OPINION: Polson judge praises retired medical examiner

I am writing to register my profound respect and admiration for Dr. Gary Dale. To my good fortune, I have known him since 1994 as an outstanding professional. I have found him to be a tremendous asset to our state who will be difficult, if not impossible, to replace.

Dr. Dale is the consummate professional. He is grounded in solid medical education, extensive experience and amazing common sense. His commitment to service and quality is unequalled except by his ethics and his long-term service without the compensation members of his medical profession typically receive, his humility and his ability to communicate complex medical terms, procedures and concepts to members of the general public, juries and educate the attorneys with whom he dealt.

Those fortunate enough to have made Dr. Dale’s acquaintance would agree his integrity, experience and ability are awesome in what is often a sea of uncertainty to those of us outside his field. He is a most self-effacing person about himself and his own abilities but, in the course of his job, he is a formidable scientist in his commitment to the facts and circumstances involved in the cases in which he worked. But that faded when he would take the time to educate succinctly and simply anyone involved in the complex area in which he worked.

While he was unbending in his commitment to the facts regardless of the wishes or desires of the competing parties with whom he dealt, his respect for all people including the victims, their families and the defendant along with the public was unflagging.

I have watched him perform in many high profile cases. He brings a calm, thoughtful, grounded, balanced, simple, straight-forward explanation to highly charged circumstances always present in the death of a person with an unquestionable air of doing the right thing.

Except his reticence when I asked him for his professional opinion that involved him working with a live person, his wry sense of humor often lightened the load and the pain inherent in the difficult circumstances that are a given part of the loss of life. As a former prosecutor, defense attorney and a current district judge, I have greatly valued his advice, education, support and quality of testimony and expertise involved in my cases.

Because his job required him to travel to different counties to appear on individual cases, it was often thankless and difficult, but he performed with integrity, confidence, compassion, competence, common sense, and an unerring commitment to the truth regardless of the outcome for the various parties involved. His commitment was always based on his professional ethics and medical competence with a view toward the respect of the law and the best interests of our state. He will be greatly missed.

Deborah “Kim” Christopher is a District Court judge in Polson.