Michael Welner - The Forensic Panel

The Forensic Panel

Welner is founder and Chairman of The Forensic Panel, a multi-specialty forensic practice which employs peer-review of its forensic consultation. The objective of peer review, pursuant to the protocols established by The Forensic Panel, is intended to minimize examiner bias by subjecting forensic assessment to the formal evaluation and scrutiny of peers, who critique the diligence, objectivity, and adherence to standards of the work. The Forensic Panel is composed of over thirty practitioner members who provide forensic consultation in psychiatry, psychology, neuroradiology, emergency and critical care medicine, nursing, toxicology, and pathology.

Welner's theories and practice regarding The Forensic Panel's “peer-review” are controversial, and have been criticized for Welner using employees rather than independent experts to conduct the review. The practice has also been criticized for the level of fees it generates, for making Welner's testimony and conclusions less credible, and for generating excessive fees. Prosecutors in two cases have said that they were misled by Welner as to the manner in which he marked up fees above those of the persons he hired as peer reviewers. For example, in April 2012 the US District Court for the Northern District Georgia ruled that the Forensic Panel’s psychiatric report prepared for the prosecution in the capital homicide case against Brian Richardson be thrown out due to testimony that neuropsychologist Joel Morgan had consulted other Panel experts before interviewing the defendant and writing his initial report. In his ruling, Judge Clarence Cooper found that The Forensic Panel’s practices amounted to co-authorship rather than “peer-review” and that the court was thereby misled, thereby violated the terms of the court’s rulings regarding expert witnesses. The prosecutors stated that they were unaware until it was brought out in court that Welner was charging them a $200–$250 markup on his employee's witness fees.