Latest news from Session/Law
Human Rights’ financial audit ‘generally satisfactory’
OLA: Controls were “generally adequate” to ensure that the Minnesota Department of Human Rights safeguarded state resources, complied with significant finance-related legal requirements and resolved prior audit findings.
MCRO Phase II might wow you
When the state’s Judicial Branch unveils its updated online court records system sometime around the end of the year, users looking for legal documents will get an eyeful.
Prisoner’s negligence suit can proceed, court rules
The Court of Appeals said that the case should proceed for a finder of fact to say whether the guards displayed deliberate indifference to Welters’ physical condition.
Court of Appeals tackles ‘pre-textual’ traffic stop
The Court of Appeals took on the thorny subject of pretextual traffic stops and racial profiling during oral arguments Wednesday in State vs. Roy Lemond McPipe. But in doing so, the court ran into a problem almost immediately.
8th Circuit: Taxpayer League founder’s wife must pay $1 million
Appeals court finds no problem in no-knock search case
A man’s attempt to shed blame on his roommates for drugs and a gun found in his locked bedroom during a no-knock search has gained no traction with the Court of Appeals.
Supreme Court: Expanded car search OK
If the dissent is correct, the case will create “too much space for future pretextual and potentially racially motivated stops and will contribute to Minnesota’s racial disparities in who is stopped and who is searched following a minor traffic stop.”
Supreme Court nixes mandatory pot reimbursements
Finding it’s impossible to comply with both state and federal laws, the state Supreme Court has put a screeching halt to mandatory medical marijuana reimbursements under Minnesota’s worker’s compensation statute.
Justices hear DNR whistleblower case
While arguing Tuesday that former DNR regional director Lori Dowling Hanson was illegally fired as a whistleblower, her attorney Marshall Tanick urged the Minnesota Supreme Court to take a step that would affect loads of future employment-law cases.
Man can be compensated after conviction reversed
A Hennepin County trial court was wrong to deny a man compensation on a theory that he was not ‘exonerated’ when his attempted murder conviction got overturned, the Court of Appeals rules.
Federal judge preserves homeless suit
A group of homeless plaintiffs may proceed with their federal lawsuit against Hennepin County and other defendants in connection with police sweeps of their encampments in 2020, a judge has ruled.
Winkler announces for county attorney
The DFLer told WCCO Radio on Tuesday morning that he is running because “we need leadership in Hennepin County, in Minneapolis and in surrounding suburbs on public safety, on criminal justice reform and racial justice.”
Creek in limbo no more
The Renville County board refused to order an environmental assessment worksheet on a county ditch project, arguing that because Limbo Creek was not on a DNR list, it was not a “public water.” The Court of Appeals on Monday disagreed.
Injunction against Judicial Branch denied
Senior Judge Ivy S. Bernhardson late Thursday denied the Teamster Local 320 union’s injunction request to block an in forma pauperis transcription pilot project that is launching today. The one-year pilot project effectively reduces court reporters’ income.
Parent’s lawyer can’t be excluded from testimony
A court may fashion an informal way to take a child’s testimony in a termination of parental rights case and may excuse a parent from attending, the Minnesota Supreme Court has ruled. But the court may not exclude the parent’s attorney when the testimony is given.
Labor union sues Judicial Branch
A labor union is suing the Minnesota Judicial Branch over a new statewide order that will require court reporters to prepare in forma pauperis transcripts during normal work hours. To court reporters, that is a major shift in policy that effectively scales back their incomes.
Data Practices Act no shield in discrimination case
Roseville’s school district can’t use state law to avoid releasing information to plaintiffs in twin federal lawsuits that claim a teacher assaulted and discriminated against Black students while school officials did nothing, a magistrate judge rules.
Ruling: COVID-19 no excuse for not paying rent
In what is apparently the first COVID-19-related eviction case to come out of the state Court of Appeals, the court Monday ruled that an emergency executive order was was no reason for a gym not to pay rent.
Data Practices Commission restarts
In its first meeting in two years as a reconstituted, fully funded and independent legislative panel, the Legislative Commission on Data Practices dipped into some legally heady topics Tuesday touching on privacy, consumer and constitutional rights.
Schiltz to litigants: Enough is enough
Occasionally, it’s time to gather your things and go home. That’s not a popular litigation stance, but neither is waiting for a judge to tell you that the time has come. That happened in federal court, when RLI Insurance Co. v. Stan Koch & Sons Trucking, Inc., was dismissed.
