Filed Under: Business Law Environment and Land Use Law Litigation
Beyond Building Green: Resiliency Resources and Potential Requirements for Addressing Climate and Extreme Weather
Incorporating resiliency into the built environment is something architects and engineers are increasingly focusing on in the face of the threats posed by climate change. Both the insurance industry and evolving standards of care may also soon require engineers and architects to incorporate resiliency into their designs, even if individual professionals do not feel climate […]
Filed Under: Litigation
Brett Favre’s Hail Mary—What First Amendment Hurdles Will the Former Packer Face in His New Defamation Cases?
This article was originally published in February 2023. An updated version of this article is forthcoming in the May 2023 edition of Wisconsin Lawyer magazine. As he so often did during his 15 years as the Green Bay Packers MVP quarterback, Brett Favre has dominated the news cycle during the NFL’s playoff season this year. […]
Filed Under: Appellate Law Litigation
Wisconsin Supreme Court: Restatement’s Risk-Utility Test Does Not Replace the Consumer-Contemplation Test as the Standard for Determining “Unreasonably Dangerous” Products
Interpreting for the first time the product liability statute adopted in 2011, the Wisconsin Supreme Court refuses to adopt Restatement (Third) of Torts Section 2(b) and holds that the consumer-contemplation test remains the standard for determining whether a product is “unreasonably dangerous” in a strict liability claim. Last month, in Murphy v. Columbus McKinnon Corp., 2022 […]
Filed Under: Appellate Law Litigation
Wisconsin Supreme Court: Restatement’s Risk-Utility Test Does Not Replace the Consumer-Contemplation Test as the Standard for Determining “Unreasonably Dangerous” Products (Extended Post)
Interpreting for the first time the product liability statute adopted in 2011, the Wisconsin Supreme Court refuses to adopt Restatement (Third) of Torts Section 2(b) and holds that the consumer-contemplation test remains the standard for determining whether a product is “unreasonably dangerous” in a strict liability claim. Last month, in Murphy v. Columbus McKinnon Corp., 2022 […]
Filed Under: Appellate Law Insurance Law Litigation
Wisconsin Supreme Court Issues Significant Opinion: Insurers Cannot Use Preclusion Principles to Sidestep Duty to Defend
Wisconsin Supreme Court issues significant insurance coverage opinion, finding that insurers cannot use preclusion principles to sidestep duty to defend. On January 26, 2022, the Wisconsin Supreme Court weighed in on one potential exception to the “complaint test” as a method of determining whether an insurance company has a duty to defend a lawsuit brought […]
Filed Under: Appellate Law Litigation
A Skeptical View of Daubert Motions in Two Recent Wisconsin Court of Appeals Decisions
Litigants routinely rely upon expert witnesses to provide opinion testimony at trial based on their specialized knowledge, training or experience. Also common, the opponent sees serious methodological flaws and thus reaches for a well-known weapon: a Daubert motion asking the trial court to exclude from evidence the report and any associated testimony. Originating in Daubert […]
Filed Under: Appellate Law Litigation
Non-Delegation in Wisconsin after Becker v. Dane County: The Dissenters
A prior post discussed how, in Becker, et al. v. Dane County, et al., Nos. 2021AP1343 & 2021AP1382, the Wisconsin Supreme Court recently turned back an effort to revive the non-delegation doctrine, a tool that—at least in its sharper versions—could be used to pare back much of the modern administrative state. This post picks up […]
Filed Under: Appellate Law Litigation
Non-Delegation in Wisconsin after Becker v. Dane County
At the end of its 2021-22 term, the Supreme Court released its long-awaited decision in Becker, et al. v. Dane County, et al., Nos. 2021AP1343 & 2021AP1382. The case affirmed the validity of orders issued by the joint public health department of Dane County and the City of Madison to control COVID-19 by, among other […]
Filed Under: Appellate Law Business Law Insurance Law Litigation
Wisconsin Joins the Majority: Profit Losses Due to COVID-19 Not Insured
Nationwide, restaurants and bars felt financial strain over the past two years. With measures in place to prevent the spread of COVID-19, many food and beverage businesses were subject to restrictions on the use of their in-person dining rooms. In a recent case, the Wisconsin Supreme Court found that COVID-19 related business interruption losses were […]
Filed Under: Appellate Law Litigation
Seventh Circuit Rejects Students’ Claim that University’s Refusal to Refund Fees During COVID Closures Amounts to Constitutional Violation
Public bodies deal with many of the same legal issues as private enterprises—plus a host of unique risks that arise because they are public actors. Public bodies therefore must take care to ensure that they are not violating the protected constitutional rights of their citizens, employees, contractors, or (in the case of schools) students. A […]
Filed Under: Litigation
Seventh Circuit Resolves Open Question Under Class Action Fairness Act
CAFA Background and Exceptions On March 16, 2022, the Seventh Circuit issued its opinion in Schutte v. Coix Health, resolving an open question about the breadth of the Class Action Fairness Act (“CAFA”). 28 USC § 1711 et seq. Congress enacted CAFA in 2005 to expand the availability of federal courts to class action defendants; […]
Filed Under: Appellate Law Insurance Law
Wisconsin Court of Appeals Rules that Reckless Homicide Cannot Constitute an Accident for Purpose of Insurance Coverage
Recently, the Wisconsin Court of Appeals ruled in a case that tests the interaction between criminal law and civil liability. In Dostal v. Strands, 2020AP1943 (Oct. 19, 2021), the court held that an insured’s criminal conviction for second-degree reckless homicide precluded a mother’s claim against the insurer for damages arising from the death of her child. […]
Filed Under: Appellate Law Litigation
Wisconsin Court of Appeals Strikes Down Insurer’s Limitation on Underinsured Motorist Coverage
The Wisconsin Court of Appeals recently held that Wisconsin law precludes enforcement of a provision in an insurance policy that purported to limit underinsured motorist (“UIM”) coverage to only those insureds who sustain bodily injury or death. Ryan Johnson died from injuries sustained in a collision involving an underinsured vehicle. Johnson’s minor son, Elliot Brey, […]
Filed Under: Appellate Law Employment & Labor Law Litigation
U.S. Supreme Court Holds Employment Protection Reaches Sexual Orientation and Transgender Status
Title VII is the portion of the federal Civil Rights Act that prohibits employers from discriminating on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, and national origin. It was first adopted by Congress in 1964. Last week, in a 6-3 ruling, the U.S. Supreme Court interpreted Title VII to prohibit discrimination on the basis of […]
Filed Under: Business Law Litigation
Seventh Circuit Decides “Corn Syrup” Advertising Feud between Molson Coors and Anheuser-Busch
The Seventh Circuit has weighed in on the highly publicized advertising dispute between beer giants Molson Coors and Anheuser-Busch. See Molson Coors Beverage Company v. Anheuser-Busch Companies, LLC, Nos. 19-2200, 19-2713, 19-2782, 19-3097 & 19-3116 (7th Cir. May 1, 2020). In early 2019, Anheuser-Busch began advertising that Miller Lite and Coors Light use corn syrup […]
Filed Under: Appellate Law Litigation
Stafford Rosenbaum Team Wins Unanimous Ruling from Wisconsin Supreme Court
Today, six months after oral argument, the Wisconsin Supreme Court unanimously ruled in favor of our client, Lynnea Landsee-Pulikkila, and reversed a 2019 decision of the Wisconsin Court of Appeals. The majority opinion, authored by Justice Ann Walsh Bradley, recognized that the court of appeals “jumped the gun” by imposing a constructive trust in this […]
