Common Grounds for Appeals: Exploring Legal Errors and Misjudgments
Appeals often focus on whether a trial court made a legal or procedural mistake that affected the outcome of the case. Common appellate issues include errors of law, procedural errors, improper evidentiary rulings, flawed jury instructions, and findings that are not supported by the record. A successful appeal usually requires more than...
The Imperative Nature of Subject-Matter Jurisdiction
Litigation is a costly endeavor. Failing to ensure you are in the correct court after years of litigating can thus have costly consequences. This dilemma was on recent display when a federal appeals court tossed a case that had been litigated in federal court for four years because subject-matter jurisdiction was...
Your Odds Of Winning On Appeal
It is common knowledge that obtaining a reversal in federal appellate court is tough. But how tough?
Well, the federal appellate court numbers are in for 2022, and the picture is dire for appellants. In the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals, private civil cases had a reversal rate of 13.6%,...
Unpublished Appellate Opinions-A Tale of Two Circuits
It's an open secret that most federal appellate courts dispense with their cases via unpublished opinions. The numbers are in for 2022, and to be precise, 86% of federal appellate opinions were unpublished. This published-unpublished distinction is important because an unpublished decision is not precedential, and thus does not create circuit law....
The Perils of Forfeiture
Federal appellate courts are loathe to address arguments not preserved in the district court. The Seventh Circuit is no different. That position was personified today in the Seventh Circuit's opinion in Sunny Handicraft v. Envision This!, No. 21-1579. Judge Frank Easterbrook, writing for the Court, refused to consider an issue the defendant...