State v. Beverly Reshall Holt, 2013AP2738-CR, 3/8/16, District 1 (not recommended for publication); case activity (including briefs) The trial court did not err in admitting the audiovisual recording of the forensic interview of Caleb, one of the child victims, at Holt’s trial for child sexual assault. Holt was charged with two counts of first-degree child sexual assault for having intercourse… Read more
15. Evidence
State v. Anthony R. Owens, 2016 WI App 32; case activity (including briefs) The circuit court properly admitted the victim’s statements about who shot him under the dying declaration exception to the hearsay rule, and the admission of the victim’s statements didn’t violate the Confrontation Clause. Owens was charged with shooting and killing Pinkard, who was… Read more
State v. Robert A. Schoengarth, 2015AP1834-CR, 2/11/16, District 4 (one-judge decision; ineligible for publication); case activity (including briefs) The circuit court erroneously exercised its discretion when it ordered that police could not testify about Schoengarth’s performance on field sobriety tests. The judge apparently accepted Schoengarth’s argument that exclusion was appropriate because he had agreed to do… Read more
Review of a per curiam court of appeals decision; case activity (including briefs) Issue (copied from the State’s petition for review): No witness, expert or otherwise, may give an opinion at a trial that another mentally and physically competent witness is telling the truth. Here, the social worker who interviewed a child regarding her claim… Read more
State v. Trista J. Ziehr, 2015AP994-CR, 1/13/16, District 2 (one-judge opinion, ineligible for publication); case activity, including briefs There isn’t much case law on Wisconsin’s “mandatory reporter” requirement, and this opinion makes no attempt to fill the gaps. Ziehr ran a daycare center and thus had a mandatory duty to report child abuse to the proper… Read more
Some interesting posts on this subject have popped up around the blogosphere. In this “introductory post” on EDTA testing, evidence professor Colin Miller explains the flaw in the State’s contention that the FBI’s EDTA testing proved that the blood in Halbach’s car did not come from the tube of Avery’s blood that someone tampered with. And… Read more
State v. Gregory Tyson Below, 2014AP2614-2616-CR, 1/12,16, District 1 (not recommended for publication); case activity, including briefs This was a high profile case in Milwaukee. Below was convicted of 29 charges of kidnapping, strangulation and suffocation, sexual assault, battery, reckless injury and solicitation of prostitutes. He appealed and asserted 4 claims for a new trial… Read more
United States v. Antonio West, 7th Circuit Court of Appeals Case No. 14-2514, 12/30/15 The trial court erroneously excluded expert evidence that West sought to admit regarding factors that made him susceptible to making an unreliable confession to a crime. West, a felon, confessed to possessing a firearm. He moved to suppress his statement arguing… Read more
