By Margo Kirchner As reported by WJI in its "Walker's judges" post on Brad Schimel and by various reporters in late 2018, no formal written application from Schimel appears to exist regarding his 2018 appointment as Waukesha County Circuit Court judge. But even outside of a formal application, written records regarding his appointment are scarce. A recent public records request by Wisconsin Justice Initiative sought copies of Schimel's application and the applications of all finalists for the position. The documents provided by the governor's office in response contained no written application from Schimel but did contain his recommendations of four others for the position. WJI's public records request also asked the governor's office for copies of any records, including emails and other correspondence, between Schimel and then-Gov. Scott Walker or his staff regarding the appointment. WJI received one page of records in response to that portion of its requests, with just the few lines of text messages shown in the image below. Paul Connell was the deputy attorney general under Schimel and Katie Ignatowski was Walker's chief legal counsel in November 2018. That's it. That appears to be the whole written record preceding Schimel's judicial appointment.
Schimel had lost his statewide reelection campaign for attorney general on Nov. 6, 2018. Walker announced Schimel's appointment as judge on Nov. 20, 2018.
0 Comments
"Walker's judges" is an effort to present information about former Gov. Scott Walker's appointees to the bench. Since the election of Gov. Tony Evers, WJI has focused on "Evers' judges." However, from time to time WJI posts "Walker's judges" columns for those who still serve on the bench. Brad Schimel was Wisconsin's attorney general when he was appointed by Walker to the Waukesha County Circuit Court in November 2018, just days after Schimel lost reelection on November 6, 2018. Usually, the information for "Walker's judges" and "Evers' judges" columns comes from the person's written application to the governor, but in Schimel's case there appears to be no such application. ![]() Name: Brad D. Schimel Appointed to: Waukesha County Circuit Court Appointment date: Nov. 20, 2018, to term ending July 31, 2018 (elected to a six-year term in April 2019) Education: Law School – University of Wisconsin–Madison Undergraduate – University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee The Waukesha County Circuit Court website contains the following biography for Schimel: "Brad Schimel grew up in the Town of Vernon and graduated Mukwonago High School. He attended UW Waukesha for 2 years and then finished his Bachelor Degree at UW Milwaukee. He began his career in the Waukesha County Courthouse as an intern in the DA's Office in 1989, and after graduating UW Law School in 1990, was hired as an Assistant DA. He served as an Assistant DA until he was elected Waukesha County District Attorney in 2006 and was twice reelected as DA. He left the courthouse in 2015 after being elected Wisconsin Attorney General. Brad and his family stayed here in Waukesha County, and he returned to the courthouse as a Circuit Court Judge presiding over Br. 6 in January, 2019." Schimel's appointment was unusual in that he likely did not apply for the job in writing. As reported in late 2018, and confirmed by the results of a recent open records request by Wisconsin Justice Initiative seeking copies of Schimel's application and the applications of all finalists for the position, no written application from Schimel appears to exist. A press release from Sept. 13, 2018, set an application deadline of Oct. 5, 2018, for the position. Applicants were to submit a cover letter, resume, completed judicial application form, and two writing samples. In a letter dated Dec. 21, 2018, to Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reporter Patrick Marley in response to an open records request made earlier that month, Nicholas J. Korger, assistant legal counsel in Walker's office, stated that "(t)here were 14 applicants for the Waukesha County judicial vacancy and a group of 6 'final candidates' . . . . The group of final candidates consisted of the following applicants: Paul Dedinsky, David Maas, Jack Melvin, Brad Schimel, Sara Scullen, and Katherine Spitz." Documents included with the letter to Marley, and recently received by WJI in response to its more recent open records request, total more than 1,000 pages. They include applications from the other five finalists, but not from Schimel. In fact, included in the records are four recommendations that Schimel wrote for other individuals seeking the job: Mass, Melvin, Matthew Fernholz, and Sarah Ponath. The four recommendations were made in separate emails to Walker's judicial appointment inbox all dated Oct. 4, 2018, within 30 minutes of each other. By Margo Kirchner Wisconsin Supreme Court candidate Brad Schimel told a crowd straight out that he’s an originalist and that the “judicial branch was always intended to be the weakest.” In seeming contradiction, he also said that a judge should keep an open mind until all evidence and arguments are in. The remarks were made at a “Get to Know” forum held Tuesday afternoon by the Lubar Center at Marquette University Law School, hosted by Director Derek Mosley. A recording of the one-hour forum is available. Schimel, a Waukesha County Circuit Court judge, is competing with Dane County Circuit Court Judge Susan Crawford for an open seat on the Supreme Court created by Justice Ann Walsh Bradley’s retirement. Schimel said that running for the Supreme Court was not in his plans until the 2023 election campaign, during which time now-Justice Janet Protasiewicz’s comments while campaigning suggested in advance how she would rule. That campaign led him to run. Schimel said that “you have to commit as a jurist to have an open mind” and that “if you can’t make that commitment, you have no business putting that black robe on.” He said he would bring back objectivity: “no more prejudging stuff. Judges must set aside all the political noise to judge the cases before them, he said, adding “It’s liberating.” Originalism means the interpretation of a constitution or law in a way that jurists today believe the writers of the document meant when they wrote and passed it—in other words, its perceived original meaning. Three other Supreme Court justices have expressed their belief in originalism, meaning that Schimel's election to the court would make that a majority view. When pressed on originalism by an audience member who asked why Schimel thinks “the Founders had all this knowledge” that does not change over time, Schimel remarked that “the Constitution has to be an enduring document.” As for his judicial philosophy, in addition to being an originalist, he is a judicial conservative, which he said differs from a political conservative. He would “apply the law as written,” he said. He discussed how evictions are tough cases for him as a judge, but “it’s a contract” and “you don’t get to put your thumb on a scale,” he said. “It’s the law and you have to apply it.” An audience member asked Schimel what role he thought the government should have in a woman’s reproductive health. She prefaced her question with a statement that she is afraid of Schimel becoming justice because after she was the victim of a sexual assault, she feared an unplanned pregnancy. He responded that his children were unplanned pregnancies, which allowed his wife and him the ability to adopt them, and that the U.S. Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision put the decision in the hands of the people. “The body in control of this issue is the voters of Wisconsin,” he said, and told the woman he had no reason to fear him. “Judges and justices are disconnected” and do not make policy, he said in response to a question about lack of voter ability to change the law with “rigged” legislative districts. When asked about outside influence in the race to his benefit, in particular advertisement money and endorsements from Elon Musk, Schimel said he welcomed anyone who helps to get his message out but that he is “not running on anybody’s agenda.” “I can’t do anything to stop the money” coming in, he said. He referenced outside money supporting his opponent, too, from George Soros and the Illinois governor, and that “you can’t be for sale.” Schimel discussed his childhood and education, his work in a prosecutor clinic during law school, his first job in the district attorney’s office in Waukesha, and his eventual positions as district attorney, state attorney general, then judge. He said that “running for office is about making friends.” “I like that,” he added. Schimel’s term on the Waukesha County Circuit Court ends July 31, 2025, so if he loses the supreme court race he is out of the courts, which he noted at the forum. In response to Mosley’s questions about Schimel's proudest accomplishments, Schimel mentioned his work as DA in building a child advocacy center in Waukesha to help child victims and their families; his work as attorney general in developing a successful drug take-back program, an office of school safety, and a chaplain program for law enforcement; and as judge presiding over a drug treatment court. Treatment courts, which address underlying causes of crime and help those who are struggling to succeed, “are one of the best things we’ve ever done,” he said. Schimel noted that throughout his career he has learned that things are not black and white—most things are grey. He said that in criminal cases in the trial court the judge is the least powerful person in the room, as the prosecutor holds the power, until sentencing. When asked about what needs to change in the justice system, Schimel pointed to the need for more defense attorneys because defendants are waiting too long in custody awaiting appointment of counsel. He also would like people to pay more attention to the judicial system, especially by voting in the April judicial elections. An audience member asked how he reconciled wanting voters to pay attention with his prior statement that the judiciary by design is the weakest branch of government. Schimel said that the weakness comes from the Founders’ documents and that he saw no inconsistency in the statements. He did, however, indicate that the courts do have a role in deciding what executive powers are legitimate. Immediately following the event, a handful of reporters sought to talk with Schimel, but his campaign staffer said he was on a schedule and could not stay. The staffer said reporters should email him, but one reporter said he had tried that three times with no response from the staffer. By Alexandria Staubach Wisconsin Court of Appeals District 2 last week reversed Wisconsin Supreme Court hopeful and Waukesha Circuit Court Judge Brad Schimel’s decision siding with Elmbrook School Board leaders on open meeting violation allegations. Elmbrook School Board members Scott Wheeler and Jean Lambert face fines after the three-judge panel unanimously ruled in favor of plaintiff Leanne Wied. ![]() Presiding Judge Mark D. Gundrum wrote for the panel, joined by Judges Shelly A. Grogan and Maria S. Lazar. The appeals court found that the school board operated under a “cloak of secrecy” in filling a vacant school board seat during COVID. Gundrum characterized the case as “an excellent example of the real-world impact of failing to adhere to open meetings law requirements.” In 2020, the school board sought to fill a vacancy during a meeting held by Zoom during the pandemic. Four candidates, including Mushir Hassan and Wied, vied for the job. During the meeting, Wheeler asked each board member to rank their first and second choices by email and send him their preferences. The email votes did not constitute formal votes but were intended to narrow the field, Wheeler said. According to Gundrum's opinion, no candidate received enough votes to be the first choice of four or more of the candidates. Nevertheless, Wheeler presented Hassan and Wied as the candidates for the board to consider. He did not announce or subsequently volunteer the results of the email vote. Ultimately the board was deadlocked three to three. Wheeler consistently voted for Hassan. On a third vote between Hassan and Wied, board member Glen Alliger, who had previously voted for Wied, switched his vote to Hassan. Before receiving all votes, Wheeler announced “We’ve got four votes for Mushir (Hassan) and two votes for Leanne (Wied),” which Wheeler said constituted a “consensus.” In fact, another member had also switched, but from Hassan to Wied, so the board was still deadlocked three to three. Wheeler then called for a formal vote, which Hassan won with five votes and one member abstaining. At no point were the results of any email votes read aloud or published in the online meeting to the entirety of the board or the public. Further, Wheeler never corrected the email vote tally, which after the meeting he characterized as an oversight. The actual numbers were disclosed only through subsequent open records requests, which produced the emails. Wied sued Wheeler and Lambert, alleging violations of the open meeting laws and another claim against the school district. Schimel sided with the defendants in circuit court. The court of appeals found that Schimel incorrectly removed Wied as the plaintiff because she had a “personal interest” in the case after having initiated a different suit against the district. Schimel also had found that Wheeler and Lambert’s actions did not constitute an “intent to hide something.” In reversing, the appeals court wrote that “Board members sharing their preferences with Wheeler in a manner that hid the same from the public and other board members was concealment that was initiated and invited by board president Wheeler.” Gundrum wrote that “the secrecy of Wheeler’s process allowed him to erroneously announce his own preferred candidate, Hassan, as having received four email preferences to advance for the subsequent up-or-down vote, and no one was in a position—at the time when it mattered, as opposed to after Hassan had already been selected, voted on, and seated as a new board member—to monitor the process.” Wheeler and Lambert remain on the Elmbrook school board with terms expiring in April 2026 and April 2027, respectively. Hassan's term ended in 2024. By Margo Kirchner
As of Aug. 1, 2025, Brad Schimel will either be a Wisconsin Supreme Court justice or out of the Wisconsin judiciary. Schimel is currently a Waukesha County Circuit Court judge, with a term ending July 31, 2025. On Dec. 19, he filed a “notification of noncandidacy,” confirming that he will not run for his Waukesha County seat as a back-up if he loses to Susan Crawford in the Supreme Court race. Schimel was appointed to the bench by then-Gov. Scott Walker in late 2018, following Schimel’s loss to Josh Kaul in the November 2018 attorney general race. Schimel won election to a full six-year term in April 2019. Crawford is a Dane County Circuit Court judge with a term ending July 31, 2030. She won reelection in April 2024 to a six-year term. She had won a contested race for an open seat in the April 2018 election. If Crawford wins the Supreme Court race, Gov. Tony Evers will be able to appoint a replacement for her on the Dane County bench. Schimel and Crawford are running for an open seat on the Supreme Court. Justice Ann Walsh Bradley announced months ago that she would not run for reelection and confirmed that by filing her notification of noncandidacy on Dec. 13. Other judges who have filed notices of noncandidacy and created open seats for the April 2025 election:
Nomination papers and valid signatures for April 2025 judicial candidates are due Jan. 7. ![]() By Gretchen Schuldt The State Department of Justice should re-think its decision to require school districts receiving school safety grants to send teachers to mental health training designed for police officers and to participate in new, vaguely defined threat reporting activities, a group of mental health organizations says. "I really hope there is an opportunity to correct the places where we're headed toward unintended consequences," Joanne Juhnke, policy director of Wisconsin Family Ties (WFT), said Tuesday. Wisconsin Family Ties is a statewide, parent-run organization working with families that include children with social, emotional or behavioral challenges. WFT, along with Grassroots Empowerment Project, Kids Forward, Mental Health America of Wisconsin, NAMI Wisconsin, and the Wisconsin Association for Marriage & Family Therapy wrote to Attorney General Brad Schimel raising questions about the grant's requirements. Schimel's office is administering the grants. "Our concerns involve both the required adolescent mental health training at schools receiving the grant and the proposed incident-reporting to the Department of Justice in the context of School Safety Intervention Teams (SSITs)," the letter said. The groups recommended that Schimel's shop "consult with relevant stakeholder groups including advocacy organizations with expertise in youth mental health." Under the state's grant requirements, participating districts would establish SSITs to perform "ongoing violence-related threat assessments, behavior monitoring, and intervention" and would track, monitor, assist, and intervene with at-risk youth, according to DOJ's grant application instructions. The grant will require participating school districts to send 10 percent of their teachers and counselors to a 12-hour training in adolescent mental health, though the training was not designed for them. "Although it does not appear in the grant materials, the full title of the training is 'Adolescent Mental Health Training for School Resource Officers,' and is the only approved training for this element of the grant," the groups' letter said. The target audience for the training is "school resource officers, security personnel, administrators, disciplinary staff, and treatment providers." "Requiring teachers to undergo training in adolescent health, delivered by law enforcement and designed with a juvenile justice perspective reinforces unfounded linkages between mental health challenges and crime and encourages teachers to view themselves as 'disciplinary staff' in their response," the letter said. Other available training would be more appropriate, the organizations said. At issue is the second round in a grant process designed to award $100 million in school safety improvement grants. About $48 million will be awarded. Individual awards will range from $10,000 to $2.5 million, according to Department of Justice grant application information. School districts are required to submit their applications by Aug. 30 and project implementation will start Oct. 1. Juhnke, in an interview, said the grant also requires information about potential threats to be entered "into databases about which we know practically nothing." The grant application instructions do not say whether school districts would supply general, district wide aggregate data or information about specific students and perceived threats. It says only that new School Safety Intervention Teams (SSIT) would “report VRA [Violence Risk Assessment] data from specific, plausible, and imminent threats to the DOJ utilizing DOJ reporting form,” but does not provide a copy of the form or describe it. WJI asked DOJ for a copy of the form Tuesday, but did not receive a response. The Department of Justice also would require winning districts to “participate in and promote the DOJ confidential reporting application or tip line, when this is developed and deployed.” Again, DOJ provides no information about the tip line or how it would function. The State Legislature in March approved a bill requiring teachers, school administrators, school counselors, other school employees, physicians, and other medical and mental health professionals to report school safety threats to law enforcement. That bill, Juhnke said, was "passed at almost light speed" with very little deliberation or public input. The grant is asking that "school districts commit themselves to processes that haven't been created," she said. The new law does not require development of a new reporting system, she said. The mental health groups, in their letter, said the tip line "risks promoting a culture of suspicion, adding to stigma regarding mental health challenges and further discouraging students and families from seeking help." Many questions about the system remain, they said. "What would be the benefit over and above any existing mechanisms for dealing with threats at school?" the letter asked. "Is there an evidence base for the benefits and drawbacks of such a system? What would be the threshold for reporting? Who would have access to the data? How long would the data be maintained? Would there be an appeal procedure for having reports removed?" Juhnke said it was important to recognize and stop any actual school threat, but "we're spiralling off in ill-defined directions from that." ![]() By Margo Kirchner A Racine County judge on Thursday dismissed all charges against Daniel G. Scheidell, who served 20 years in prison for sexual assault before a court finally allowed him to present evidence that strongly suggested the attack was committed by someone else. Racine County Circuit Court Judge Mark Nielsen granted the state’s motion to dismiss, after Racine County Assistant District Attorney Dirk Jensen said the state could not meet its burden in a new trial. One of Scheidell’s supporters in the gallery clapped as the judge dismissed the case. Scheidell’s conviction was vacated in 2015, but Attorney General Brad Schimel’s Department of Justice unsuccessfully appealed that decision twice. A jury convicted Scheidell in October 1995 of attempted first-degree sexual assault and armed robbery following a trial based heavily on testimony of the victim, J.D. J.D. awoke in her apartment early one morning in May, 1995, to find a knife-wielding man straddling her waist. The perpetrator during the attempted assault wore a black knit ski mask and jacket over his head and never spoke. J.D. managed to retrieve a pistol from her nightstand and the man left. She was certain he was her upstairs neighbor, Scheidell, based on the man’s “distinctive body and walk” and part of the face she saw while she struggled with him. When police arrived, they found Scheidell coming down the stairs, looking like he just woke up. He gave a voluntary statement and allowed police to search his apartment, but found nothing incriminating. They searched the alley – nothing. At trial, defense counsel sought to offer evidence of a different, similar sexual assault that occurred five weeks after the attack on J.D., when he was in custody. The second assault occurred about four blocks away from J.D.’s residence, and many of the facts of the crime, including mode of entry, weapon, mask, time of day, and build of the assailant, were similar. The assailant in the second crime, however, got away and was not identified. Scheidell’s trial judge denied admission of the evidence because there was not any evidence directly connecting a third person to the crime Scheidell was accused of committing. The jury found him guilty in October 1995 and Scheidell appealed all the way up to the State Supreme Court. He lost there, with the court ruling that mistaken-identity evidence is not admissible when a defendant tries to show that some unknown person committed the crime. Scheidell applied to the Wisconsin Innocence Project for help. In 2013, the Innocence Project obtained a DNA profile from the second sexual assault and matched the profile to a Wisconsin inmate serving time for a 1998 sexual assault. Scheidell moved for a new trial to present evidence that a now known perpetrator committed the crime for which Scheidell had been convicted. In June 2015, Racine County Circuit Court Judge John Jude granted the motion and vacated Scheidell’s conviction. Scheidell was released on bond shortly thereafter. Although the state appealed, a three-judge Wisconsin Court of Appeals panel (including two conservative Gov. Scott Walker appointees) affirmed the grant of a new trial in the interest of justice. “It is undoubtedly reasonable to conclude that this new evidence casts doubt upon whether justice was done in the original proceeding,” Appeals Judge Brian K. Hagedorn wrote in a concurring opinion. The Supreme Court denied the Schimel team’s request for review and sent the case back to Racine for a new trial. Thursday, at a hearing set for argument on a motion to modify bond, Jensen, the assistant district attorney, moved for dismissal based on additional investigation. Nielsen granted the motion and dismissed the case without prejudice, meaning the state could theoretically file it again. The judge gave defense attorney Patrick Cafferty until Oct. 2 to file a new motion with legal support for his position that the case should be dismissed with prejudice, meaning it cannot be filed again. Scheidell sighed audibly several times when he approached his family and friends after the hearing. Cafferty said that he is “thrilled for this gentleman” and attributed Scheidell’s release to the work of many lawyers. Cafferty indicated that Scheidell’s original trial counsel, in particular Debra Patterson, worked hard to get the evidence of the second assault admitted: “The work the lawyers did early on laid the foundation” and “they deserve the credit,” he said By Margo Kirchner Pregnant women in Wisconsin remain at risk of being thrown in jail and forced into treatment despite a federal judge’s determination that the state’s “cocaine mom” statute is unconstitutional. U.S. District Judge James D. Peterson last spring declared the law impermissibly vague and blocked its enforcement statewide. State Attorney General Brad Schimel immediately appealed, however, and the law remains in effect while the litigation continues. Here’s what happened to two women under the law. In May 2013, Alicia Beltran, then 28, learned she was pregnant. A few weeks later, she sought prenatal care at a clinic in Washington County. She informed a physician’s assistant that she previously abused Percoset, which contains an opioid, but recently finished a course of Suboxone to treat her addiction. The physician’s assistant recommended that Beltran take a second course of Suboxone and, when Beltran refused (believing she already kicked her Percoset use), the clinic reported her to a Washington County social worker. In July 2013, five law-enforcement officers arrested Beltran at her home, handcuffed her, and took her to a doctor for evaluation. The doctor declared Beltran and her pregnancy to be healthy and said he did not consider inpatient drug treatment to be necessary. Nevertheless, the officers drove Beltran to the county jail. An assistant district attorney filed an action against Beltran under the cocaine-mom law and an attorney was appointed for Beltran’s fetus. Beltran was taken in handcuffs and shackles to a courtroom, where she requested an attorney. The commissioner said none would be provided until the next hearing. Beltran was ordered to a treatment facility, where she tested negative for all drugs. The court held Beltran at the facility for over two months, scheduling a jury trial for late October. Beltran went to federal court to challenge her detention; the ADA, in response, dismissed the cocaine-mom action against Beltran and had her released. In 2014, Tamara Loertscher, then 29, was unemployed and could no longer afford medication for her hypothyroidism. Without the medication she suffered depression and fatigue and began using marijuana and methamphetamine a few times a week. When Loertscher in August 2014 suspected she was pregnant, she went to a hospital to confirm it. She acknowledged her drug use to hospital personnel but told them she planned to stop using drugs to have a healthy baby. She checked into the hospital for care and received the thyroid medication she needed. But the hospital reported Loertscher to the Taylor County Department of Human Services, saying her behavior with drugs and alcohol put her fetus in serious danger. Taylor County appointed a lawyer to represent Loertscher’s fetus. Loertscher, however, was not entitled an appointed lawyer yet. While in the hospital, Loertscher had to appear by phone, with little notice, in a temporary physical custody hearing. Loertscher said she did not wish to speak without legal representation and refused to participate. The court commissioner considered this a waiver of appearance, continued without Loertscher, and ordered her held at the hospital and then transferred to an inpatient drug treatment facility. Loertscher, though, checked herself out of the hospital. After another hearing, at which Loertscher represented herself, the court found her in contempt and ordered her to report to either the inpatient treatment facility or jail. Loertscher spent 18 days in jail, during which time she received no prenatal care and experienced pain and cramping. She was not permitted to see an obstetrician. When Loertscher refused to take the redundant pregnancy test required by the jail doctor, she was placed in solitary confinement. Loertscher on her own found a list of Taylor County public defense attorneys and contacted one;, a public defender was appointed. Loertscher was released after she signed a consent decree that required an alcohol and drug-abuse assessment and weekly drug testing at her own expense. All tests were negative. Loertscher delivered a healthy baby. The cocaine mom law (also known as Act 292) allows medical staff or county social workers to report and detain a pregnant woman if they think she “habitually lacks self-control” regarding alcohol or drugs “to a severe degree” with a “substantial risk” of an effect on or danger for her fertilized egg, embryo or fetus. Authorities can take a woman into initial custody if they think she meets this standard, but she refuses to accept abuse treatment. If a court agrees, it can order the woman to treatment against her will and keep her in custody indefinitely. Loertscher self-medicated, but stopped upon learning she was pregnant; Beltran previously used drugs but was clean at the time she was ordered to a treatment facility. Both women planned no further drug use during pregnancy and therefore refused abuse treatment. In Loertscher’s case, Judge Peterson found that the statute’s language, especially in light of current medical knowledge, fails to give fair warning about what conduct is prohibited and fails to provide authorities any meaningful standard for enforcement. But Judge Peterson’s April ban on enforcement of the cocaine-mom law was short-lived. Schimel and his department immediately appealed and sought a stay of Peterson’s order. Though both Peterson and the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals refused to stay the order, the state was undeterred and sought relief in the U.S. Supreme Court. On July 7 the Supreme Court stayed Peterson’s injunction while the appeal is pending. The parties filed appellate briefs over the summer, but no date for oral argument is set; a decision could come months or even a year after argument. Meanwhile, pregnant women in Wisconsin remain subject to a law that may very well be unconstitutional. The long-term future of Peterson’s injunction is uncertain. Federal courts decide only live, ongoing disputes. The state’s first argument on appeal is that Loertscher no longer has a live dispute---not because her pregnancy ended (a legal doctrine permits continuation of a case involving pregnancy if the issue is capable of repetition) but because she moved out of state before Peterson issued his order. On appeal, the state argues that Loertscher no longer has any stake in enforcement of the law: she “makes no plausible argument that, having moved out of Wisconsin, she will be subject to Act 292 in the future.” According to the state, “the fact that the present dispute involves a pregnancy-related law does not dictate a different result---this case is moot not because of the short duration of pregnancy, but because Plaintiff has moved out of Wisconsin” and fails to show that she intends to move back. If the Seventh Circuit agrees with the state, Loertscher’s case will be dismissed as moot, the cocaine-mom law will remain on the books, and pregnant women who once used drugs but no longer do will remain at risk. Ten medical and public health organizations, meanwhile, filed a friend-of-the-court brief in the Seventh Circuit saying Peterson was right to declare the law unconstitutionally vague. The organizations represent hundreds of thousands of healthcare providers nationwide and include the American Medical Association, the Wisconsin Medical Society, the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, and the American Academy of Pediatrics. They argue that research contradicts the state’s assumption that prenatal exposure to controlled substances causes inevitable harm. The organizations say Peterson “rightly concluded that ‘no one knows at what level drug or alcohol use will pose a risk to the unborn child’”; thus, an expectant mother cannot know when she would be subject to the law. After repeatedly taking a pain killer before learning of pregnancy? After smoking marijuana once a week for a month or two? After having a single glass of wine? The organizations argue that the law deters women from being honest with medical personnel or seeking essential prenatal care in the first place. Moreover, the law puts pregnant woman and her fetus on opposite sides of a legal dispute, but their health cannot be separated from each other. The National Coalition for a Civil Right to Counsel, in a second friend-of-the-court brief, sided with Loertscher in challenging the lack of legal representation at critical proceedings. Sexual predators and mentally ill individuals receive appointed counsel at all significant stages of confinement proceedings. Fetuses are appointed attorneys at the very start of cocaine-mom proceedings. Yet pregnant women, even if poor, are not appointed lawyers for the initial temporary-custody and plea hearings, which can result in forced treatment and involuntary confinement. Loertscher’s and Beltran’s cocaine mom proceedings show that even when a woman requests counsel at these hearings her request may be ignored. Counsel may be appointed for a later fact-finding hearing, but only if the woman contests the case at the earlier hearings. Before any right to counsel arises, the woman must decide on her own how to plead, to demand a jury, and to demand that the fact-finding hearing be held within 30 days. Loertscher and Beltran appear to be the only two women to have challenged the cocaine mom law in the 20 years since passage. Shortly after Beltran filed her federal case, authorities released her and dropped all abuse charges. Beltran filed a type of case used to seek release. Because she obtained that release U.S. District Judge Charles N. Clevert, Jr. dismissed the case as moot while calling what happened to Beltran “extremely disturbing” and suggesting that the result may have been different in a civil rights case. Loertscher’s challenge uses civil-rights and declaratory action laws, which could allow the case to continue after her release or delivery of her baby. etween 2005 and 2014, said Peterson in his decision, 3,326 reports of alleged unborn-child abuse were pursued by caseworkers. Some 467 of those reports were substantiated with some evidence. The briefs in Loertscher’s appeal suggest why challenges to the law are rare.
First is the law’s coercive nature. When a woman refuses to receive treatment “voluntarily,” she faces a temporary hold in custody and a formal petition for confinement and treatment. Such a choice may coerce women to simply submit to unwanted treatment. Second, the woman proceeds though preliminary stages without the assistance of counsel, while her fetus has counsel and is pitted against the mother. Then, by the time the woman may find a lawyer on her own or be appointed counsel, she is closer to delivery and possibly unwilling to get involved in stressful litigation. Third, cocaine mom proceedings are not public. They occur in juvenile court, where files are sealed. The briefs in Loertscher’s appeal note only one additional publicly known case, which made the Racine paper in 2005. No public record means no public outcry and no awareness by attorneys who could advise the women affected. If Loertscher’s case is dismissed because she moved out of state, perhaps another pregnant woman will step forward to challenge the cocaine mom law. But how about repeal? ![]() State Attorney General Brad Schimel accepted a $2,500 campaign donation from a predatory loan king who was in business with a reputed mob figure, records show. Schimel accepted the donation from Rod Aycox, of Alpharetta, GA, on March 15, campaign finance records show. The donation is listed in Schimel's latest campaign finance report. Aycox is the founder and chief executive officer of Atlanta-based Select Management Resources and routinely pumps big money into campaigns of candidates symapthetic to the exhorbitant-interest payday/title loan industry. Aycox also operates companies under the names LoanMax, Midwest Title Loans and several other brands, according to the Center for Public Integrity. The profits he derives from charging high interest rates to poor people allows him to live in luxury. Aycox, a former used car and insurance salesman, was at one time a co-owner with Alvin Malnik of Title Loans of America. Malnik is a reputed mob associate. As the Los Angeles Times put it: If you believe Forbes magazine ("The Invisible Enterprise"), Malnik essentially invented the black art of money-laundering, taking mob money and routing it to legitimate ventures (like real estate). To wit: "In the 1960s, Miami lawyer Alvin Malnik set up the Bank of Commerce in the Bahamas. Mob money flowed into its secret numbered accounts by the hundreds of millions--(mob financier Meyer) Lansky money, most of it--and then out again into Tibor Rosenbaum's International Credit Bank of Switzerland before returning to the United States for investment." By the way, did you know that Swiss francs were used to finance construction of the apartment buildings in Clairemont and Rancho Penasquitos. The gaming commissions of New Jersey and Las Vegas have made Malnik persona non grata . All lies, he says. And the Arizona Republic reported in 1999: In a January 1997 sworn deposition for a Georgia civil action, Aycox, then president and part-owner of Title Loans of America, revealed Malnik as an owner of U.S. Title Trust, which owns 50 percent of Title Loans of America. In the same deposition, Aycox reported that he is a 33 percent owner and Kenneth Partiss of Atlanta was a 17 percent owner. In 1983 Partiss was among 84 defendants indicted in Miami after a U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration drug-smuggling probe that covered 20 states. He was acquitted. |
Donate
Help WJI advocate for justice in Wisconsin
|