Muscatine High School was at bat in the fifth inning and Spencer Ludman was waiting in the dugout for his turn at bat when a foul ball rocketed off a Davenport Assumption player’s bat and struck Ludman in the head. He suffered a skull fracture,…
Tomorrow the Iowa Supreme Court is expected to hand down one decision, which will bring to 69 the number of cases disposed of in the first seven months of the 2016-17 term. After the release of tomorrow’s decision, 43 submitted cases will remain to be…
Eight years before the Civil War, drafters of the Iowa Constitution incorporated language into the Bill of Rights aimed at protecting the rights of fugitive slaves who traveled to Iowa. A convicted murderer is now asking the Iowa Supreme Court to apply that language in…
Dennis Willard was admitted to the University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics for treatment of injuries suffered in a motorcycle accident. Among his injuries was a dislocated shoulder, but Willard alleges that was inflicted by hospital staff while he was sedated. Now he is asking…
The Sixth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution says criminal defendants have the right to a jury made up of a cross-section of the community. Assembling a jury that precisely reflects a community’s racial makeup can be statistically challenging in a state with small percentages of…
The developer of a wind energy project planned in Worth County did not have a “vested right” to continue with the project after the Worth County Board of Supervisors enacted an ordinance the developer claimed doomed the project, a divided Iowa Supreme Court held in an April 24 decision.
The Iowa Supreme Court issued opinions in eleven cases in February 2026. At the links immediately below, you can read On Brief’s analysis of the following opinions:
The State Auditor has broad access under Iowa law to state and local records in conducting audits, including otherwise confidential information, but the Auditor’s access does not extend to records shielded by attorney-client privilege, the Iowa Supreme Court held in an April 17 decision.
The Iowa Supreme Court reversed a $20.5 million Polk County jury verdict against homebuilder D.R. Horton for negligence arising from a subcontractor’s employee being briefly buried under several feet of dirt while working in a trench.
On Brief: Iowa’s Appellate Blog is devoted to appellate litigation with a focus on the Iowa Supreme Court, the Iowa Court of Appeals, and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit.
