Legal Expert Was Barred From Opining on Good Time Credits
Posted on December 3, 2025 by Expert Witness Profiler
This litigation arises from Plaintiff Raymond Flanks’ (“Plaintiff”) wrongful conviction for first-degree murder in 1985. Plaintiff alleged that the Orleans Parish District Attorney’s Office (“OPDA”) secured his wrongful conviction in violation of his constitutional rights by withholding material exculpatory evidence.
Plaintiff retained Robert Lancaster, a lawyer, as an expert in Louisiana parole and pardon law.
Lancaster’s opinions concern when Plaintiff would have been released from prison on his sentence for armed robbery if he had not also been convicted of first-degree murder. Defendants contended that Lancaster’s testimony should be excluded because his expert report does not show that his opinions are reliably based on his experience or on the evidence in this case.
Law And Legal Expert Witness
Robert Edward Lancaster spent eleven years teaching the Parole and Reentry Clinic at the Louisiana State University Law Center and representing over 100 individuals seeking early release on parole or a reduction of sentence through clemency before the Louisiana Board of Pardons and the Committee on Parole.
Lancaster has been a professor at LSU Law since 2009, and prior to that he taught at Yale Law School, American University School of Law, and Indiana University School of Law. Before going into academia, Lancaster worked as a public defender for seven years.
Discussion by the Court
Defendants argued that the proposed testimony of Lancaster was unreliable because he provided no explanation for his conclusion that the Department of Corrections would have applied a 50% diminution rate to Plaintiff’s sentence for armed robbery. Defendants pointed out that Lancaster cited no laws, regulations, or authoritative sources regarding parole and calculation of good time credits.
The Court found Lancaster’s proposed testimony to be unhelpful, as the substance of his opinion can easily be addressed by a jury instruction. This Court reviewed Lancaster’s expert report and found that it clearly invades the province of the Court to instruct the jury on any applicable law.
The report did not provide any explanation on how Lancaster reached this conclusion. It appeared that Lancaster may have reached this conclusion based on his experience teaching the Parole and Reentry Clinic at LSU Law for the past 11 years. The report did not cite any laws or regulations upon which Lancaster relied.
The Court will provide the jury with a jury instruction on the law regarding good time credits. Lancaster did not provide any additional opinions beyond that law. He stated only that Plaintiff “could have been eligible for ‘good time’ release after serving seven years and six months.” He did not opine as to any factors that the Department of Corrections may have considered in determining Plaintiff’s eligibility for release. Therefore, his opinion provided only a legal conclusion that Plaintiff could have been eligible for good time release after serving half of his sentence for armed robbery.
Held
The Court granted the Defendants’ motion to exclude the testimony of Robert Lancaster.
Key Takeaway:
Lancaster’s expert report clearly invaded the province of the Court to instruct the jury on any applicable law. An expert may never render conclusions of law that would constitute an invasion of the province of the Court to determine the applicable law and to instruct the jury as to that law.
Please refer to the blog previously published about this case:
Vocational Evaluation Expert Allowed to Opine on Lost Earning Capacity
Case Details:
| Case Caption: | Flanks V. City Of New Orleans |
| Docket Number: | 2:23cv6897 |
| Court Name: | United States District Court, Louisiana Eastern |
| Order Date: | December 01, 2025 |
