On Point: 24. Jurisdiction, etc

State v. Brantner, 2020 WI 21, 2/25/20, affirming in part and reversing in part a summary order, 2018AP53; case activity (including briefs)

Brantner was arrested (for reasons unrelated to this case) in Kenosha County by Fond du Lac County detectives. They took him to jail in Fond du Lac, where a booking search revealed several different types of pills concealed in his boot. He was tried, convicted and sentenced in Fond du Lac on five counts of drug possession and five associated bail-jumping counts. The supreme court now rejects his argument that he didn’t “possess” any of the drugs in Fond du Lac County–that the arrest in Kenosha terminated his possession because he lacked control over the pills. But it agrees with him that his conviction on two of the counts (with their associated bail-jumping counts) is a double-jeopardy violation; the bare fact that he had pills with two different oxycodone dosages (5 and 20 milligram) will not support two different charges of possessing that drug.

City of Cedarburg v. Ries B. Hansen, 2020 WI 11, 2/11/19 (on bypass of the court of appeals); case activity (including briefs)

Municipal courts have subject matter jurisdiction over ordinance violations (e.g. an OWI 1st), and circuit courts have subject matter jurisdiction over misdemeanors and felonies (e.g. an OWI 2nd or subsequent). In this 4-3 decision, SCOW holds that a municipal court had subject matter jurisdiction over an OWI 2nd that was mischarged as an OWI 1st. 

State v. Larry W. Olson, 2019 WI App 61; case activity (including briefs)

Olson and the state resolved some felony counts with an agreement that he’d plead not guilty by reason of mental disease or defect. The court found him NGI and committed him for 19 years, placing him on conditional release immediately. A few weeks later, Olson admitted violating his release conditions by smoking methamphetamine. DHS, which supervises NGI committees, immediately took him into custody. For reasons unknown, it held him for eight days before filing a petition to revoke his supervised release. This, everyone agrees, violated Wis. Stat. § 971.17(3)(e), which says such a petition “shall” be filed within 72 hours of detention (excluding weekends and holidays). The dispute on appeal is what that violation means: the state says there’s no consequence at all; Olson says a late petition is no good and must be dismissed. In legalese, the question is whether the word “shall” is mandatory or directory.

Waupaca v. K.E.K., 2018Ap1887, District 4, 9/26/19 (not recommended for publication), petition for review granted 7/24/20, affirmed, 2021 WI 9; case activity

This opinion infuses uncertainty, if not confusion, into the law governing circuit court competency to decide a Chapter 51 recommitment case and the substantive legal standard that courts are to apply at the recommitment stage.

State v. James Edward Olson, 2018AP1987, 9/17/18, District 1 (one-judge opinion, ineligible for publication); case activity (including briefs)

Olson says that the DOC extended his probation by six months without notice to him, and he shouldn’t have to pay the fees associated with those six months. The court of appeals has two problems with this claim: the record contains an order for the extension, apparently signed by him, and his probation ended in 1997.

State v. Brantner, 2018AP53, petition for review of a summary order granted 5/14/19; affirmed in part and reversed in part 2/25/20; case activity (including briefs)

Issues:

1. Do the United States and Wisconsin Constitutional protections against double jeopardy bar the State from punishing a criminal defendant twice for violations of Wis. Stat. § 961.41(3g)(am) for possessing pills containing different doses of the same substance at the same time?

2. When an individual is arrested in one county with controlled substances on his person and transported in police custody to a different county where the substances are removed from the individual’s person during the booking process, does a trial for possession of the controlled substances in the destination county violate the individual’s rights under Article I, Section VII of the Wisconsin Constitution and Wis. Stat. § 971.19?

State v. A.L. , 2019 WI 20, affirming a published court of appeals decision, 2017 WI App 72; case activity

This appeal centers on the proper interpretation of §938.30(5)(d) and §938.13 governing juveniles found not competent during a delinquency proceeding. SCOW holds a circuit court may resume suspended juvenile delinquency proceedings to reexamine the competency of a juvenile who was initially found not competent and not likely to become competent within the statutory period. It also holds that circuit courts retain competency over juvenile delinquency proceedings even after the accompanying JIPS order has expired.

City of Cedarburg v. Ries B. Hansen, 2018AP1129, petition for bypass granted 2/12/19; case activity (including briefs)

Issue (from petition for bypass):

City of Eau Claire v. Booth, 2016 WI 65, ¶1, 370 Wis. 2d 595, 882 N.W.2d 738 held that when a circuit court handles a 1st offense OWI that is mischarged due to an unknown prior offense, it is a defect in the circuit court’s competency but not the circuit court’s subject matter jurisdiction. Accordingly, a defendant must timely object to the circuit court’s lack of competency or the objection is forfeited. Is the same true when the mischarged OWI is in municipal court?

St. Croix County v. Kimberly L. Severson, 2017AP1111, 11/13/18, District 3, (i-judge opinion, ineligible for publication); case activity (including briefs)

This is a City of Eau Claire v. Booth redux. In 2001 Severson was charged with OWI 1st in Eau Claire County and convicted of a separate OWI 1st in St. Croix County. Had St. Croix conviction been properly charged as an OWI 2nd, Severson would have had a constitutional right to counsel. But te court of appeals, applying Booth, held that Severson’s failure to object to the St. Croix County circuit court’s lack of competency to proceed to judgment forfeited that issue for appeal.

State v. A.L., 2016AP880, review of a published court of appeals decision granted 6/11/18; case activity

Where a juvenile has been found incompetent to stand trial, Wis. Stat. § 938.30(5)(e)1. says he or she can be later reevaluated–but only if he or she was found likely to regain competence. Nevertheless, the court of appeals, relying on a tendentious reading of the legislative history, decided even a juvenile who has been found unlikely to become competent can also be reevaluated.