On Point: 45. WI Supreme Court

State v. Melisa Valadez, 2016 WI 4, 1/28/2016, on certification from the court of appeals; case activity (including briefs)

What looked like a case about the meaning of “likely to result in … deportation” has turned into something else entirely: in a fractured decision, the court holds that the defendant has successfully shown she is likely to be excluded from admission to the country and raises, but does not resolve, the possibility that plea withdrawal claims for failure to give the required immigration warning must be brought within the time limits of Wis. Stat. Rule 809.30 (or perhaps within the strictures of Wis. Stat. § 974.06).

State v. Brett W. Dumstrey, 2016 WI 3, 1/15/16, affirming a published court of appeals decision; case activity (including briefs)

Residents of multi-family dwellings, beware! According to the dissent, this decision “creates a great inequity” between those who live in houses and those who don’t (e.g. SPD clients). The majority holds that a locked, parking garage beneath an apartment building is not curtilage protected by the 4th Amendment, and an apartment dweller has no reasonable expectation of privacy in the private parking space for which he pays rent. Attorney Anthony Cotton, counsel for Dumstrey, offers his thoughts on the decision.

Review of a published court of appeals decision; case activity (including briefs)

Issue (from the State’s petition for review)

When a defendant who pleads guilty or no contest is misinformed that the maximum penalty that could be imposed is lower than the maximum actually allowed by law, and the sentence imposed is more than the defendant was told he could get, is the defendant entitled to withdraw his plea, or may the defect be remedied instead by reducing the sentence to the maximum the defendant was informed he could receive?

Review of a published court of appeals decision; case activity (including briefs)

Issue (composed by On Point)

Does the state statute preempting certain local firearm regulations, § 66.0409(2), apply to the Madison Transit and Parking Commission’s rule prohibiting weapons on city buses?

Review of a court of appeals summary disposition, case activity (including briefs)

Issues (from the DOJ’s PFR here, Democratic Party’s response here):

1.  The public records law contemplates that some records should not be disclosed because it would be contrary to the public interest, and courts recognize the public importance of protecting crime victims and law enforcement techniques. Here, DOJ determined that releasing videos from prosecutors’ training seminars would not be in the public interest because the videos contained discussions of crime victims and law enforcement strategy. Was DOJ’s rationale sufficient to overcome the presumption of disclosure?

Winnebago County v. Christopher S., 2016 WI 1, on certification from the court of appeals, and affirming the circuit court’s orders for commitment and involuntary medication; majority opinion by Justice Gableman, concurrence/dissent by Justice Abrahamson; case activity

The provisions of ch. 51 allowing the involuntary mental health commitment of prison inmates without a finding of dangerousness does not violate substantive due process because the statute’s provisions are reasonably related to a legitimate state interest.

New Richmond News v. City of New Richmond, 2015 WI 106, 12/18/15 (per curiam); case activity (including briefs)

We take note of this decision not because of the issue presented (does the federal Drivers’ Privacy Protection Act restrict access to records that would otherwise be subject to inspection under Wisconsin’s open records law?) but because of what it may portend for a handful of criminal cases briefed and argued in—but not decided by—the Wisconsin Supreme Court before the death of Justice N. Patrick Crooks in September 2015.

On a bypass petition; case activity (including briefs)

Issues (from the appellant’s brief):

Does a circuit court lack subject matter jurisdiction to enter an OWI 1st offense civil judgment if a defendant has a prior unknown out-of-state OWI conviction?

State v. Daniel S. Iverson, 2015 WI 101, 11/25/2015, reversing a 1-judge court of appeals decision; case activity (including briefs)

Do cigarette butts decompose? Do they “result[]…from community activities”? Those are just two of the burning questions left unanswered (smoldering?) after this blaze of statutory construction.

Review of a published court of appeals decision; case activity (including briefs)

In this case the supreme court will address an important issue about the offense of using a computer to facilitate a child sex crime, § 948.075(1r). The court of appeals granted McKellips a new trial on a charge under that statute, holding the jury was erroneously instructed to decide whether McKellips’s cell phone constituted a “computerized communication system” when it should have been instructed to decide whether McKellips’s uses of the phone constituted communication via a “computerized communication system.” The supreme court might also address another issue that has implications beyond § 948.075: Namely, whether instructional error that isn’t objected to at trial can be a basis for a new trial in the interest of justice.