Plaintiff Jacqueline Garrison applied for a job as a United Airlines ramp service employee. Garrison, like all ramp service applicants, had to perform a physical capability assessment. Like all applicants, Garrison had to fill out several forms, provided by Datafit, before taking the physical test. Garrison argued that the Consent & Authorization Form solicits family medical history in violation of the Illinois Genetic Information Privacy Act.
Plaintiff has retained an expert, Dr. J. Richard Ludgin, who will testify that the consent form targets the identification of information that Plaintiff argued constitutes genetic information under GIPA’s broad definitions for same.
United filed a motion to exclude the testimony of Garrison’s expert, Ludgin, pursuant to Federal Rule of Evidence 702 and the Daubert standard.
Healthcare Administration Expert Witness
Dr. John Richard Ludgin is the the former Chief Medical Officer of BayCare Health System, Inc. Since 1998, he has held senior hospital leadership roles, often titled Chief Medical Officer, though his responsibilities have consistently extended beyond traditional clinical leadership. In addition, he has played key roles in Joint Commission compliance, both local and national healthcare initiatives, clinical quality improvement, patient safety, IRB oversight, clinical research, protocol development and implementation, quality outcomes reporting, clinical risk management and regulatory compliance.
Discussion by the Court
Ludgin’s Opinion Is Not the Product of Reliable Principles and Methods
United argued that Ludgin does not base his opinion on any reliable principle or method. Ludgin’s opinion focuses on the following language from the consent form: “I understand that I must notify the technician administering the assessment if I have any ailments that may impede my performance of the assessment.”
In a written declaration, Ludgin asserted that this language on the consent form “reasonably and implicitly required” “family history of certain conditions” because these conditions “may constitute inherited bodily disorders which could impede the prospective employee’s performance of the assessment.”
Then, during his deposition, Ludgin tried to flesh out his analysis. He testified that a job applicant could be inclined to provide more information than what the employer had requested because “people who are looking to get hired are very solicitous, especially when they want the job … they’re usually pretty forthcoming … more broadly than what is asked or what’s required, and maybe even into the realm of what’s prohibited to be requested.”
Anslysis
Nothing in Ludgin’s professional experience suggests that he is an expert in human resources, hiring processes, or the psychology of job applicants. At best, he testified that he has hired some unspecified number of people at unspecified times in the past.
As a result, Ludgin’s testimony to that effect does not support his opinion regarding what information United’s consent form sought.
The same is true for other support Ludgin proffered for his opinion: that, in his professional experience working in the healthcare industry, patients filling out consent forms construe “words like” “ailment” “much more broadly” and less “precisely” than medical practitioners. This phenomenon of imprecision may be true of patients receiving medical care—where Ludgin’s professional experience lies. Again, however, Ludgin did not connect the dots to the instant case.
Ludgin did not point to anything in his professional experience that led him to the conclusion that the “common sense” or “just in general” meaning of “ailment” includes family health history.
A jury is perfectly capable of assessing the “common sense” or “general” meaning of the word “ailment” themselves, without Ludgin’s input. The Court held that his opinion was unhelpful and inadmissible.
Held
The Court granted United’s motion to exclude Dr. J. Richard Ludgin’s opinions.
Key Takeaway
Ludgin has not connected his decades in healthcare administration to the question at hand: How a reasonable person, filling out the consent form pursuant to their United job application, would understand the statement: “I understand that I must notify the technician administering the assessment if I have any ailments that may impede my performance of the assessment.”
Case Details:
| Case Caption: | McKnight V. United Airlines, Inc |
| Docket Number: | 1:23cv16118 |
| Court Name: | United States District Court, Illinois Northern |
| Order Date: | March 30, 2026 |
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