A personal gripe I have of coverage of legal and judicial topics is the lack of research.

Few appear to read the briefs, focusing on judicial doctrine, without getting an editorial rebuke for writing “legalese,” thought to alienate a chunk of readership.

Gadfly Michael Horne has a well-researched piece out topical to Milwaukee’s race for City Attorney.

Horne digged out a case that blew up in City Atty Grant Langley's face, awarding a bank $400,000, paid by Milwaukee taxpayers.

Besides the $400,000 judgement, the judge, Ralph Adam Fine, denounced the City Atty's office under Langley's administration, for calling the bank’s legal position: "Hogwash," "Ludicrous," "Crazy," and "Obstructionistanarchist".

Writes Judge Fine:

Why should Wisconsin citizens get stuck with the $200,000 tab paid to an innocent Wisconsin woman who was the victim of a political prosecution by the United States Dept of Justice?

State Representative Pedro Colon (D-Milwaukee) says the federal government should foot the bill, not Wisconsin taxpayers.

United States Attorney Stephen Biskupic was excoriated by the Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit last year in an extraordinary decision that freed the innocent state worker, Georgia Thompson.

From the Associated Press:

MADISON,Wis. (AP) -- A lawmaker wants the state to force the federal government to reimburse an employee who was wrongly convicted in federal court.

Bad laws are the worst sort of tyranny.
~Edmund Burke

The race for Milwaukee City Attorney is off and running.

Longtime City Attorney Grant Langley versus State Representative Pedro Colón (D-Milwaukee) in what promises to be a spirited race for a heretofore obscure office.

Colón is out to change the position, with an activist’s approach.

Colón has made some enemies and stepped on some toes as an activist attorney and state representative, but he brings a broad coalition in his campaign for the April 1 election.

As has been widely noted, Congresswoman Gwen Moore, District Attorney John Chisholm, the incoming president of the Milwaukee Bar Association and the Wisconsin Trial Lawyers Association and almost all of Milwaukee’s legislative delegation have endorsed Colón’s hard-line approach to flushing out destructive policy, and becoming part of the solution in addressing city-wide problems.

As Greg J. Borowski of the Journal Sentinel wrote in a column from December.