Appeals

This week, I won a reversal in the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals. The case, Bradley v. Village of University Park, concerns the constitutional issue of procedural due process. However, this appeal focused on whether the law of the case doctrine and mandate rule applied. This is the second time the case was appealed to the Seventh Circuit.
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The Safety, Accountability, Fairness and Equity-Today Act, commonly known as the SAFE-T Act, is an Illinois statute enacted in 2021 that reforms the criminal justice system. It represents a shift in the approach to policing, pretrial detention, bail, sentencing, and corrections. The law—a lightning rod in the debate over crime and punishment—was set to go into effect on January 1, 2023. One such provision of the statute would have eliminated cash bail across the state. But a Kankakee County judge found that portion of the law unconstitutional last week.
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I had the honor of being published in this month's edition of the Illinois Bar Journal. The article is entitled, "To Remain Silent: Navigating The Minefield of Custodial Interrogations." It examines Miranda warnings and the latest developments in Illinois and federal courts on this ever evolving issue.

 

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The Seventh Circuit has issued its annual report for 2021, and once again, the trend is down. The number of appeals filed in 2021 was 2,493, a decrease of 5% from 2020. This cannot be attributed to the pandemic or economic forces alone. Examining the bigger picture, the number has steadily declined over 15 years. For example, there were 3,518 appeals filed in 2006, amounting to a drop of over 1,000 appeals over the last 15 years.
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The United States Supreme Court recently issued its 2021 year-end report on the federal judiciary. While federal filings fell across the board, appellate filings experienced a notable decline. Continuing its downward trend over the last five years, the number of federal appellate filings decreased 8% from 48,190 in 2020 to 44,546 in 2021. This is a 13% drop from 2017. Pro se appeals, which accounted for 48% of filings, fell 9%.
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