WJI's Daily Reads for Mar. 3, 2022

Wisconsin Public Radio: Wisconsin Department of Corrections returns to in-person visitation.

"I know a lot of people really depend on the visits that they do get. It could be from a mom or dad, or like I said, if you have children, you really depend on and look forward to those times together," (Ramiah) Whiteside (associate director of Ex-incarcerated People Organizing) said. "To have it open back up and then kind of abruptly go back down, that's definitely a psychological, emotional whirlwind to say the least."

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Judge finds that Rep. Robin Vos and former justice Michael Gableman violated the open records law.

(Dane County Circuit Judge Frank) Remington said (Michael) Gableman had no reason to withhold the records the group sought and his Office of Special Counsel's actions violated a standard under state law triggering punitive damages. 

"(The office's) decision at the time of its denial of access was to send a three sentence, misspelled, summary rejection email. This is the sort of 'unconsidered and irrational' conduct deserving of punitive damages," Remington wrote, referring to the law's requirements. 

CBS 58: Marquette University poll shows increased Republican support for marijuana legalization.

For the first time, a majority of Republicans (51%) surveyed said they support marijuana legalization, with 42% opposed.

It's a 10-point shift in opinion from 2019 when 41% supported legalization, 56% opposed.

Reason: Not much on promised criminal justice reform in President Biden's state of the union speech.

The White House press office pushed out voluminous "fact sheets" throughout the day touting the Biden administration's successes in improving U.S. infrastructure, fighting gun crime, and its plans to curb inflation, but neither the White House nor Biden had much to say about the sweeping criminal justice platform that he ran on.

Politico: Jan. 6 committee says former president Donald Trump broke the law.

In a major release of its findings, filed in federal court late Wednesday, the committee suggested that its evidence supported findings that Trump himself violated multiple laws by attempting to prevent Congress from certifying his defeat.

“The Select Committee also has a good-faith basis for concluding that the President and members of his Campaign engaged in a criminal conspiracy to defraud the United States,” the committee wrote in a filing submitted in U.S. District Court in the Central District of California.

Law & Crime: National Rifle Association survives New York Attorney General's claim to dissolve the organization, but case continues on other grounds.

Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Joel Cohen called the attorney general’s lawsuit “a grim story of greed, self-dealing, and lax financial oversight at the highest levels of the National Rifle Association,” if she could prove those claims. But Cohen found that the accusations did not merit the ultimate penalty.

“Her allegations concern primarily private harm to the NRA and its members and donors, which if proven can be addressed by the targeted, less intrusive relief she seeks through other claims in her complaint,” Cohen wrote . . . . "Moreover, dissolving the NRA could impinge, at least indirectly, on the free speech and assembly rights of its millions of members. While that alone would not preclude statutory dissolution if circumstances otherwise clearly warranted it, the Court believes it is a relevant.”