Feb. 18, 2025 – “Aggrieved” meant something different to the Wisconsin Supreme Court majority and dissent in Brown v. Wisconsin Elections Commission (WEC), 2025 WI 5 (Feb. 18, 2025), leaving a citizen who complained to the WEC about the city of Racine’s alternate absentee voting sites without judicial review.

In an opinion written by Justice Jill J. Karofsky, the 4-3 majority held that the standard definition of “aggrieved,” unless the Legislature specifies differently, required an individual have “an…
Continue Reading Supreme Court: Complainant to Wisconsin Elections Commission Lacked Standing

Feb. 12, 2025 – All the members of the Wisconsin Supreme Court agreed Friday in Wisconsin Elections Commission (WEC) v. LeMahieu, 2025 WI 4 (Feb. 7, 2025), that WEC Administrator Meagan Wolfe may continue in that position past the expiration of her term because the position is not vacant.

The court then disagreed in concurrences written by Justices Ann Walsh Bradley and Rebecca Grassl Bradley on whether the Supreme Court properly decided the case governing this decision, State …
Continue Reading Supreme Court: Wisconsin Elections Commission Administrator Remains as Holdover

Jan. 28, 2025 – Although a legal issue remained in the future, an order in a divorce case was final – killing the ex-husband’s appeal because it arrived too late – allowing the Wisconsin Supreme Court to reiterate the standards for finality critical for appeal deadlines.

A 4-2 majority denied the ex-husband’s appeal in Morway v. Morway, 2025 WI 3 (Jan. 22, 2025). Chief Justice Annette Kingsland Ziegler did not participate in the case.

Although Justice Rebecca Frank…
Continue Reading Appeal Denied: The Finality of Orders at Issue in Post-Divorce Case

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Jan. 27, 2025 – In Wisconsin Voter Alliance (WVA) v. Secord, 2025 WI 2 (Jan. 17, 2025), a 5-2 majority reversed and remanded a District II Wisconsin Court of Appeals decision because it violated the prohibition defined in Cook v. Cook, 208 Wis. 2d 166 (1997), which held that the court of appeals cannot reverse its own decisions.

The supreme court did not decide the merits: whether state public records law requires release of Notice of Voting…
Continue Reading Supreme Court: Appeals Court Wrongfully Overruled Precedent in Public Records Case

Jan. 9, 2025 – A required psychological report filed less than 48 hours before a final hearing for involuntary commitment stripped the circuit court of competency because it deprived the person to be committed of due process, the Wisconsin Court of Appeals recently decided in Outagamie County v. M.J.B., 2024 AP 250. Circuit courts have subject matter jurisdiction under the Wisconsin Constitution, but a circuit court may not be competent to hear a case if it fails to…
Continue Reading Appeals Court: Circuit Court Lost Competency in Final Hearing for Involuntary Commitment After Required Report Arrived Late

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Dec. 13, 2024 – A restitution award was appropriate even though more than half the defendant’s income came from Social Security Disability Income (SSDI), the Wisconsin Court of Appeals District II recently ruled in
State v. Joling, 2023AP1023-CR (Dec. 11, 2024). Under 42 U.S.C. section 407(a), money paid from Social Security shall not be “subject to execution, levy, attachment, garnishment, or other legal process.” Eric J. Joling pleaded no contest to one count of OWI (fifth offense)…
Continue Reading Appeals Court: Social Security Income Did Not Preclude Restitution Award

Dec. 3, 2024 – Legislation that required Joint Finance Committee (JFC) approval on settlements in cases prosecuted by the Wisconsin Department of Justice (DOJ) did not violate the constitutional separation of powers between legislative and executive branches, a majority of the Wisconsin Court of Appeals, District II has concluded.

In Kaul v. Wisconsin State Legislature, 2022 AP 790 (Dec. 2, 2024), the three-judge panel reversed (2-1) the Dane County Circuit Court’s summary judgment orders, concluding the lower court…
Continue Reading Appeals Court Upholds Law Giving Legislature Power to Approve DOJ Settlements

Sept. 10, 2024 – A party seeking health insurance coverage for autism-related medical treatment has lost an appeal at the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals, in Midthun-Hensen v. Group Health Cooperative of South Central Wisconsin, No. 23-2100 (Aug. 5, 2024). Beginning in 2017, Angela Midthun-Hensen and Tony Hensen asked their insurer, Group Health Cooperative of South Central Wisconsin, Inc., (Group Health) to cover speech therapy and sensory integration therapy for their autistic son. Group Health decided that neither therapy…
Continue Reading Seventh Circuit Upholds Decision Denying Coverage for Autism-related Treatment

Sept. 9, 2024 – A county zoning ordinance requiring cellphone towers to be at least one-half mile apart is preempted by state law, the Wisconsin Court of Appeals (District IV) has ruled in
Savich v. Columbia County Board of Adjustment, 2023AP78 (July 18, 2024). In August 2020, Tillman Infrastructure, LLC (Tillman) and AT&T Mobility (AT&T) applied to the Columbia County Planning and Zoning Department for a permit to build a cellphone tower at a specific site on farmland…
Continue Reading Cellphone Tower Separation Ordinance Preempted by State Law

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Sept. 6, 2024 – A plaintiff’s failure to honestly and meaningfully address a question of appellate jurisdiction under
28 U.S.C. section 2107 rendered his appeal frivolous, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit has ruled in
Upchurch v. O’Brien, 22-2541 (Aug. 6, 2024). As a result, the Seventh Circuit held, sanctions under
Federal Rule of Civil Procedure (FRCP) 38 were appropriate. The Great Outdoors Timothy O’Brien and his wife Margaret owned a resort on Catfish…
Continue Reading Failure to Address Jurisdictional Issue Rendered Appeal Frivolous

Aug. 29, 2024 – Whether the right to counsel had attached at a probable cause hearing wasn’t a settled matter of law, meaning an attorney wasn’t deficient when he failed to object to a lineup identification that occurred without counsel present, the Wisconsin Court of Appeals (District I) has ruled in

State v. Robinson​, 2020AP1728 (Aug. 6, 2024). On Dec. 18, 2017, a man walked into a U.S. Bank branch on West Capitol Drive in Milwaukee and slipped…
Continue Reading Failure to Object to Post-hearing Lineup Identification Not Deficient

Aug. 29, 2024 – The FBI was not required to seek a warrant before obtaining cell phone data on an armed man heading toward the site of civil unrest because of exigent circumstances, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit has held in
U.S. v. Karmo, No. 23-1082 (July 31, 2024). Civil unrest broke out in Kenosha on Aug. 23, 2020, after the police shot a Black man while attempting to arrest him. Michael Karmo and…
Continue Reading No Warrant Required for Cell Phone Data of Armed Man Heading Toward Unrest