¶1Whether a witness who is called as an expert has the requisite qualifications and knowledge to enable him to testify, is a preliminary question for the court. The decision of this question is conclusive, unless it appears upon the evidence to have been erroneous, or to have been founded upon some error in law. Nunes v. Perry, 113 Mass. 274, 276. Commonwealth v. Sturtivant, 117 Mass. 122. In the case at bar, no such error is shown; on the contrary, it appears that the witness had no knowledge of the quality of the coal in question, except through the reports of his engineer. Exceptions overruled.
132 Mass. 217
Perkins v. Stickney
Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court
Decided January 30, 1882
Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court · decided 1882-01-30
Contract upon an account annexed for coal sold and delivered. The answer set up a warranty by the plaintiffs that the coal should be first-class coal, and fully equal to the coal sold by one Job, and alleged a breach of the warranty. Trial in the Superior Court, before Staples, J., who allowed a bill of exceptions, in substance as follows: The plaintiffs were wholesale coal-dealers in New York. The defendants were wholesale and retail coal-dealers in Fall River.
Relies on Commonwealth v. Sturtivant · Nunes v. Perry
Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know
Decided 1882-01-30
How this case has been cited
Cited by 39 later decisions (1 by the Supreme Court) — most recently October 1983 · most notably Stillwell & Bierce Manufacturing Co. v. Phelps (1889), City of Fort Wayne v. Coombs (1886)
5 federal appellate · 2 district · 30 state decisions — followed in 11 states
Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.
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