On Point

Involuntary medication litigation and Covid-19 litigation were bound to cross paths, especially with all the vaccine mandates. But who could have foretold the twist presented by SCOW’s decision on Monday in Gahl v. Aurora Health Care, Inc., 2021AP1787-FT? Allen Gahl, attorney in fact for John Zingsheim, who is on a ventilator, sought a court order forcing Aurora to administer Ivermectin (de-worming medication) to him.

The court of appeals has ordered publication of the following criminal law related decision: State v. Nicholas Reed Adell, 2021 WI App 72 (circumstances justified extension of traffic stop to determine whether driver had prohibited alcohol content)

State v. Jesse Rogalla, 2019AP1486-CR, 10/26/21, District 3 (1-judge opinion, ineligible for publication; case activity (including briefs)

Officer Klieforth was dispatched to a home after someone reported that Rogalla was yelling at a woman inside. Klieforth heard both parties screaming, peeked in a window, saw Rogalla yelling as a woman knelt before him crying “You don’t have to do this” and “Why?” After hearing a loud slap, Klieforth entered without a warrant based on fear for the woman’s safety.

State v. S.T., 2021AP1278-1280, 10/26/21, District 1 (1-judge opinion, ineligible for publication); case activity

The circuit court terminated S.T.’s parental rights to three of her children after she brought one of them (a 5-month old twin) to the hospital with severe burns on his body. S.T. appealed arguing that during the grounds phase of the TPR trial the circuit court erroneously relied on irrelevant evidence–testimony regarding past  CHIPS and TPR proceedings that predated the births of these three children.

Attorney Keith Findley and colleagues have a new paper out. They examined cases in the postconviction context to determine how often prosecutors use their plea-bargaining power to preserve a conviction even when the conviction appears deeply flawed and the chances that the defendant is innocent are high. Guess what they found . . .

Given all the recent changes on the Wisconsin Supreme Court, SCOWstats has run a new Linguistic Inquiry Word Count software analysis of their opinions, including those from most of the new justices. It scores opinions on things like analytical thinking, speaking with clout, and so forth.  One interesting finding: Chief Justice Ziegler uses emotional words–negative […]

This week SCOTUS granted review on two cases involving Native American sovereignty. It also issued two summary rulings (without briefing or argument) that reversed federal appeals court decisions that had denied qualified immunity to police officers accused of using excessive force. In other words, SCOTUS summarily ruled for the police. Read more here.

State v. X.S., 2021AP419, review of an unpublished court of appeals opinion, granted 10/18/21, case activity

Issues:

1. Whether the court of appeals erroneously exercised its discretion in denying “Xander’s” motion for reconsideration less than 24 hours after it was filed without any explanation?

2. Whether a juvenile who stipulates to the prosecutive merit of a delinquency petition is estopped from presenting any evidence to contradict factual averments in the petition even when those facts do not negate probable cause for the charged offense?

3. Whether the court of appeals erroneously applied the discretionary standard of review?

That is the subject of today’s Immigration Professors’ blog post, which reports that the 2nd Circuit recently addressed the issue and links to a lengthy law306.com article highlighting a split among the circuits.  Apparently, the 4th, 5th, and 8th Circuits hold that undocumented immigrants are not included in “the people” of the Second Amendment.

That’s what Berkeley, California did. Read about the measure and its impact in this article from The Atlantic.