Expert psychiatric opinion evidence on retrospective fitness to plead must identify the factual basis for the opinion and explain the reasoning connecting the expert's current observations to the subject's capacity at the earlier relevant time. Conclusions that do not rise above the level of assertion are inadmissible. Where an expert's report is overwhelmingly addressed to the subject's current mental state and does not explain why those findings are applicable to a period years earlier, the report will not meet the admissibility criteria for expert opinion evidence.
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