On Point: 1. Appeals

State v. Oscar C. Thomas, 2020AP32, petition for review of a published decision granted 1/11/2022; affirmed 2/21/23; case activity (including briefs)

Issues presented (from the petition):

Whether the Court of Appeals applied the wrong standard in determining that admission of DNA evidence in violation of [Thomas’s] right of Confrontation was harmless?

Whether the Court of Appeals erred in determining that [Thomas’s] confession to a sexual assault was corroborated by a significant fact?

Rock County v. P.P., 2021AP678, District 4, 12/16/21 (one-judge decision; ineligible for publication); case activity

P.P. challenges the sufficiency of the evidence elicited in support of the involuntary medication order issued in April 2020, along with the original commitment order. Both orders were set to expire in October 2020, so in September 2020 the County petitioned to extend them for 12 months. P.P. stipulated to the extension. (¶¶2-4). Because of the September 2020 extension of the medication order, P.P.’s appeal of the original order is moot.

State v. A.P., 2021AP1146-47, 12/7/21, District 1 (1-judge opinion, ineligible for publication); case activity

A.P. appealed orders terminating his parental rights to his two children. The court of appeals rejected his claim that the circuit court erroneously exercised its discretion when it refused to make his mother the guardian of the children and his new trial in the interests of justice claim.

State v. Corey Rector, 2020AP1213, certification filed 11/24/21; granted 2/16/22; affirmed 5/23/23; District 2; case activity (including briefs)

Issue (from the certification):

Whether the plain meaning of “separate occasions” in the sex-offender-registration statute means that the two convictions must have occurred at different times in two separate proceedings so that the qualifying convictions occurred sometime before a defendant is convicted in the current case. Stated otherwise, can the qualifying convictions occur simultaneously, as they did in this case, and as Wittrock and Hopkins held?

State v. Sean B. Day, 2021AP1018, 11/24/21, District 4 (one-judge decision; ineligible for publication); case activity (including brief)

Day was initially charged with repeated sexual assault of a child for sexual contact with a 14-year-old when he was 17. He ended up pleading to a single count of fourth-degree sexual assault and was put on probation. The circuit court failed to mention expunction at the sentencing hearing, but later–both in writing and at the postconviction motion hearing–it gave the reasons it did not find expunction appropriate.

State v. Laverne Ware, Jr., 2021 WI App 83; case activity (including briefs)

When the parties filed their initial briefs in this appeal, it was a community-caretaker case. But during briefing, the Supreme Court decided Caniglia v. Strom, which made clear that this doctrine doesn’t permit searches in the home (in the process invalidating some Wisconsin cases). So now–as the Caniglia concurrences foretold–it’s instead a case about the “emergency aid exception.”

State v. X.S., 2021AP419, review of an unpublished court of appeals opinion, granted 10/18/21, case activity

Issues:

1. Whether the court of appeals erroneously exercised its discretion in denying “Xander’s” motion for reconsideration less than 24 hours after it was filed without any explanation?

2. Whether a juvenile who stipulates to the prosecutive merit of a delinquency petition is estopped from presenting any evidence to contradict factual averments in the petition even when those facts do not negate probable cause for the charged offense?

3. Whether the court of appeals erroneously applied the discretionary standard of review?

City of Port Washington v. Sandra J. Koziol, 2021AP449-450-FT, 10/6/21, District 2 (1-judge opinion; ineligible for publication); case activity (including briefs)

Each year, Wisconsin’s municipal courts resolve close to half of a million cases, including traffic offenses, OWIs, and other quasi-criminal matters. See data here. A party aggrieved by a municipal court judgment has a statutory right to appeal it. This unpublished opinion resolves an issue of first impression regarding the procedure for appealing municipal court judgments in a way that restricts that right and violates the statute.

State v. Santiago B. Rios, 2020AP2132-CR, was slated to be decided today, but it wasn’t. Instead, the court of appeals issued an order directing the state (represented here by the district attorney’s office) to file a respondent’s brief.

State v. Donald P. Coughlin, 2019AP1876-CR, petition for review of an unpublished court of appeals decision granted 9/14/21; case activity (including briefs)

Issues presented (from State’s petition for review)

1. How does a court consider the theory of guilt in an evidence sufficiency claim when an inconsistency exists between a jury instruction and verdict?

2. Must a court accept a jury’s resolution of any vagueness in testimony as jury credibility and weight determinations and must a court then adopt the reasonable inferences that a jury may have drawn from the evidence?

3. Has Coughlin, as the defendant challenging the sufficiency of the evidence, met his heavy burden to overcome the great deference this Court gives to the jury and its verdict to satisfy that the evidence, viewed most favorably to the State and the convictions, was insufficient to sustain the 15 guilty verdicts relating to his sexual assaults of John Doe 2 and John Doe 3?