Christopher Toto v. Raelyn Knowles, 261 A.3d 233

Toto’s car was rear-ended, pushing it into a minivan; he reported immediate loss of consciousness, head pain, and thereafter experienced headaches, balance problems, and impaired vision that he did not have pre-accident.
Toto sued Knowles for negligence, alleging Knowles’s vehicle struck his from behind and caused his injuries.
Toto designated an optometrist to testify that the accident caused a "visual midline shift;" Knowles moved in limine to exclude that expert, arguing the optometrist was unqualified and the diagnosis is not recognized.
The trial court granted the motion in limine as to the optometrist’s causation opinion and initially denied summary judgment to Knowles, but on reconsideration entered summary judgment for Knowles, concluding "visual midline shift" was Toto’s sole claimed injury and he lacked necessary expert proof of causation.
On appeal, the Maine Supreme Judicial Court considered whether the summary judgment record, viewed in Toto’s favor, created a genuine dispute of material fact on causation given Toto’s testimony of immediate and post-accident symptoms.
The court vacated the summary judgment and remanded, holding that, although Toto could not rely on the excluded optometrist opinion to prove a visual midline shift, his testimony and other facts were sufficient to create a genuine issue on whether the accident caused some injury without requiring expert proof.

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Whether Toto needed expert proof to show the accident caused his claimed injuries	Toto argued his immediate loss of consciousness, head pain, headaches, balance problems, and vision impairment after the collision could, via common experience and reasonable inference, support causation	Knowles argued Toto’s sole injury was a medically complex "visual midline shift" requiring admissible expert causation testimony, and without it causation cannot be proved	Court held expert testimony was required for proving a visual midline shift, but Toto’s non-expert evidence (immediate symptoms and post-accident complaints) created a genuine issue of fact as to whether the accident caused some injury, so summary judgment was improper
Whether summary judgment was appropriate given the in limine exclusion of Toto’s optometrist	Toto maintained that even without the expert’s causation opinion, his lay testimony and other facts sufficed to allow a jury to infer causation	Knowles argued the exclusion left Toto with no admissible evidence to prove causation and that summary judgment should be entered	Court held the exclusion of the optometrist opinion did not eliminate all evidence of causation; a factfinder could reasonably infer causation from lay evidence, so summary judgment was vacated

Kurtz & Perry, P.A. v. Emerson, 8 A.3d 677 (2010 ME 107) (standard for reviewing summary judgment and viewing facts favorably to nonprevailing party)
Estate of Smith v. Cumberland Cnty., 60 A.3d 759 (2013 ME 13) (negligence elements and summary judgment burden allocation)
Merriam v. Wanger, 757 A.2d 778 (2000 ME 159) (expert testimony required for complex medical causation)
Patten v. Milam, 480 A.2d 774 (Me. 1984) (lay jurors may infer causation when negligence and harm are within common knowledge)
Marcoux v. Parker Hannifin/Nichols Portland Div., 881 A.2d 1138 (2005 ME 107) (factfinder may draw reasonable inferences of causation without speculation)
Foddrill v. Crane, 894 N.E.2d 1070 (Ind. Ct. App. 2008) (rear-end collision causation for headaches and neck pain can be inferred without expert testimony where no prior injury and force was evident)
Tolliver v. Dep’t of Transp., 948 A.2d 1223 (2008 ME 83) (complex facts may require more substantial evidence of proximate cause)
Cyr v. Adamar Assocs. Ltd. P’ship, 752 A.2d 603 (2000 ME 110) (definition of proximate cause)