Anaheim California Expert Witness Engineer Directory

Agent Not Liable for Loss Given Insured’s Vague Instructions for Coverage

April 08, 2026 — Tred R. Eyerly - Insurance Law Hawaii
The Illinois Appellate Court affirmed the district court’s grant of summary judgment to the insured’s agent because there was no breach of duty. Jon Van Order v. Hauk, et al., 2025 Ill. App. Unpub. LEXIS 2378 (Ill. Ct. App. Dec. 23, 2025). The insured began renovating a vacant home in October 2018. He met with agent Joseph Hauk and explained the property was vacant and would be going through renovations for the next several months. Hauk then procured a policy through Shelter Insurance Company insuring the vacant property against several specified perils. The policy provided coverage for water damage if “[t]he exterior of the building sustained a covered loss” and “that loss created an opening through which the water entered.” Damage caused by escaping water from within a plumbing system was excluded if: (1) the damage was caused by a “continuous or repeated leakage over a period of fourteen days or more” or (2) the insured premises had been vacant for 30 consecutive days immediately preceding the loss. Read the full story...
Reprinted courtesy of Tred R. Eyerly, Damon Key Leong Kupchak Hastert
Mr. Eyerly may be contacted at te@hawaiilawyer.com

UPDATED: No Easy Fix for Potomac River Sewage Spill, Now Estimated at $20M

April 08, 2026 — Jim Parsons & Debra K. Rubin - Engineering News-Record
One month after a collapsed pipeline north of Washington, D.C., spilled about 240 million gallons of raw sewage into the Potomac River and possibly between 300 and 400 million—which could be the largest wastewater spill in U.S. history—efforts are progressing to clear the damaged section and begin repairs despite weather and other impacts. Reprinted courtesy of Jim Parsons, Engineering News-Record and Debra K. Rubin, Engineering News-Record Ms. Rubin may be contacted at rubind@enr.com Read the full story...

When Logic Doesn’t Matter: Why ‘Irrational’ Isn’t a Ground to Overturn an Arbitration Award in Tennessee

November 09, 2025 — Matthew DeVries - Best Practices Construction Law
Arbitration has long been viewed as a faster, more efficient alternative to litigation. But anyone involved in construction disputes today knows that is not always the case. The process can be just as costly, sometimes taking as long as a court case. Yet one thing remains consistent, and it is the most important point for everyone in the construction process to understand before signing an arbitration clause: once an arbitrator decides, that decision is almost always final. That reality was reinforced in a recent Tennessee Court of Appeals decision, MidSouth Construction, LLC v. Burstiner (June 12, 2025) (pdf). The case involved a homeowner who tried to overturn an arbitration award following a dispute about defective deck construction. The homeowner argued that the arbitrator’s decision was “fundamentally irrational.” The court rejected that argument. Read the full story...
Reprinted courtesy of Matthew DeVries, Buchalter
Mr. DeVries may be contacted at mdevries@buchalter.com

Leaders in Dispute Resolution Need to Make Unbiased Decisions for Mediation to Succeed

March 31, 2026 — Rick G. Erickson - Snell & Wilmer
As a mediator helping to settle construction disputes and as an arbitrator deciding outcomes of these disputes, I found certain lessons to be especially helpful after graduating last summer from the Executive Education program at Harvard Kennedy School (HKS). The exceptional HKS curriculum included courses focused on negotiation strategies for multiparty disputes, decisive leadership during crisis, and human behavior affecting dispute resolution. In particular, our HKS class debated the impact of cognitive bias in dispute resolution, and we studied a central theme that decision-making is universally scientific. That is, parties making decisions in dispute resolution exhibit and rely upon empirical factors that good mediators and decision makers should appreciate and understand. Bias, for example, can cause key players to discount persuasive witnesses, admissible evidence, and reliable expert opinions that influence the outcome of a construction dispute. Biased decision makers may also choose to withhold key information from the mediator, as though doing so will help rather than hurt what is supposed to be an objective and diplomatic process. Read the full story...
Reprinted courtesy of Rick G. Erickson, Snell & Wilmer
Mr. Erickson may be contacted at rerickson@swlaw.com

CEO: Power Isn’t the Only Electrical Challenge for AI Data Centers

April 14, 2026 — Francesco "Frio" Iorio - Engineering News-Record
Everyone knows that data centers are voracious consumers of electricity. In fact, the U.S. is currently scrambling to meet unprecedented levels of power demand not seen since the early days of electrification and the widespread adoption of air conditioning. Read the full story...
Reprinted courtesy of Francesco "Frio" Iorio, Engineering News-Record
ENR may be contacted at enr@enr.com

Construction Expert and Judge Living in the Same Hood Is Not Grounds For Recusal

December 08, 2025 — Matthew DeVries - Best Practices Construction Law
In a recent Tennessee Court of Appeals decision, Nowaczyk v. Daniels Construction (Nov. 4, 2025), a contractor tried to disqualify the trial judge because the judge happened to live in the same neighborhood as a potential expert witness for the homeowners. The court’s response? Proximity isn’t prejudice. The dispute started when homeowners sued Daniels Construction for allegedly botched remodeling work. When the judge disclosed during a hearing that he lived near the plaintiffs’ proposed expert, the defense moved to have him recused from the case. They argued that prior cases involving the same expert had led to recusals. The trial judge, however, made clear there was no personal or professional relationship with the expert and denied the motion. Read the full story...
Reprinted courtesy of Matthew J. DeVries, Buchalter
Mr. DeVries may be contacted at mdevries@buchalter.com

Recovering Attorney’s Fees and Arguing the Fees Are Inextricably Intertwined

December 02, 2025 — David Adelstein - Florida Construction Legal Updates
Attorney’s fees are a big part of any dispute. And the attorney’s fees should be because fees are a factor and can ultimately drive the outcome of a dispute. No one wants to spend $100,000 in fees to recover $100,000, so the conversation regarding attorney’s fees needs to be had early. Generally, a party can recover reasonable attorney’s fees if authorized by contract or by statute. So, there would need to be a prevailing party attorney’s fees provision in a contract, if suing on a contract, or there would need to be a statute authorizing the recovery of attorney’s fees, if suing on a statute. Then, there is authority that the party still needs to prevail on the significant issues in the dispute, as determined by the trial court (or binding arbitrator), in order to be the prevailing party for purposes of attorney’s fees. (Absent that, you are dealing with a proposal for settlement to create a procedural basis to recover fees, which is explained here.) Reasonable attorney’s fees, however, does not mean you will recover 100% of your attorney’s fees. Some percentage will presumably be discounted meaning becoming 100% whole when factoring in attorney’s fees is not always a practical outlook. Read the full story...
Reprinted courtesy of David Adelstein, Kirwin Norris
Mr. Adelstein may be contacted at dma@kirwinnorris.com

At Lake Powell, Engineering Is Outpacing Colorado River Policy

February 10, 2026 — Bryan Gottlieb - Engineering News-Record
Arizona’s Lake Powell is in trouble. U.S. Bureau of Reclamation modeling shows the reservoir dropped roughly 36 ft between December 2024 and December 2025, a decline that is no longer a warning but an operating condition engineers are designing around. Read the full story...
Reprinted courtesy of Bryan Gottlieb, Engineering News-Record
Mr. Gottlieb may be contacted at gottliebb@enr.com

ANAHEIM CALIFORNIA CONSTRUCTION EXPERT WITNESS DIRECTORY AND CAPABILITIES