On Point: C. Unpublished Opinions

Sauk County v. S.A.M., 2019AP1033, 9/3/20, District 4 (one-judge decision; ineligible for publication), reversed, 2022 WI 46; case activity

Wisconsin involuntarily commits mentally ill people  at a higher rate than any other state in the United States–close to 5 times the national average. Click here. Wisconsin is also in the minority of states that will dismiss an appeal from an expired commitment order as moot. Unless we’re  prepared to accept that, compared to the rest of the country, Wisconsin has a much larger percentage of residents who are both mentally ill and dangerous, this is troubling. It suggests that Wisconsin may be unlawfully committing and medicating people and then denying them their right to appeal. SCOW is poised to decide whether commitment appeals are ever moot. So the court of appeals could have stayed this appeal until SCOW resolved the point. Instead, it walked out on a limb to dismiss the appeal as moot.

State v. Andrew W. Bunn, 2019AP2127-CR, 9/9/20, District 1 (1-judge opinion, ineligible for publication); case activity

One evening, an unknown woman approached a cop car in a church parking lot near a playground and said that two adults were having oral sex in a pickup truck on the other side of a fence. The cops saw the truck but no activity inside. They didn’t ask for the woman’s name, but they did go investigate.

State v. Victoria L. Conley, 2019AP902, 9/10/20, District 4 (one-judge decision; ineligible for publication); case activity (including briefs)

Conley pleaded to one count of disorderly conduct related to a couple of altercations occurring over a few minutes in Madison. After sentencing she moved to withdraw her plea alleging that the court failed to apprise her of the nature of the charge, and that she did not otherwise understand. The court of appeals holds that, assuming the colloquy was deficient, the record shows she understood the charges.

State v. D.S., 2019AP2230 through 2019AP2233, District 1, 8/25/30 (one-judge decision; ineligible for publication); case activity

D.S. challenges the orders terminating her parental rights to her children on the ground, first because her lawyer was unable to appear and represent her at a pretrial hearing because his law license was temporarily suspended, second because trial counsel didn’t obtain 400 pages of discovery until the day before the  dispositional hearing. Her challenges are rejected.

State  v. Catherine Cuskey Large, 2019AP1966-CR, 8/13/20, District 4 (1-judge opinion, ineligible for publication; case activity (including briefs)

The court of appeals correctly affirmed the circuit court’s decision to suppress OWI evidence in this case, where an officer admitted that the New Glarus Police Department’s “protocol” was to administer PBTs on motorists whether they had probable cause for OWI or not. But court of appeals did so by taking a heavy-handed approach to waiver, a rule of administration that appellate courts have the discretion to apply or not.

Rock County v. R.J., 2020AP93, 8/13/20, District 4 (1-judge opinion, ineligible for publication); case activity

Thank heavens this opinion is not published. R.J’s initial commitment expired before he filed his notice of appeal. According to the court of appeals, R.J. should have sua sponte addressed mootness in his initial brief–before the County ever argued the point. Because R.J. waited to see whether the County would even raise mootness and then addressed the matter in his reply, the court of appeals dismissed his appeal. The court of appeals also made an error of law regarding the “contemporaneous objection” requirement.  Hopefully, R.J. will move for reconsideration or petition for review.

State v. Tory J. Agnew, 2019AP1785-CR, District 4, 7/30/20 (not recommended for publication); case activity (including briefs)

The court of appeals affirms the structure of a bifurcated sentence for an unclassified felony to which a sentence enhancer applied, even though the sentence imposed runs afoul of the statutes and prior case law.

State v. William Francis Kuehn, 2018AP2355, 7/28/20, District 1 (not recommended for publication); case activity (including briefs)

Kuehn pleaded to 5 counts of possession of child pornography; 10 more were dismissed and read-in. The court of appeals rejects Kuehn’s three challenges to his conviction and sentence. It holds trial counsel wasn’t deficient in deciding a third-party-perpetrator (Denny) defense wasn’t viable at trial. It says the circuit court properly assessed the $500 per-image surcharge for the 10 images that made up the read-ins. And, it finds not overbroad the circuit court’s imposition of an ES condition that Kuehn have no contact with his girlfriend.

State v. Christopher J. Vaaler, 2019AP2174, 8/6/20, District 4 (one-judge decision; ineligible for publication); case activity (including briefs)

An officer pulled Vaaler over in the very early morning for not having his headlights on. Per the court of appeals, Vaaler’s unusual manner of speech, the odor of intoxicants, and the fact of an open beer next to him were enough for the officer to conduct the OWI investigation that ultimately led to Vaaler’s arrest and conviction:

State v. Brian Anthony Taylor, 2019AP1770-CR,  District 1, 7/28/20 (not recommended for publication); case activity (including briefs)

What a frustrating decision. Taylor filed a pre-sentencing motion to withdraw his plea for repeated sexual assault of a child, but the circuit court denied it applying the more stringent post-sentencing plea withdrawal standard. “No problem,” says the court of appeals, “we’ll apply the correct standard for you and affirm.”