Expert Witness in a veterinary case who hadn't got recent clinical experience.
Though I have recently sold my veterinary practice, I’m focussing my clinical work on wildlife and am working with the police on the immobilisation of dangerous dogs.
My last operation at my practice was neutering a cat called James Bond! I thought that castrating James Bond seemed a very good way to go out.
The sheer amount of video and photographic evidence can be overwhelming.
I had a case a few months ago where I received 247 images of one dog on a day of seizure. With digital imaging, it's too easy to take 10 pictures which aren't quite right rather than one picture that is correct. Of course, as the Expert Witness, you have to go through all of those because you can't be selective in your evidence.
I don't understand why Experts produce long Reports.
I rarely write a Report over nine or 10 pages. I think that there are crucial points which you have to discuss: anything else becomes noise. Keeping the report quite tight is really key.
Expert Witness work is very rewarding.
It’s the reward of seeing a dog come in emaciated and going out healthy to a new home. Or going into a house where a Yorkshire Terrier is in kept in a cage that it can’t stand up in. Taking them out of those cages and cleaning them up and sending them off to a new home is more rewarding than a cat spay.
My advice for other Expert Witnesses is…
Always sit on both sides of the table – the prosecution and the defence. Be fair and even-handed. And always leave your ego out of anything you're doing.