Plaintiffs Josepha Austin, Robin Cruz, Gordana Pobric, and Jennifer Haselman brought this action claiming harm resulting from their exposure to polychlorinated biphenyls (“PCBs”).
Defendants Monsanto Company, Bayer CropScience, L.P., Solutia, Inc., and Pharmacia L.L.C. (collectively “Monsanto”) filed a motion to exclude the testimony of Dr. Gayle Morse. Plaintiffs intended to call Morse to testify about cognitive injuries they allegedly suffered as a result of PCB exposures.
Psychology Expert Witness
Gayle Morse is a licensed psychologist and neuropsychologist in New York State. She holds a doctorate in counseling psychology and is a tenured professor at Russell Sage College, where she serves as the internship director of the mental health counseling and community program. She currently teaches psychology courses and maintains a private clinical practice.
Morse has been involved in PCB research since 1994. Her work has included multiple studies on the impacts of PCBs on members of the Akwesasne Mohawk Tribe. That work reportedly included the neuropsychological testing of hundreds of people who were exposed to PCBs. Morse has authored several peer-reviewed articles on the effects of PCB exposure on human populations, and has testified that one of her projects revealed evidence of adverse effects of PCBs on human neuropsychological functioning.
Discussion by the Court
In her expert report, Morse concluded, “with a reasonable degree of medical/scientific certainty, that the above exposures to PCBs are consistent with [Plaintiffs’] injuries and that said PCB exposures were a significant contributing cause to their cognitive conditions.”
Monsanto’s challenge to Morse focuses on her qualifications and the reliability of her conclusions.
Qualifications
With respect to her qualifications, Monsanto noted that Morse spends most of her professional time working in academia, with her clinical practice occupying only one day per week. Within her clinical practice, she generally treats people with severe psychopathology such as schizophrenia or long-term trauma. In her deposition testimony, she distinguished her practice from that of a neuropsychologist.
She also testified that she performs neuropsychology evaluations approximately twice a year. Monsanto criticized Morse for not being board certified in neuropsychology. The Court found that board certification is only relevant in the context of an expert’s other qualifications.
Morse concedes that she is not a neuropsychologist, and that she only conducts such testing occasionally.
The neuropsychological tests in this case were administered by Dr. Eric Mart. Monsanto did not challenge his qualifications to perform and interpret such testing.
The Court held that Morse is not testifying outside her area of expertise. Nor is she merely relaying the opinion of Mart. Indeed, there is no suggestion that Mart formed any sort of opinion regarding the impact of PCBs. Instead, it is Morse who independently reviewed the test results and formed an opinion about how those results align with her knowledge about the potential impacts of PCB exposure.
Reliability
Morse reviewed not only Mart’s test results, but also the reports of Plaintiffs’ experts Kevin Coghlan, who generated data regarding PCB levels at Burlington High School, and Dr. Paul Rosenfeld, who opined on the level of hazard resulting from those PCB levels. She further reviewed the report generated by Dr. David Carpenter, with whom she has worked in the past and who offered his opinion as to general causation. In the course of preparing her own report, Morse interviewed each Plaintiff. Applying her professional knowledge, Morse developed opinions about the individual health impacts of PCB exposures. Her report explicitly states that she considered other possible causes of Plaintiffs’ conditions, and that she reached her conclusions with a reasonable degree of medical or scientific certainty.
Monsanto is critical of Morse’ use of Plaintiffs’ “premorbid functioning” as a tool for determining that PCBs played a role in causing their conditions.
In her deposition, Morse explained that she was not able to rule out the impact of all other factors, such as one Plaintiff’s tuberculosis or another’s thyroid condition, since she is not a physician.
Aside from those issues, she was able to compare the Plaintiffs’ abilities and achievements prior to their time at Burlington High School with their abilities after their respective PCB exposures, note the differences, and opine as to cause. Her caveats about certain medical conditions did not undermine her methodologies, and instead left room for cross-examination and argument regarding her conclusions.
Monsanto’s final criticism of Morse is that she did not identify the dose at which PCBs could be expected to cause the conditions discussed in her report. However, more than one expert in this case has offered the opinion that the dose-response relationship for PCBs may be nonlinear, and even non-threshold.
Held
The Court denied Monsanto’s motion to exclude the testimony of Gayle Morse, Ph.D.
Key Takeaway:
Plaintiffs have shown by a preponderance of the evidence that Morse is qualified and that the data on which she is relying, which includes both neurological testing and PCB exposure estimates, is sufficient and reliable. Moreover, Plaintiffs have carried their burden of showing that Morse is applying reliable methodologies based on her significant experience with PCB studies, that she reliably applied accepted principles and methodologies to the facts of this case, and that her testimony will assist the trier of fact.
Case Details:
| Case Caption: | Austin V. Monsanto Company |
| Docket Number: | 2:23cv272 |
| Court Name: | United States District Court, Vermont |
| Order Date: | December 01, 2025 |
