Archives: Wisconsin Court of Appeals

Frequent filer cases are (fortunately) rare, but they exert an undue cost on the legal system.

It’s rare that a discretionary order, such as maintenance, is reversed on appeal. It’s even rarer that the Wisconsin Court of Appeals goes to such length in reversing the order that it takes special concern to assure that on remand, the prevailing party on appeal can have a new judge hear the matter. Both occur in Lemke v. Lemke,

In re the Paternity of F. T. R. raises a number of interesting questions, both legally and philosophically for the Wisconsin Supreme Court.

The Court of Appeals decision in Tierney is just silly. That led to me thinking … what other family law rules are simply silly?

Yes, the law sometimes works in mysterious ways. Take, for example, a recent Wisconsin Court of Appeals opinion that reached the right conclusion, although for somewhat convoluted reasons. In the process, the court has, thankfully, cleared up one of the more silly aspects of family law in Wisconsin.

Lawyers, especially courts in a common law system, need to be careful of the words they choose.

Hopefully, the Wisconsin Court of Appeals decision in Nehls will be relied upon only for the waiver issue, not approving the use of a GAL serving as a type of “special master” in deciding custody matters.

This article will first examine the historical development of the concept of impermissible double counting, next examine the recent case (McReath v. McReath) and suggest what courts should do if the issue presents itself.

Wisconsin had long adhered to the “relevance” test for expert testimony: Whether the evidence would likely assist the finder of fact. As recently as a year ago, the Wisconsin Supreme Court refused to adopt Daubert. Never shy, the Wisconsin Legislature has decided it knows evidentiary law better than the Wisconsin Supreme Court.

This article analyzes the implications of the Wisconsin Court of Appeals’ opinion in McReath v. McReath.