Two ways MTIS is instructed
Expert witness work and forensic investigation are related but separate services. A forensic investigation may end with MTIS giving evidence, and often does. It does not have to, and expert evidence does not depend on it.
Following an MTIS forensic investigation
The natural progression. MTIS examined the evidence, established the mechanism and wrote the findings, and the matter has since reached a point where somebody has to stand behind them. Because the investigation was run to an evidential standard from the first day — custody documented, destructive steps notified, alternatives recorded — little additional work is needed to put that into the form a court requires.
Independently, on a matter MTIS did not investigate
Equally common, and the reason this is a service in its own right. MTIS is instructed after the fact, on evidence gathered by somebody else — an in-house team, a testing house, another consultancy, or the other side. The question then is not what MTIS would have found, but whether what was found supports what is now being claimed from it.
What MTIS can do without having run the investigation
- Examine whatever physical evidence survives and form an independent opinion on it.
- Review the existing investigation report, the test results and the laboratory work package.
- State whether the conclusions drawn actually follow from the evidence recorded, or reach beyond it.
- Identify what was never examined, what was destroyed, and what that costs the conclusion.
- Say whether the test methods chosen were capable of answering the question asked of them.
- Set out the alternative explanations the original work did not exclude.
- Advise what further work, if any, would resolve what remains open.
Capacities
- Party-appointed expert — instructed by one side, with the duty to the court unchanged.
- Single joint expert — appointed by both parties on an agreed scope.
- Expert determination — where both sides agree in advance to be bound by the technical finding, avoiding the cost of litigating it.
- Advisory expert — assisting a legal team behind the scenes without producing a report for the court, including preparing the technical cross-examination of an opposing expert.
- Review of an opposing report — a documented technical critique for the instructing team.
The report
Expert evidence in the Malaysian courts is governed by Order 40A of the Rules of Court 2012. Its requirements are mandatory: a report that does not comply may not be treated as an expert report at all, may be given minimal weight, and may attract an adverse costs order. MTIS reports are prepared to that structure and contain:
- The expert's qualifications and experience in the specific issue in dispute.
- The literature and materials relied on.
- A precise statement of the issues MTIS was asked to consider, and the instructions given.
- The evidence examined, the analysis applied, and the reasoning from one to the other.
- Where a range of opinion exists, a statement of that range — including opinions that do not assist the instructing party.
- The conclusions reached, and the limits of what the evidence establishes.
- A statement of belief in the correctness of the opinion.
- A statement that the expert's overriding duty is to the Court, and that the expert complies with it.
- Where testing was carried out, the identity and qualifications of whoever performed it and whether it was under MTIS supervision.
In arbitration the position differs. The IBA Rules on the Taking of Evidence govern party-appointed experts and require a statement of independence rather than the Order 40A declaration. MTIS prepares to whichever applies to the forum.
Beyond the report
- Meetings of experts — narrowing the technical issues with the opposing expert and producing a joint statement of what is agreed and what remains in dispute.
- Responsive reports — addressing an opposing expert's report once it is served.
- Testimony — giving evidence and being cross-examined on it.
- Technical support to counsel — explaining the metallurgy so that the questions put are the right ones.
Who provides the evidence
Instructions are taken by the MTIS directors, whose registrations and experience are set out on the About & People page — chartered engineers with industrial failure-investigation careers and senior academic appointments.
Instruct MTIS
An instruction begins with a conflict check, so we ask for the parties before anything else. One request form covers both routes — tell us the capacity in which MTIS would act, and whether an investigation has already been carried out.