Has anyone ever really regretted hiring an expert too early?

The plaintiff’s attorney filed the original complaint before retaining an economist. The antitrust cause of action requires a definition of a relevant geographic market and product market. Without consultation with an economist, the definitions were poorly constructed, offering three separate definitions of a relevant geographical market, all with differing dimensions. The defendants’ attorneys retained several economists to prepare experts’ reports, due the same day as the last day for filing an amended complaint. The lead defense counsel paid a considerable sum for the preparation of the reports.

The defense counsel chose not to take the plaintiff’s economist’s deposition. The plaintiff’s economist also prepared an expert’s report also due on the lasts day for filing an amended complaint. With the consultation of the economist, the plaintiff’s report proposed a more reasonable definition of the geographic market which was included in the final amended complaint. The defense expert’s report, instead of presenting a reasonable definition of a relevant geographic market, chose to base all calculations on the most unreasonable of the original definitions proposed in the original complaint.

All of the work performed by the defense’s economists was shown to be irrelevant. These economists then had little time to prepare a rebuttal report which had to contain responses to the plaintiff’s expert’s report and a complete reconstruction of their own report. Had they based their report on their own definition of the relevant geographic market, the investment in the report would not have been wasted.