On Point

State v. Kelly W. Brown, 2018AP2382-CR, Distrct 4, 5/23/19 (1-judge opinion, ineligible for publication); case activity (including briefs)

Deputy Weinfurter stopped Brown because he thought that Brown’s car had 6 headlights illuminated on its front rather than the maximum of 4 allowed by §347.07(1). The stop led to an OWI 2nd charge. Brown moved to suppress arguing that the deputy’s assumptions about the number of headlights on his car were unreasonable. Indeed his car had only 4 headlights.

Barron County DHHS v. S.R.T., 2018AP1574 & 1575, 5/22/19, District 3 (one-judge decision; ineligible for publication); case activity

S.R.T. appeals the termination of his parental rights to his twin sons. He argues the court erroneously entered default judgments on grounds when he didn’t show up for a hearing, that the proceedings violated his right to due process because they were fundamentally unfair, and that the court erred in refusing to vacate the default judgments. The court of appeals rejects all three claims.

State v. T.J.B., 2018AP2449, 5/22/19, District 2 (one-judge decision; ineligible for publication); case activity

T.J.B. was charged as a juvenile with various drug and gun charges; he’d sold a little less than a pound of weed and was in possession of two handguns. (¶¶5-8). The State sought waiver into adult court.

State ex rel. Joshua M. Wren v. Reed Richardson, 2017AP880, review of an unpublished court of appeals order granted 5/14/19; case activity

Issue (from the petition for review):

Whether a criminal defendant who was denied a direct appeal and consequently was also deprived of counsel on appeal due to his trial counsel’s failure to file a notice of intent was properly denied habeas corpus relief based on the State’s assertion of a laches defense.

Portage County v. J.W.K., 2019 WI 54, 5/21/2019, affirming an unpublished order dismissing appeal as moot; case activity

Practitioners know that it’s rare to get from final judgment to court of appeals decision on the merits in less than a year. Just the ordinary statutory time frames for appointment of counsel, transcripts, motions or notices, transmitting the record, and briefing schedules can easily eat up well over half that time. So, an extension of a ch. 51 commitment–which is statutorily limited to one year in length–will often, if not invariably, be over by the time a decision can be reached. The supreme court now decides that, in some cases at least, this makes appeals of those extensions moot.

In re Judicial Disciplinary Proceedings Against Piontek, 2019 WI 51, 5/21/19; case activity

The supreme court suspends Judge Michael Piontek from office for five days for “obviously unethical” and “clearly improper” misconduct in two criminal cases.

State v. Traci L. Kollross, 2019 WI App 30; case activity (including briefs)

The circuit court held that the filing of a municipal court citation against Kollross for OWI 1st tolled the three-year statute of limitation for a criminal charge based on the same incident. The court of appeals disagrees and orders the criminal OWI charge against Kollross be dismissed because it was filed too late.

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. Christopher L. Gee, 2019 WI App 31; case activity (including briefs)

Christopher Gee was accused of sexually assaulting two women at knifepoint; one of the women had come to Gee’s apartment building because someone there had agreed to pay her for sex. He admitted to police that he’d had sex with this second woman, but said it was consensual and he’d simply refused to pay her afterward–something he said he often did. (¶10).

State v. Carrie E. Counihan, 2017AP2265-CR, petition for review granted 5/14/19, and State v. Donavinn Coffee, 2017AP2292-CR, petition for review granted 5/14/19; case activity (Counihan; Coffee)

Issues:

Does a defendant forfeit his right to challenge a judge’s consideration of information at sentencing by failing to object to the information at the time of sentencing?

If trial counsel does not object to the court’s consideration of the information and the defendant alleges postconviction that trial counsel was ineffective for failing to object, what is the standard for determining whether trial counsel’s failure was prejudicial?