Across the Region 

Posted: 1:00 am Mon, May 21, 2007
By Minnesota Lawyer

IOWA

Iowa Supreme Court adopts emergency court rules

Lessons learned from Hurricane Katrina have prompted the state to enact emergency rules for attorneys to follow during a widespread disaster in Iowa.

The rules, signed by Iowa Supreme Court Chief Justice Marsha Ternus last week, are designed to keep legal services available in an emergency by allowing out-of-state lawyers to temporarily practice in Iowa.

“As we saw from the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, a major disaster can disrupt the availability of legal services when people need them most,” Ternus said in a statement. “Our new rules … will help lawyers meet the need for legal services after disaster strikes.”

Under the rules, lawyers from other states could temporarily provide free legal aid to Iowans in an emergency. Out-of-state lawyers could also temporarily practice in Iowa if a disaster affects their state.

The Iowa Supreme Court has the authority to declare a disaster — which could be a hurricane, flood, wildfire, tornado, public health emergency or events caused by terrorists or acts of war.

Out-of-state lawyers are permitted to practice in Iowa until 60 days after the court declares the emergency has ended.

Although several states adopted similar rules temporarily after the Gulf Coast hurricanes of 2005, Iowa appears to be the first to adopt permanent rules, according to John Holtaway, client protection counsel at the Center for Professional Responsibility at the American Bar Association.

Evidence found lacking in negligence suit

The Iowa Supreme Court has ruled that there isn’t enough evidence to call a jury to decide whether the city of Maquoketa was negligent in keeping up the entrance of a building where a woman fell nearly four years ago.

Mary Belle Westphal fell down stairs outside the Maquoketa Community Center in July 2003 as she was trying to open a door. Westphal suffered a head injury and fractured her elbow, shoulder, hip and rib. Westphal, who was 87 when she died in 2004, was in and out of care facilities until her death.

Her estate sued the city for negligence after she died.

Jackson County District Court ruled there wasn’t enough evidence to call a jury, but the Iowa Court of Appeals ruled a jury would be needed on one count.

Dillinger relative seeks legal lock on robber’s persona

A relative of the infamous bank robber John Dillinger is trying to stop cities across the country from holding Dillinger Days festivals without his permission.

Jeffery Scalf, who says he is the great nephew of the Great Depression-era bank robber, has filed several lawsuits to get a legal lock on Dillinger’s name, and his latest effort is directed at officials in Mason City.

City officials and organizers have been planning an event to commemorate Dillinger’s robbery of a bank in Mason City in 1934. Those plans are being reviewed after Scalf contacted event planners last week about changing the festival’s name. City officials say they will review whether Scalf has a legal claim to Dillinger’s name before any final arrangements are made.

Dillinger died in 1934 after federal agents shot him outside Chicago’s Biograph Theater.

nebraska

Governor signs bill to shield cities from liability

Cities in Nebraska will soon be able to get back in the business of recreation without fear it could land them in court.

Gov. Dave Heineman signed a bill (LB564) last week that will help shield cities and other political subdivisions from liability if an injury on public property was a result of the inherent risk of the recreational activity.

Entities still could be sued if officials were aware of an unsafe condition and did nothing to repair it in a reasonable time.

The law went into effect immediately.

A state Supreme Court ruling prompted the bill. The high court ruled in favor of a woman who severely injured an ankle when she stepped into a hole on the lawn of the Dawes County courthouse while attending a celebration in 2002.

After the ruling, towns concerned about liability closed down skate parks and sledding hills.

Supreme Court rejects challenge to education funding

The Nebraska Supreme Court has rejected a challenge to the state’s school funding system because, it said, determining whether schools have enough money is a political question, not a legal one.

The court also said Nebraska’s Constitution differs from most other states’ in that it doesn’t include any language describing the quality of education the state must provide. Without such language, the court said, it didn’t have a standard for comparing spending.

“This court could not make that determination without deciding matters of educational policy in disregard of the policy and fiscal choices that the Legislature has already made,” the court said in its ruling.

The lawsuit, which a Lancaster County judge dismissed in 2005, was filed by the Nebraska Coalition of Educational Equity and Adequacy, which represents 25 of the state’s smallest school districts.

NORTH DAKOTA

Housing official sentenced for embezzlement

The former director of the Benson County Housing Authority has been ordered to repay more than $82,000 to federal programs.

U.S. District Judge Ralph Erickson also ordered Faye Nystrom, of Harlow, to serve six months in jail for embezzlement. She received three years probation.

Nystrom pleaded guilty in February. Authorities said she took nearly $65,000 from the housing authority between January 2002 and November 2004.

Most of the missing money came from the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. It was discovered after a 2005 audit.

South DAKOTA

Bootleggers get probation and community service

Two women have been sentenced for bootlegging alcohol on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation.

U.S. District Judge Karen Schreier of Rapid City last week sentenced Louise Jumping Eagle, 62, of Pine Ridge to a $500 fine and two years of probation. Juanita Jumping Eagle, 53, of Rapid City, was sentenced to two years of probation and 20 hours of community service.

The women, who are related through marriage, could have received up to five years in prison after pleading guilty to dispensing intoxicants in Indian Country, the federal bootlegging law that allows prosecutors to charge offenders if a tribal ordinance bans alcohol.

At separate times in December 2005, each woman sold vodka to an undercover Bureau of Indian Affairs agent, federal prosecutors said.

Alcohol is barred from the 5,000-square-mile reservation that’s home to more than 15,000 Oglala Sioux. The reservation has one of the nation’s highest alcoholism-related mortality rates.

AG questions financing of school funding lawsuit

Dozens of school districts and the South Dakota Coalition of Schools should be audited to determine whether they are illegally funding a lawsuit that challenges the state’s school financing system, according to Attorney General Larry Long.

Long said he has asked Auditor General Martin Gui
ndon to conduct audits of the coalition and the approximately 70 school districts that have provided money to support the lawsuit, which alleges that the state is falling far short of providing adequate funding for schools.

In prior cases, the South Dakota Supreme Court has ruled that a school district has no legal standing to challenge the constitutionality of a law, Long said. The state’s highest court also has ruled that school districts cannot pay the legal fees of some other organization or person, he said.

Long said he believes it is improper and illegal for the school districts to finance the lawsuit that argues the current state funding system for school districts is unconstitutional.

The attorney general said he is responsible for taking action if he believes public money is being spent illegally. He said it is improper for taxpayers in school districts to fund a lawsuit against the state, which must use taxpayers’ money to defend against the lawsuit.

WISCONSIN

Court rejects appeal in slayings of hunters

A Minnesota truck driver sentenced to life in prison for murdering six deer hunters in northern Wisconsin after a confrontation over trespassing was not a victim of a racially biased court system as he claimed, a state appeals court has ruled.

The 3rd District Court of Appeals rejected Chai Soua Vang’s request for a new “minority counsel” to represent him. “Our independent review of the record discloses no improper racial issues with regard to sentencing or otherwise for appeal,” the three-judge panel said.

The appeals court upheld Vang’s convictions for six counts of first-degree intentional homicide and three counts of attempted first-degree intentional homicide, agreeing with his attorneys that there was no merit to an appeal.

The fatal shootings occurred in November 2004 after a group of deer hunters in Sawyer County confronted Vang, 38, of St. Paul, Minn., over trespassing in a tree stand.

Vang, a Hmong immigrant and experienced hunter, testified during his trial that he shot the six white hunters and wounded two more in self-defense.

School district must release adult images

Pornographic material a Cedarburg teacher viewed on his school computer is public record, the state Supreme Court ruled Tuesday.

The Cedarburg School District must hand over a collection of pornographic images a teacher allegedly viewed on his school computer to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel newspaper, the Supreme Court said in affirming a decision by Ozaukee County Circuit Judge Paul Malloy.

The teacher, Robert Zellner, argued to keep the porn secret, saying releasing it would violate copyright law and his interest in privacy outweighs the need for public access. A state appeals court sent the case directly to the Supreme Court.

The high court said releasing the images would fall under the “fair use” exception to copyright infringement.

The presumption of complete public access to records outweighs Zellner’s privacy and reputation interests, the court said.