Court Opinion

ID: 9689939
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 18:49:53.928269+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:18:52.812273
License: Public Domain

HEFFERNAN, CHIEF JUSTICE
(dissenting). The majority opinion in this case correctly states the *433standard for determining whether the court of appeals has abused the discretion, provided by sec. 752.35, Stats., to grant a new trial when it appears that the real controversy has not been fully tried. The standard is:
[w]hether or not we would have agreed with the decision of the court, we will uphold the discretion of a court we are reviewing if the decision made on appropriate facts and the correct law is one which a court reasonably could have reached.
State v McConnohie, 113 Wis. 2d 362, 370, 334 N.W.2d 903 (1983).
After stating this deferential standard, the majority opinion determines that the real controversy appears to have been fully tried in this case. In doing so, the majority opinion supplants a function that is properly lodged with the court of appeals.
The issue before this court is not whether it appears that the real controversy has been fully tried, but whether the court of appeals abused its discretion in so finding. As a matter of judicial administration, determination of that question is entrusted to the court of appeals. If this court is going to review convictions using the same standard employed by the court of appeals, court reorganization has gained us little. Because I am not persuaded that the court of appeals abused its discretion by ordering a new trial in this case, I dissent.