Posted on Friday, 13th February 2009 by Patrick Dorwin
The liberal attack special interest group One Wisconsin Now (OWN) issued a press release which stated:
Jefferson County Judge Randy Koschnick had a higher reversal rate in 2008 than three quarters of all other circuit court judges and since 2000 more than one in four of his decisions were overturned, according to data released by the Wisconsin Law Journal
But in fact, the Wisconsin Law Journal has responded to OWN’s ridiculous press release.
Unfortunately, an irresponsible special interest group called One Wisconsin Now has looked at the numbers and found that Supreme Court candidate Judge Randy Koschnick is in the bottom third of circuit court judges throughout the state.
True perhaps, but, if even one of the 27 cases used to reach that had been an affirmance, rather than a reversal, Judge Koschnick would be above the median, and be in the top half.
One Wisconsin Now also claims that Judge Koschnick is reversed in one-quarter of his cases. This is of course absurd, as my numbers look only at those court of appeals opinions that result in a full opinion. The thousands of cases where trial judges reach the correct result and are not appealed are not included.
The organization also claims there is something remarkable about the cases in which Judge Koschnick is reversed, because the Court of Appeals uses language along the lines of “the circuit court judge applied an incorrect legal standard.â€
Of course, we all know that in every case when an appellate court reverses, it says that the wrong legal standard was applied, or the circuit court erroneously exercised its discretion, or applied the law incorrectly. Otherwise, the case would be affirmed.
Some numbers that One Wisconsin Now doesn’t want you to know is that Judge Koschnick has handled over 40,000 cases. He’s been appealed 27 times. Of those 27 cases, he’s been reversed 7 times.
One Wisconsin Now continues with the same liberal attack about “Koschnick’s lack of understanding about the law.” But the FACT of 7 reversals out of more than 40,000 cases shows how ludicrous, no, how desperate, OWN is to tear down the truth about this man running against the ultra-liberal Justice Shirley Abrahamson.
Learn more at Koschnick for Justice.
Posted in Home | Comments (15) |
15 Responses to “Lib group gets slapped down on Koschnick lie”
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.
February 13th, 2009 at 8:21 pm
Hmm….you say Judge Koschnick has handled over 40,000 cases. Now he’s been a judge for 10 years, so by my math that’s 4,000 cases per year for Judge Koschnick alone. Then again, I’m willing to bet you’re including traffic cases among those 40,000, just to boost Koschnick’s numbers.
February 14th, 2009 at 2:50 am
So, what’s your point Zach? That’s only about 20 cases a day. Doesn’t sound like a lot.
February 14th, 2009 at 8:04 am
Just like every other Circuit Court Judge.
February 14th, 2009 at 8:13 am
Did anyone notice that even the Chicago Tribune is questioning the acceptance of donations to Abrahamson from lawyers with cases pending before the court?
February 14th, 2009 at 8:46 am
So a left-wing special interest group is trying to mislead voters? I am shocked.
hope & change
February 14th, 2009 at 11:38 am
Is there a link to the source of the $1,000,000+ campaign donations that Shirley Abrahamson has raised? It would be interesting to know who or what groups are financing her. I bet it’s not those who believe justice should be honest and follow the Constitution.
February 14th, 2009 at 4:07 pm
“I bet it’s not those who believe justice should be honest and follow the Constitution.”
Please share, who are the groups that don’t believe justice should be honest and shouldn’t follow the constitution?
February 14th, 2009 at 7:45 pm
No libtard groups believe in the Constitution. They believe in power.
Lies gain them power, power gains them control
Try to follow along “super id” you can learn alot.
On a related note, you dodged the question about Libtard Abrahamson and the sources of her Ca$h.
Why did you dodge “stupor id”?
February 14th, 2009 at 9:19 pm
Super ID posts this as his profile:
“I am a moderate, a republican, a speculator, an arbitrageur, an advocate, an atheist, an asshole, and apparently an aficionado of alliterations.”
He’s right on number seven.
February 14th, 2009 at 9:47 pm
Paul, I believe you meant that he is a “super-asshole”.
February 15th, 2009 at 11:30 am
Gus, I don’t believe I was asked the question about fundraising. The posted topic was on the reversal rate, which I addressed at my blog. But because you have now asked, you can find Abrahamson’s contributors here:
http://www.wisdc.org/pro09-100948.php#big
The biggest pac money came from doctors, dentists, and unions. In response to the AP’s article, I’ll direct you to Rick Esenberg’s post on sharkandshepherd.com, he pointed out that campaign contributions are public record and there is a difference between a client’s contributions and the contributions of a lawyer. But don’t take my word, take his.
” They believe in power. Lies gain them power, power gains them control Try to follow along “super id†you can learn alot [sic].”
Sounds in line with every special interest group of both sides of the political spectrum no? It sure worked for Gableman and WMC.
And Super Asshole works for me.
February 15th, 2009 at 11:54 am
“tbones”, you can find the information you seek at the following link:
http://cfis.wi.gov/Public/Registration.aspx?page=FiledReports
Abrahamson’s Pre-primary 2009 report is 73 pages long, and appears to be made up mostly of trial lawyers, consultants and activists.
Happy reading.
February 15th, 2009 at 1:12 pm
If these numbers supposedly don’t mean anything, why create them in the first place? Compiling these ranks and looking at the numbers are the only methods we have for evaluating justices. OWN didn’t create the numbers, we just report them.
Besides, these reversals we’re talking about aren’t complicated cases. One of the cases Koschnick was overturned on was a traffic case. If he can’t be trusted to interpret the TRAFFIC laws correctly, we definitely can’t trust him to interpret the Wisconsin constitution correctly either.
February 16th, 2009 at 8:28 am
7 out of 40,000… Yeah that’s something to be worried about Robert….
February 16th, 2009 at 8:54 pm
Robert:
In fairness, Koschnick wasn’t overturned for a misinterpreting traffic ordinances. He was overturned for misinterpreting, or rather failing to interpret at all the common law standard for exclusable neglect in a traffic case.
Fred: The 40,000 case number is just as false as the claim that Koschnick’s reversal rate establishes that he is in the bottom third of judges.
The 40,000 (if it is indeed the number) represents only the cases that were filed in Koscnick’s branch. It does not account for unopposed cases (e.g. traffic forfietures, creditor actions, or plea bargins) Nor does it take account for the cases that he made no rulings because of settlements. As you probably know, 97% of civil cases settle, which means just counting the number of filings is worthless.
So how do you evaluate a circuit court judge? You look at the cases that are appealed. In theory, these are the tough cases (Koschnick has 27, of which 7 were reversed). Were they tough cases, where two different judges could apply the correct law and reach opposite conclusions? Was the mistake obvious? did the judge fail to grasp the legal issues? In a number of the cases that Koschnick got reversed the legal issues were not complex. Usually, a tough case takes more ink to discuss and reverse or affirm It is not uncommon for the cases before the Wisconsin Supreme Court to span several hundred paragraphs.
Yet, in a number of Koschnick’s reversals, the Court of Appeals didn’t need much ink to show that he blew the issue. Mertz was reversed in 8 paragraphs, Demler in 13. IMO, he may be ready for the big leagues at somepoint, but right now he needs more time in minors.
cheers.