Court Opinion

ID: 9730268
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 15:06:51.46016+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:26:05.316704
License: Public Domain

SHIRLEY S. ABRAHAMSON, J.
(concurring). I join the court’s opinion. I write separately, as I have previously, to comment on a recurring problem in appellate practice, namely, how appellate counsel and this court should handle issues presented to the court of appeals but not decided by that court. See State v. Lossman, 118 Wis. 2d 526, 547, 348 N.W.2d 159 (1984), and cases cited therein.
In this case, the court does not address issues left unresolved by the court of appeals. It remands the issues to the court of appeals. See pp. 862, 863.
In some cases in the past, we have decided the unresolved issues. In other cases in the past, we have remanded the unresolved issues to the court of appeals. See State v. Lossman, supra. Ordinarily the court of appeals decides these issues on the briefs previously submitted to that court and available to this court.
We have not explained why we take one approach or the other. Counsel are unable to predict whether this court will decide the “undecided” issues or remand them to the court of appeals. Counsel therefore are uncertain whether to raise and brief again these unresolved issues in this court.
If the issues have been briefed either in this court or the court of appeals and counsel are willing to rely on the briefs, I would prefer, in the interest of judicial economy, speedy resolution of appeals, reduced costs to the litigants, and finality of decisions, that this court decided the unresolved issues. I write, as I did in State v. Lossman, supra, to call counsels’ attention to take care in their petitions for review and in their briefs and oral arguments in this court to consider which court should decide the unresolved issues.