Page 12 - Expert Witness

 AICPA Statement on Standards for Valuation Services No. 1, Valuation of a Business, Business
Ownership Interest, Security, or Intangible Asset

 AICPA SSFS No. 1

Other Guidance

The practitioner should ask the client or the client’s attorney to provide the appropriate guidance appli-
cable to the practitioner’s forensic work before undertaking any substantive forensic accounting ser-
vices. If the client or the client’s attorney is unfamiliar with the specific requirements, the practitioner
can perform research or, alternatively, engage his or her own legal counsel to determine the guidance to
follow.

Federal, State, and Local Requirements

Federal, state, and local administrative, court, and jurisdictional standards, procedures, rules, and proto-
cols differ. For example, state courts have differing requirements related to the designation and disclo-
sure of expert witnesses, the admissibility of expert testimony, the filing of expert witness reports, and
the use of courtroom demonstratives, among other matters. Refer to appendix D, "Courts and Websites,"
for a listing of federal and state courts and their websites.

The Federal Rules of Evidence applicable to expert witnesses in federal civil matters are as follows:

 Rule 702, "Testimony by Expert Witnesses"

 Rule 703, "Bases of an Expert’s Opinion Testimony"

 Rule 704, "Opinion on an Ultimate Issue"

 Rule 705, "Disclosing the Facts or Data Underlying an Expert’s Opinion"

 Rule 706, "Court-Appointed Expert Witnesses"

Rule 26, "Duty to Disclose; General Provisions Governing Discovery," of the Federal Rules of Civil
Procedure describes, among other things, the following:

 Requirements for disclosure, including electronically stored information (ESI)

 Reports and testimony of expert witnesses

 Basis upon which a federal trial judge can disallow opinion testimony by lay witnesses

 Determination of whether testimony by experts meets the minimum standards

 Identification of the bases of opinion testimony by expert

Refer to appendix E, "Excerpts of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure and the Federal Rules of Evi-
dence," for applicable sections of the rules, as well as citations to websites containing the rules.

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