Please ensure Javascript is enabled for purposes of website accessibility

How judges fared: 2015 year in review

By: Erika Strebel, [email protected]//January 12, 2016//

How judges fared: 2015 year in review

By: Erika Strebel, [email protected]//January 12, 2016//

Listen to this article

charts-1

The Wisconsin Court of Appeals reviewed more than 800 cases in 2015 and, in the end, affirmed circuit court judges around the state about 82 percent of the time.

  • Circuit court judges in Milwaukee County, which comprises all of the District 1 Court of Appeals, were affirmed 84 percent of the time.
  • Trial court judges in District 2 were affirmed 77 percent of the time.
  • The District 4 Court of Appeals affirmed 80 percent of decisions from circuit court judges in 2015.
  • The District 3 Court of Appeals affirmed 81 percent of the cases it heard in 2015.

Judge Lisa Stark, presiding judge of the District 3 Court of Appeals, said that in 2015 there were no clear-cut trends that she saw in the cases heard in her district. The biggest change she saw was in the number of civil matters, rather than criminal, that the court reviewed.

For the last few years, she said, the split between criminal and civil cases was about 50/50. But in 2015, about 60 percent of the decisions her court issued were in civil cases.

Another observation Stark made was that her district was inundated with one-judge appeals, many of them dealing with operating-while-intoxicated cases. One-judge appeals are available by statute in certain types of cases.

“But there are no particular trends,” Stark said. “The civil cases have been all over the board.”

How circuit court judges fared at the state Court of Appeals in 2015

In compiling these data, we counted only full decisions by the Wisconsin Court of Appeals on the Wisconsin Court System and excluded summary decisions. It’s also important to note that a judge could be listed in a decision here as a presiding judge who was reversed, even though he or she merely entered an order consistent with the law of the case as established by another judge.

A judge could be reversed in the Court of Appeals and ultimately be affirmed by the State Supreme Court, but the earlier reversal would nevertheless remain counted as a reversal in the Court of Appeals.

Also worth noting is that as the law changes, so can a judge’s holding. When it was issued, a holding could be entirely consistent with binding precedent and yet later be reversed because a subsequent decision changed the law.

APPEALS-CHART

– Data compiled by Erika Strebel

Here’s how circuit court judges fared before the state Supreme Court

The Wisconsin Law Journal has compiled a comprehensive review of all circuit court decision that went on to the Wisconsin Supreme Court and state Supreme Court in 2015. Below is a complete listing of judges who initially ruled on cases considered by the justices in 2015, and whether the high court affirmed or reversed the appealed decision.

SUPREME-CHART

– Compiled by Erika Strebel

Polls

Should Wisconsin Supreme Court rules be amended so attorneys can't appeal license revocation after 5 years?

View Results

Loading ... Loading ...

Legal News

See All Legal News

WLJ People

Sea all WLJ People

Opinion Digests