Children & the Law Section | State Bar of Wisconsin

The Children & the Law Section members include judges, court commissioners, prosecutors, guardians ad litem, agency attorneys and private practice attorneys who represent various parties including children, parents, and grandparents as well as agencies that serve children.  The practice areas of the section members include family, juvenile delinquency and child welfare proceedings.

The State Bar of Wisconsin offers its members the opportunity to network with other lawyers who share a common interest through its 24 sections. Learn more at http://www.wisbar.org/groups.

Website: https://www.wisbar.org/forMembers/Groups/Sections/ChildrenandtheLawSection/pages/home.aspx
Follow:

Children & the Law Section | State Bar of Wisconsin Blogs

Children & the Law Section Blog | Children & the Law Section

Blog Authors

ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ
Christie A. Christie
Rebecca A. Foley
Bridget A. Kinderman
Beth A. Lauck
Monika Allis
Payton Altman

Latest from Children & the Law Section | State Bar of Wisconsin

  • July 21, 2026

     

    Guardians ad litem play an important role in adult, child, and family matters. A GAL provides recommendations to the court that shape decisions involving adult and minor guardianships, protective placement, physical placement, and legal custody, among other matters.

    If you already are a guardian ad litem (GAL), thank you for using your skill, knowledge, and experience in making best-interest recommendations for the vulnerable populations whose cases you are appointed in.

    GAL work can be incredibly

…
Continue Reading Guardian ad Litem Work: Challenging, Meaningful, and Needed

To safeguard the Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination, Miranda prevents prosecutors from introducing statements made by suspects under custodial interrogation unless law enforcement informs the suspect of certain now-familiar rights. [1] Specifically, a person under custodial interrogation “must be warned that he has a right to remain silent, that any statement he does make may be used as evidence against him, and that he has a right to the presence of an attorney, either retained or appointed.” [2] The…
Continue Reading Wisconsin Supreme Court: 12-Year-Old Boy was in Custody During School Police Questioning

In light of the new Court of Appeals decision,
State v. Mann-Tate, 2024AP2585-CR, on Feb. 3, 2026, Wisconsin needs a legislative fix to address the current due process concerns related to the reverse waiver statute. As attorneys practicing in the youth justice arena for many years, we believe the fix seems obvious: Wisconsin should eliminate original adult jurisdiction for youth. The current waiver statute, Wis. Stat. 938.18, allows the court to consider the unique attributes of youth identified by…
Continue Reading Wisconsin Should Eliminate Original Adult Jurisdiction for Youth

In Wisconsin, children with incarcerated parents often face compounded challenges that extend far beyond the courtroom. The emotional toll of separation, coupled with the instability it can create in housing, education, and caregiving, frequently manifests in behavioral and mental health concerns. These children are the disproportionate majority in CHIPS and JIPS proceedings, and their trauma, often unspoken, can echo across generations. As practitioners, we must recognize that parental incarceration is not merely a background detail – it is a

…
Continue Reading The Generational Impact of Incarcerated Parents on Children

In recent years, advancements in neuroscience have shaped and reshaped how we understand the adolescent brain and psyche.

For most of our nation’s legal history, however, children have been overlooked, undervalued, and misunderstood. In the 1990s, several criminologists coined the term “super-predator” in a book in which they theorized that America would be the “home to thickening ranks of juvenile ‘super-predators’ – radically impulsive, brutally remorseless youngsters, including ever more pre-teenage boys, who murder, assault, rape, rob, burglarize, deal

…
Continue Reading Neuroscience in the Courtroom Informs How We Should Sentence Youth

The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) is a law that makes available a free appropriate public education to eligible children with disabilities throughout the United States and ensures special education and related services to those children.

Those who work with children in the court system should understand the basics from IDEA so that they can support families in accessing crucial educational services and promote a child’s educational stability.
Child Find and FAPE
Among other requirements within the IDEA,…
Continue Reading Advocating for Students with Disabilities: IDEA Basics for Wisconsin Attorneys

After the court grants a termination of parental rights (TPR), children are at their most vulnerable legal juncture. At this step of the proceedings, children are legal orphans, waiting to be adopted or to find other permanency. So, imagine the devastation when a change of placement is filed and the child has no opportunity to do anything about it. That is precisely what happens under current law. After a TPR is granted, children, their counsel, and their guardians ad…
Continue Reading The Child’s Wishes after TPR: An Afterthought? A Proposed Amendment to Chapter 48

Wis. Stat. section 938.34(3)(f) allows for children to be placed in a juvenile detention facility as a dispositional placement for up to 365 days. However, the regulations for holding kids in juvenile detention facilities for up to 365 days are woefully inadequate. History The guidelines under which juvenile detention centers operate were last reviewed and modified in 2010. They were designed to address safety and basic programming standards for the traditional short-term placements for which juvenile detention facilities and…
Continue Reading The 365-day Secure Detention Programs for Youth are Poorly Regulated

Over its last several sessions, the Wisconsin Supreme Court has attempted to determine that burden of proof required during at dispositional phase of a termination of parental rights case in Wisconsin.

The Court first addressed this issue in June 2023 in its decision in State v. A.G.1 In a December 2023 article in this blog, my co-author Courtney L.A. Roelandts and I provided a detailed analysis of this case, which dealt with the issue of the burden…
Continue Reading Soon We May Soon Know the Required Burden of Proof in TPR Dispositional Hearings

Diane Rondini headshot
Diane Rondini, a retired public defender, has received the 2024 Robert E. Shepherd Jr. Leadership Award for Excellence in Youth Defense.

Diane Rondini, a retired public defender and past chair of the State Bar of Wisconsin Children and the Law Section Board, has received the 2024 Robert E. Shepherd Jr. Leadership Award for Excellence in Youth Defense at the Gault Center’s Youth Defense Leadership Summit in Denver, Colorado, on Oct. 19, 2024. About the Award The Shepherd Award celebrates…
Continue Reading Diane Rondini Wins Prestigious Leadership Award for Excellence in Youth Defense

The sibling bond is a fundamental aspect of human relationships. The bond often outlasts many other connections throughout a person’s life.

In the area of foster care and adoption, where stability and emotional support are important, the preservation of sibling relationships takes on an even greater significance.

As children navigate their self-discovery and personal development, the sibling relationship is a critical influence in their lives. Thus, understanding the impacts of sibling separation in foster care and adoption settings is…
Continue Reading The Sibling Bond: Its Importance in Foster Care and Adoptive Placement

In May 2024 in this blog, 1 my co-author Jenni Spies Karas and I warned that practitioners and judges should be mindful to cite the authority by which they are requesting or entering default judgment, pending the outcome of the Wisconsin Supreme Court case State v. R.A.M.

That caution has become a reality.

Courtney L.A. Roelandts headshot

Courtney L.A. Roelandts, Marquette 2018, is the assistant managing attorney of the Children’s Court Guardian ad Litem Division of the Legal Aid Society of

…
Continue Reading State v. R.A.M. and a Parent’s Right to Counsel in TPR Cases

Transracial adoption has elicited strong responses for over five decades, with the country split between two extreme ends of the spectrum. On one end, transracial adoption is compared to cultural genocide, while on the other, transracial adoption provides children of color with better opportunities and diverse cultural experiences.1 There is little agreement regarding transracial adoption. However, what is certain is that colorblindness and a lack of cultural competency pose significant threats to children who are transracially adopted. A…
Continue Reading Colorblindness and Cultural Competency in Transracial Adoptions

A parent in a termination of parental rights proceeding has a near absolute statutory right to counsel, pursuant to Wis. Stat. section 48.23. Case law establishes that a parent’s statutory right to counsel is not limited to those who appear in person, and that such a right can withstand default judgment.1Wis. Stat. Section 48.23(2)(b)3 In response to these cases, the Wisconsin Legislature amended the statutes to create a process by which a parent may presumptively waive their…
Continue Reading ‘Egregious’ and Accidental Waiver of Counsel in TPR Cases

For the past several years, Wisconsin has ranked near the top of the country for racial disparity in nearly every category related to the juvenile justice system.1

State and national trends also support that there is a particular group of youth of color that are uniquely susceptible to involvement in the juvenile justice system: those who have a disability. Nationally, children with disabilities are removed from school and referred to and involved in the juvenile justice system at…
Continue Reading Interrupting the School to Prison Pipeline at the Intersection of Race and Disability

The idea of a family drug treatment court is that it takes teamwork, collaboration, and commitment to successfully rehabilitate participants with substance use disorders via a community-based alternative to incarceration.

Milwaukee County’s Family Drug Treatment Court (FDTC), begun in May 2011, and was a first for Wisconsin. The program diverts participants from the traditional justice system into a specialty court and creates an individualized plan that takes into account the participant’s mental and physical health as well as any…
Continue Reading An Overview of Milwaukee County’s Family Drug Treatment Court