Category: Appeals

A cursory glance at the daily calendar in the Northern District of Illinois reveals a recurring theme: "Schedule A" cases. Such matters are prevalent in the district court judges' court calls. In fact, the Northern District of Illinois is by far the most popular court for filing Schedule A patent infringement cases. These matters get their...

Out of the 155 cases filed in the Northern District of Illinois during the three-year time period from January 1, 2020 to December 31, 2022, the claimant prevailed 75 percent of the time on default judgment or consent judgment, and the claim defendant prevailed zero percent of the time. The requested injunctive...

While some vestiges of Covid-19 remain, things in the judicial world have largely returned to normal. One noticeable laggard has been in-person status hearings. In the Northern District of Illinois federal court, judges are slowly transitioning to more in-person hearings for daily court calls. A review of the profile pages of the Northern...

Last week, Seventh Circuit Judge Illana Rovner took senior status. She had been an associate judge on the Seventh Circuit since 1992. Prior to that, she was a district court judge on the Northern District of Illinois for almost a decade. A member of what could be described as the Court's "old guard,"...

In commercial litigation, building a strong record for an appeal is an important, but often overlooked step. This process involves strategic planning to ensure that every piece of evidence and argument presented during the trial is accurately recorded. A well-prepared record can be the key to success in the appellate court,...

Criminal appeals are legal processes where a defendant seeks a higher court's review of a lower court's decision, primarily to address errors made during the trial. These appeals are not about re-trying the case, but rather examining whether legal mistakes occurred that affected the trial's outcome. The role of appellate attorneys...

Complex business disputes often escalate into litigation, which eventually ends in the appellate courts, making appellate strategy a critical component in the pursuit of a favorable outcome. The intricate dynamics of these cases demand astute legal analysis, meticulous planning, and persuasive advocacy skills, factors that could tip the scales of justice in...

I had the honor of receiving a rare accolade from a federal appeals court in its published opinion. I represented Marcus Conner in Conner v. Reagle, a habeas corpus appeal that asserted Mr. Conner’s constitutional right to a speedy trial was violated. The odds were heavily stacked against Mr. Conner, as less than...

A seminal First Amendment decision was just issued by the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals. In Missouri v. Biden, the Plaintiffs alleged that federal officials violated the First Amendment by coercing social media platforms to censor disfavored speech. The federal district court of Louisiana agreed, and the Fifth Circuit partially affirmed. The Fifth Circuit...

The Seventh Circuit has issued its annual report for 2022, and once again, the trend is down. The number of appeals filed in 2022 was 2,362, a decrease of 5% from 2021. This cannot be attributed to the pandemic or economic forces alone. Examining the bigger picture, the number has steadily declined...