To my surprise, a Chicago litigation consulting firm (Zagnoli, McEvoy, Foley, LLC) visited this blog and read my post on statistics and urban legends. So, I have repaid the compliment by visiting their website, where I found this interesting article: “Statistics through the eyes of jurors: Providing context to get the most out of expert testimony in toxic tort cases” (2007).

I suspect they were wondering if I had plagiarized their article, but plagiarism is something I abhor and, besides, I first saw the article this afternoon. It’s another example of “anything can happen,” or “great minds think alike,” or maybe just that it’s inevitable to think about urban legends when you think about statistics and the law.

The ZMF article is about civil trials and civil juries, where statistics are apparently frequently presented in court by expert witnesses (as opposed to criminal trials).

The article is well worth reading as a caution to lawyers when using statistics.