On Point: B. Published opinions

State ex rel. Michael J. Gendrich v. Litscher, 2001 WI App 163

Issue: Whether the “presumptive mandatory release date” under § 302.11(1g) creates a liberty interest in parole protected by due process.

Holding: Prisoners sentenced for a “serious felony” between April 21, 1994, and December 31, 1999, are given a “presumptive” MR date. Discretionary parole does not create a due process-protected liberty interest, while mandatory release does.

State v. Ronald Ransdell, 2001 WI App 202, PFR filed 8/27/01
For Ransdell: Ellen Henak, SPD, Milwaukee Appellate

Issue: Whether the automatic initial commitment to institutional care provision, § 980.06, on its face violates substantive due process.

Holding: A person challenging the constitutionality of a statute must show its infirmity beyond reasonable doubt; a statute restricting liberty implicates a “strict-scrutiny” test. ¶5. Applying this test,

State v. Alfredo Ramirez, 2001 WI App 158, PFR filed 7/11/01
For Ramirez: Elizabeth A. Cavendish-Sosinski

Issue: Whether § 943.201(2) creates a continuing offense such that, as applied to Ramirez, it violated the ex post facto clause because the statute was promulgated after he commenced the activity that formed the basis for the charge.

Holding:

¶18. We hold that Ramirez obtained money in the form of wages,

City of Milwaukee v. Tanya M. Bean, et al., 2001 WI App 258, PFR filed 11/8/01
For Bean: Jerome F. Buting, Pamela S. Moorshead

Issue1: Whether prostitution activities in the area encompassed by the injunction were shown sufficiently to constitute a nuisance.

Holding:

¶13. Although it is true, as the appellants argue, that the infusion of prostitution in the affected areas can, on one level at least,

State v. Joseph E.G., 2001 WI App 29, 240 Wis. 2d 481, 623 N.W.2d 137
For Joseph E.G.: Susan E. Alesia, SPD, Madison Appellate

Issue: Whether § 301.45(1m) (1997-98) violates equal protection and substantive due process in failing to excuse juveniles convicted of false imprisonment from sex offender registration.

Holding:

¶12 In contrast to the facts that could relieve an offender from registration for those crimes enumerated in WIS.

State v. Matthew J. Trecroci, Ryan J. Frayer, Ronnie J. Frayer, Scott E. Oberst, Amy L. Wicks, 2001 WI App 126
For defendants: Robert R. Henak

Issue: Whether warrantless police entry of a stairway in a multiple unit building was lawful.

Holding: Existence of reasonable expectation of privacy in a stairway leading to the upper levels of a dwelling is decided case-by-case, rather than under bright-line rule.

State v. Robert F. Hart, 2001 WI App 283
For Hart: John Deitrich

Issue: Whether the need to transport in a police vehicle a person, who is not in custody, is itself an exigency justifying a pat-down search for weapons.

Holding:

¶17. … With five members of the court declining to adopt a per ser rule, the law in Wisconsin is that the need to transport a person in a police vehicle is not,

State v. Eddie McAttee, 2001 WI App 262
For McAttee: Russell D. Bohach

Issue: Whether the Riverside probable cause finding was tainted by a factual misrepresentation (specifically, that McAttee had been implicated by a “coconspirator”) in the police report submitted in support of continued detention.

Holding: Though describing the informant as a coconspirator “may have been legally inexact, it also may have accurately conveyed the police’s understanding,

State v. Ashley B. Steele, 2001 WI App 160, PFR filed 6/25/01
For Steele: Christopher William Rose

Issue: Whether sentencing eligibility for “boot camp” is determined by bright-line statutory guidelines, or by exercise of trial court discretion.

Holding:

¶12. While an offender must meet the eligibility requirements of Wis. Stat. § 302.045(2) to participate in the challenge incarceration program, pursuant to Wis.

State v. Bill Paul Marquardt, 2001 WI App 219, PFR filed 9/20/01
For Marquardt: James B. Connell

Issue: Whether evidence seized under a warrant defective because unsupported by probable cause may be admissible under the good-faith doctrine.

Holding: Given that, subsequent to trial-level litigation, the supreme court recognized the good-faith exception to the exclusionary rule, in State v. Eason, 2001 WI 98,