E. Harold Hallows

The case Dumer v. State concerned the conviction of an eighteen-year-old defendant for rape after he followed a twenty-six-year-old woman, struck her when she resisted, and engaged in sexual intercourse with her in a clump of bushes after pulling her across an alley. The defendant appealed on grounds that the civil branch of the circuit court lacked subject-matter jurisdiction over the criminal case and that the trial court had improperly invoked its authority, while also raising issues related to pretrial discovery of witnesses. The court held that Wisconsin circuit courts possess original jurisdiction over all civil and criminal matters not prohibited by law, that the administrative designation of specific branches for criminal cases in Milwaukee County was not exclusive, and that the assignment of the case to the civil branch judge was valid under statutes authorizing transfers and general assignments by the chief justice. The court further reasoned that the evidence, including the complainant's testimony of physical violence and the defendant's partial admission, established that the victim's will to resist was overcome by force, upholding the conviction.

criminal lawprocedure

In Brown v. State, the defendant, charged with armed robbery, moved to suppress statements he made to police after arrest on grounds they were involuntary, claiming police threats and denial of counsel despite his requests; he sought to introduce evidence of his prior experiences successfully invoking his right to silence and his former attorney's repeated advice to remain silent without counsel. The trial court excluded this evidence as immaterial, credited the officers' testimony, found the statements voluntary under the totality of the circumstances, and allowed the case to proceed to a guilty plea on a reduced robbery charge. On appeal from the conviction, the Wisconsin Supreme Court held that the excluded evidence had only slight probative value regarding voluntariness, that its exclusion was within the trial court's discretion under evidence rules and constituted at most harmless error, and that the statements were properly admitted, so the conviction stood.

criminal lawprocedure

In Powers v. Hunt-Wesson Foods, Inc., a restaurant cook sued the ketchup manufacturer after a sealed bottle broke in his hand while he attempted to open it by tapping it, causing a laceration; the case proceeded solely on a strict liability theory after the bottle and packaging showed no visible damage. The Wisconsin Supreme Court upheld the application of strict liability under the rule from Dippel v. Sciano adopting Restatement (Second) of Torts § 402A, which imposes prima facie liability on a seller of a defective product that is unreasonably dangerous and reaches the user unchanged, treating it as negligence per se while shifting the burden to the defendant to disprove negligence. The court reasoned that this doctrine is not absolute liability, permits ordinary negligence defenses including contributory negligence and product misuse if not reasonably foreseeable, and that the evidence of an intact carton and the plaintiff's ordinary handling was sufficient to support the jury verdict against the manufacturer.

torts & liability

The case concerned whether defendant Upchurch was entitled to a hearing on the voluntariness of his inculpatory statement to police before or during his robbery trial, and whether the statement could be used on rebuttal after he testified without such a hearing. The trial court denied a Goodchild hearing as untimely and allowed the statement into evidence via a police officer's rebuttal testimony. The Wisconsin Supreme Court held that under Wis. Stat. § 971.31(3), Upchurch had a statutory right to an evidentiary hearing on the statement's admissibility at trial unless previously waived, and that voluntariness must be determined by the court before the statement could be used even for impeachment because trustworthiness depends on it not being involuntary. The court remanded the case for a limited hearing on voluntariness, with instructions to reinstate the conviction if the statement was voluntary or grant a new trial if involuntary.

criminal lawprocedure

In Nelson v. Fisher Well Drilling Co., employees sued a contractor for unpaid wages on a municipal sewer construction project, alleging they performed tasks in higher-paying job classifications such as pipelayer or air-tool operator but were compensated only at the general laborer rate under the prevailing wage scale incorporated into the contract. The court reviewed the facts of the work performed, the wage determinations made by the Department of Industry, Labor and Human Relations pursuant to secs. 66.293 and 103.49, Stats., and the contractor's statute of limitations defense for pre-1969 claims. The core reasoning emphasized that, per the statutes and Wis. Adm. Code ch. IND 90, the type of work done—not prior occupational titles—determines the applicable minimum prevailing wage rate, with liability including liquidated damages for noncompliance.

labor & employmentbusiness & regulatory

This case involved a personal injury lawsuit by the Nolans against Venus Ford, Inc., arising from an automobile collision, in which the plaintiffs had settled with two other drivers before trial. The Nolans challenged the trial court's denial of their requests to excuse jurors with ties to a local insurance company for cause, its decision to structure the special verdict by asking about the settled nonparty drivers' negligence before Venus Ford's, and its refusal to grant a new trial in the interests of justice. The Wisconsin Supreme Court affirmed the judgment, holding that the juror qualification statute requires individualized proof of bias rather than automatic exclusion of insurance-affiliated jurors, that trial courts have broad discretion in framing verdicts under precedents like Pierringer v. Hoger, and that the plaintiffs had not shown any abuse of that discretion or other grounds warranting a new trial.

proceduretorts & liability