Milwaukee recently began operating a streetcar line, known as The Hop. The Hop now runs on a 2.5-mile loop through downtown and the Historic Third Ward. While streetcars provide a valuable form of transportation, they also present specific safety risks, and they can cause serious bodily and property injury.

Unfortunately, the risk of accidents can be higher when a streetcar system first begins operation. Necessary safety precautions may not be implemented, and drivers can be inexperienced. In addition, motorists may not be used to sharing the road with the streetcars. Victims of streetcar accidents may include streetcar passengers, drivers and passengers in a vehicle that collides with a streetcar, and pedestrians and bicyclists traveling near the tracks.

Here are five ways a streetcar accident can occur:

If you have filed a claim with an insurer following a car accident and received a denial, you are not alone. This happens to many accident victims, but it does not necessarily mean that you are without recourse. Take these steps to help you determine your legal options following the denial of your claim: 

Understand Why You Were Denied

While all denials lead to you not being paid for your losses, there are many reasons why an insurance company could deny your car insurance claim. These reasons may include:

• The policy does not provide coverage for the claim. It may be that the policy you selected does not cover the loss you experienced. For example, some people opt to forgo collision insurance and only take out a liability insurance policy, the minimum required by law.
• The driver does not qualify as a person insured by the policy.
• The accident took place during a lapse in coverage caused by the policyholder’s failure to pay premiums.
• You have reached policy maximums for insurance coverage amounts, and your insurer will not cover your entire loss.
• You failed to notify your insurance carrier about the purchase of a new vehicle.

In many cases, insurers issue a denial because they believe that the policy at issue does not cover the loss. Sometimes, however, insurers make a denial in bad faith, which is against the law. If you believe that this is the case, you should speak to a lawyer as soon as possible.

By Ray Dall’Osto and Steve McGaver

Governor Scott Walker lost the November 6 gubernatorial election to Democrat Tony Evers. With the change in leadership in January 2019, hopefully there will come a change in priorities and policies in Wisconsin. One area that is expected to change is how pardons are handled. It is hoped that governor-elect Evers may reverse the current Walker policy of no pardons and no reviews and grant pardons to those he deems meritorious. 

Scott Walker was elected in 2010, and he has held office from 2011 through January 2019. He is the first governor in the State of Wisconsin’s history since 1848 to categorically refuse to exercise the state constitutional prerogative to consider or grant pardons or commutation, no matter how worthy a pardon applicant might be of getting such.

Identity theft occurs when someone utilizes another person’s personal information without their permission and uses this information to commit fraud or other crimes. With today’s technology, this type of white collar crime can be easy to perpetrate, and it can take place in a variety of settings.

For example, a recent data recent breach at a major credit reporting agency affected 143 million consumers. The hackers accessed Social Security numbers, birth dates, addresses, and driver’s license numbers. This personal information is now readily available and could be used to take out loans or credit cards. 

Identity theft is also prevalent in filing income taxes. An identity thief can utilize a taxpayer's personal information to file a tax return and receive a refund without the taxpayer's knowledge before the taxpayer has a chance to file their own return.

During the holiday season, you will likely have many occasions to celebrate with friends and family. When you drink alcohol at these parties, it is best to avoid getting behind the wheel of a vehicle. You should do everything you can to ensure that you are not one of the many who will be arrested for OWI (Operating While Intoxicated, the official charge for drunk driving in Wisconsin) during the holidays.

Alcohol Consumption by Holiday

According to Alcohol.org, the average number of drinks consumed on Thanksgiving is 2.7. The average number of drinks consumed on other “winter holidays” is 3.1. New Year’s Eve is one of the booziest holidays for Americans, as the average number of drinks consumed on that day is 4.4. 

Tips to Avoid Driving Drunk

The National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, one of the organizations that make up the National Institutes of Health, offers the following tips:

Many people associate DUI, or driving under the influence, with the overconsumption of alcohol. However, one can be convicted of a DUI (also called Operating While Intoxicated or OWI) for driving while under the influence of illegal drugs or prescription medications.

Marijuana OWI

There are several reasons why marijuana OWI charges are on the rise in recent years. Marijuana has become legal for medical or recreational purposes in many states. Also, Canada recently legalized pot for recreational use nationwide. In addition, growing practices have yielded increasingly more potent marijuana crops. 

Wisconsin law states that “No person may drive or operate a motor vehicle while . . . [t]he person has a detectable amount of a restricted controlled substance in his or her blood.” This is different from how the law defines OWI for alcohol, which occurs when someone drinks to a point that “renders him or her incapable of safely driving.”

Wisconsin takes child pornography charges seriously and does not often grant leniency to those who have been accused of these types of crimes. A conviction of this nature can affect every aspect of your life, including where you live, who will hire you, and who will associate with you. It is important to fight these charges as aggressively as possible.

The Wisconsin Child Pornography Possession Law

Under Wisconsin law, possession of child pornography is defined as possessing or accessing any material depicting a child engaging in sexually explicit conduct. The law requires that the accused have the intent to view such an image. The law applies to any developed or undeveloped film, photographic negatives, photographs, motion pictures, videotapes, or other recordings. 

The law specifies that the accused must: 

By Raymond Dall’Osto and Christopher Strohbehn

After working in the Wisconsin criminal justice field for the past 40 years, I have learned a great deal. For one, the populations of state and federal prisons have increased from 250,000 to 1,500,000 during that time, even though the overall crime rate has decreased substantially. In 2010, there were 186,000 inmates in federal prisons, 98,000 of whom were incarcerated for drug crimes. When I began practicing law, the state of Wisconsin had fewer than 4,000 inmates in prison, but the number of inmates is now more than 20,000. Even though the crime rate has decreased, the U.S. continues to lead the world in the rate of people who are incarcerated. Many of us wonder how our society has reached this point and what can be done to fix the problem.

Harsh mandatory minimum sentence laws, increased sentence structures for felony offenses, and longer sentences being imposed by judges have all led to over-incarceration. Additional factors include the unavailability of parole or the elimination of programs providing early release for prisoners with good behavior or who have successfully completed treatment.

When you agree to a contract, you expect that it will be honored. You will likely also take future actions based on the presumption that the agreement will be kept. When a party breaches a contract, the other parties to that contract have legal recourse and can bring a civil lawsuit.

Identifying a Breach of Contract

The first step in pursuing a civil lawsuit for breach of contract is identifying that there has been a breach. A breach can occur one of three ways:

• Failing to perform as promised.
• Making it impossible for the other party to perform.
• Repudiating the contract (communicating an intent not to perform).

Breach of Contract Damages

Next, you must determine what types of damages are available. Sometimes, the contract itself will set damages in case of a breach. These types of damages are called liquidated damages. If there is no such provision, or if such a provision is determined by the court to be unenforceable, the court will consider two other major types of damages.

Slipping and falling can lead to serious injuries that may require extensive medical treatment. If you have been hurt in a slip and fall accident, there are things you can do to strengthen your case and increase your chances of recovering compensation. 

Demonstrating Liability

One of the main hurdles in a slip and fall case is proving that the business or property owner knew of the condition that caused your fall and did not take the proper steps to correct it. Alternately, you can satisfy this requirement by showing that any reasonable business or property owner would have known about the condition, because it was present for a substantial period of time before you fell.

Following an injury, you should take the following steps: