Expert Witness:Maria's death was the fault of the Sheriffs Office

This article looks at the case of Maria Teresa Macias. Macias was killed by her husband Avelino Macias.  The Sonoma County Sheriffs Office were the ones dealing with this case. It was states that Maria had contacted the Sheriffs office on more that 22 different occasions leading up to her death.  In this documentation Macias family is suing the Sheriffs department for not acting properly to the act of domestic violence that lead up to the domestic homicide of Maria Teresa Macias. Maria's family claims that the Sheriffs Office neglected to take her case seriously becasue she was not only a women but a latino woman. In this case a expert witness, San Diego Police sergeant Anne O'Dell was brought in to review the case. In the link I provided below you can see the way in which O'Dell went about determining that the Sonoma County Sheriffs office did indeed neglect an attempt to prevent this homicide from happening . O'Dell states that in many case and situations the Sheriffs Office could have responded but simply brushed the numerous 911 phone calls away. Personally I think the article is very interesting. We hear a lot about expert witnesses in trials but I have never actually seen a case in which one has been used and ultimately determined the outcome. I am sure there are many cases out there where this has been the case (otherwise expert witnesses wouldn't be as important as they are).

http://www.justicewomen.com/witness.html