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High court: No change to appellate record rules

By: Erika Strebel, [email protected]//January 17, 2018//

High court: No change to appellate record rules

By: Erika Strebel, [email protected]//January 17, 2018//

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The Wisconsin Supreme Court has declined to adopt proposed changes to the state’s rules governing the appellate record.

The Judicial Council had proposed changing the procedures for supplementing the record on appeal, as well as rules concerning sealed documents, transcripts of certain recordings and pre-sentence investigation reports.

The council is an independent body of judges, lawmakers and lawyers and other stakeholders in the legal system that is charged with recommending changes to court procedures for the Supreme Court and state Legislature. The council filed its proposal concerning the appellate record on May 26.

The recommendation had specifically called for allowing appellate courts to provide access to pre-sentence investigation reports that are already in the record and requiring parties to submit transcripts of deposition recordings 10 days before a proceeding.

The changes, according to the council’s memo, were meant to clarify current rules and make the court more efficient.

The Wisconsin Supreme Court heard public testimony on the petition Tuesday morning from Jenny Andrews, chief staff attorney for the Wisconsin Court of Appeals, who presented the petition on the behalf of the Judicial Council but also discussed the Wisconsin Court of Appeals’ concerns with a provision involving pre-sentence investigation reports. She was the only person to file written testimony on the rule. That testimony related to the appeals court’s concerns.

Jeremy Perri, director of the State Public Defender’s appellate division, also testified Tuesday, pushing back against those concerns.

The justices met in closed conference on Tuesday afternoon following Andrew’s and Perri’s testimony. Starting in its previous term, the court has not been required to meet in public to debate and vote on proposed rule changes.

In the end, the justices voted 5-2 to deny the petition, said Supreme Court Commissioner Julie Rich. Justices Shirley Abrahamson and Ann Walsh Bradley cast the dissenting votes, she said.

Abrahamson and Bradley make up the court’s liberal-leaning minority.

The majority of the justices were not persuaded that the proposed changes were needed and were concerned that attempting to clarify one part of the rules could lead to confusion in other areas, said Rich.

The court will issue a written order stating why it denied the petition.

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