Rebecca Berfanger

The Indiana Court of Appeals today affirmed summary judgment for the city of Hammond, where an attorney who practices law there contested an ordinance that would charge a fee to have a business license. The lawyer claimed the fee was tantamount to a tax.In the opinion, David Paul Allen v. City of Hammond, 45A03-0708-CV-372, it states that on July 28, 2005, Allen filed a complaint for declaratory judgment against the city to invalidate the ordinance requiring businesses to have a license….

  The Indiana Court of Appeals today upheld a lower court’s ruling that in at least one case of the state’s application of a law prohibiting violent and child sex offenders from living within 1,000 feet of a school or public area where children congregate is unconstitutional.The ruling came in State of Indiana v. Anthony W. Pollard, No. 05A02-0707-CR-640. Judges heard arguments in the case March 31. The state argued that Indiana Code Section 35-42-4-11 was not considered ex post facto…

The Court of Appeals will be on the road on Thursday, hearing cases in Franklin and Evansville. It will hear its 180th and 181st cases on the road since 2001 when the court began regularly hearing arguments at venues around the state.State v. Karl Jackson will be heard at Franklin College at 10 a.m. in the Branigin Room of the Napolitan Student Center. It marks the court ;s fifth visit to Franklin. The three-judge panel includes Chief Judge John G. Baker,…

Court of Appeals Judge Margret Robb will be the special guest at the First Judicial District Pro Bono Committee’s Fifth Annual Pro Bono Attorneys Night July 16. The event features a buffet supper and awards presentation from 5 to 6:30 p.m. at Bennigan’s at the U.S. Steel Yard and a Gary RailCats baseball game against the Schaumberg Flyers at 7 p.m.The event honors volunteer lawyers from Lake, Porter, LaPorte, Jasper, Newton, Pulaski, and Starke counties. The Richard P. Komyatte “Access to…

The ACLU of Indiana hosted a standing-room-only audience Oct. 3 for its “First Wednesday” lecture, “The School Paper: Who decides what is ‘news’?” addressing First Amendment issues for student-staffed newspapers.The audience, including educators and students, listened as Indianapolis Star political reporter Matthew Tully moderated panelists R. George Wright, IU School of Law – Indianapolis professor of constitutional law, administrative law, and jurisprudence; Diana Hadley, executive director of the Indiana High School Press Association; and Teresa White, Noblesville High School journalism advisor.White…

A man appealed his Class A misdemeanor battery conviction claiming that his wife, who reported to police that her husband hit her and was murdered before the scheduled trial date, was no longer around for him to confront as his accuser and was the only witness to the battery.In Albert Boyd v. State of Indiana, No. 03A01-0701-CR-1, the three-judge panel affirmed the trial court’s conviction. The battery charges stemmed from a physical altercation that the defendant-appellant’s wife, Ruth Boyd, reported against her…

   In fall 2003, various gyms around the country and around the world made headlines when they started implementing bans on camera phones so that patrons wouldn ;t take photos of other patrons in embarrassing situations like changing in the locker room, finishing that last crunch, or breaking a sweat on the treadmill.    While courthouses can cause some people to break into a sweat, the similarities end there. However, more and more courthouses are starting to ban cell phones and electronic…