John Doe investigations related to Scott Walker

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Two John Doe investigations were launched by Milwaukee County District Attorney John Chisholm (D) into the activities of staff and associates of Governor Scott Walker (R). These investigations and the events surrounding them have been described as "the most tumultuous political events in Wisconsin in generations—perhaps in history."

A John Doe investigation, which is a special investigation into alleged criminal activity, is ordered by a judge who oversees it with broad powers and can order the investigation be conducted in secret, essentially imposing a strict gag order on those involved. Targets of such investigations are not allowed to speak about the investigation, and their lawyers play a very limited role. John Doe investigations, defined in Wis. Stat. section 968.26, are "intended as independent, investigatory tools to ascertain whether a crime has been committed and, if so, by whom."

The first investigation, which will be referred to as John Doe I, started in May 2010 when then-Milwaukee County Executive Scott Walker was running for governor of Wisconsin. That investigation was closed in March 2013 but overlapped with a second investigation, John Doe II, which began in August 2012 and was effectively halted in early 2014 by both state and federal lawsuits filed against the parties involved in the investigation.

The Wisconsin Supreme Court officially put an end to the investigations in a 4-2 ruling on July 16, 2015, noting "a state law outlawing such coordination was 'unconstitutionally overbroad and vague under the First Amendment'" and that "the special prosecutor's legal theory is unsupported in either reason or law."

The use of the John Doe proceeding in these two investigations became extremely controversial for several reasons. First, the investigations appeared to be politically motivated because they targeted only prominent conservative political figures and organizations and allowed similar abuses by left-leaning operatives to go unpunished; second, the scope of the investigations expanded far beyond the original complaint and appeared to be an a open-ended fishing expedition aimed at criminalizing political activity. And finally, the secrecy order appeared to violate basic constitutional rights of the targets, who were not allowed to defend themselves before the judge or the public.

However, the prosecutors involved in bringing the John Doe investigations, including at least one Republican, contended they stayed within the bounds of the law and the Constitution and maintained that the people opposed to the investigations were spinning a false narrative.

John Doe I

Background

Prior to becoming governor of Wisconsin in 2011, Scott Walker spent eight years as Milwaukee County Executive. While in that position, Walker started an annual event, Operation Freedom, which provided active duty military personnel, veterans and their families free admission to the Milwaukee County Zoo.

Governor Scott Walker

In 2007, the Military Order of the Purple Heart (MOPH) took over administering the funds associated with the event. A year later, in 2008, Walker aide Darlene Wink—who would subsequently be charged with two misdemeanors during John Doe I—discovered funds were missing from the 2007 event receipts and brought this to the attention of Walker's chief of staff, Tom Nardelli. The case was turned over to the Milwaukee County district attorney’s office in 2009. On April 23, 2009, Nardelli met with the district attorney’s lead investigator, David Budde. Nardelli informed him of his belief that the funds had been taken by Kevin Kavanaugh, the treasurer of MOPH at the time of the event.

A few days later, on April 28, 2009, Walker announced his bid for governor. He won a two-way primary in September of 2010 and went on to win the general election, beating Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett (D).

Though prosecutors had a potential suspect, no investigation into the missing funds took place until over a year after the funds were initially reported missing. On May 5, 2010, Assistant District Attorney Bruce Landgraf asked for the authority to launch a John Doe investigation into the missing funds. He asked for the John Doe on the premise of determining where the funds originated (i.e., sponsors and donors of the Operation Freedom Event). His request was granted by Judge Neal Nettesheim, who had been appointed the John Doe judge.

John Chisholm, Milwaukee County District Attorney

John Doe investigation and expansion

During the 2010 gubernatorial election, the John Doe investigation was expanded several times to include a Walker donor and Walker's county executive staff.

On April 19, 2010, the Wisconsin Government Accountability Board (GAB) received a complaint from a girlfriend of a Walker donor stating that contributions had been made by other people on behalf of the donor, William Gardner, in order to skirt contribution limits. On May 10, 2010, the GAB initiated an investigation into the allegations. Gardner admitted to using money from his business, Wisconsin & Southern Railroad Co., to reimburse employees for making political contributions to the campaigns of Walker and several others. This allowed Gardner to exceed the $10,000-per-individual cap placed on Wisconsin gubernatorial elections.

On May 18, 2010, the GAB and Landgraff decided to combine the two investigations under the Milwaukee County John Doe, despite the fact that Gardner resided in another jurisdiction, Washington County, and the allegations against him had no relation to the missing funds. That same day, Gardner contacted the GAB and agreed to cooperate.

On May 13, 2010, Wink, who had originally discovered and reported the missing funds, admitted to Dan Bice, a columnist at the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, that she had been posting positive comments about Walker on the newspaper's online site. According to Bice, "She also agreed that nearly all of her online comments could be described as political. She even conceded that she was going online and defending her boss on the Journal Sentinel Web site while at her county job. Asked if that was a good idea, she said, 'Probably not, no.'" Within hours of making the admission, she resigned from Walker’s office. The investigation was then expanded to include investigating Wink for doing campaign work on county time. On May 14, 2010, her county office was searched, and computers and documents were seized.

In August 2010, the investigation was expanded again several times, and affidavits were submitted for search warrants for Wink’s home and Internet, email services of Walker staff members, and Tim Russell’s work computer. Russell had been Walker's deputy chief of staff before moving over to the Housing Department. He was replaced by Kelly Rindfleisch in March 2010.

During September of that year, a subpoena was sent to Christopher Brekken, owner of a Harley-Davidson dealership, for credit card records related to Kavanaugh and the missing Operation Freedom funds. Brekken was unable to supply credit card records because maintaining such records is against state and federal law. Notwithstanding his inability to produce records sought by the DA, Brekken was jailed on October 19, 2010. A memorandum accompanying a lawsuit filed in February 2014, Eric O'Keefe et al v. Francis Schmitz et al, detailed how this situation unfolded:

“

One such incident began in September 2010, when Christopher Brekken, owner of Rice Lake Harley Davidson in Barron County, received a subpoena seeking the credit card number used for certain purchases from his dealership on a specific date. Brekken’s dealership does not and did not maintain records of the credit card numbers of specific customers and had no way of obtaining the information. In fact, such information is protected by Wisconsin and federal law, and it would be illegal for Brekken’s dealership to maintain records of credit card numbers or obtain them from other sources. Brekken timely informed Landgraf that he had no information in response to this request and could not obtain it. This answer did not satisfy Landgraf, and he obtained a bench warrant for Brekken’s arrest. Brekken was arrested on October 19, 2010 and remained in jail even after producing the basic information about the purchases that he was legally allowed to maintain. Landgraf informed Brekken’s attorney that he should pressure Brekken’s bank or credit card company to turn over the information, despite that it would be illegal to do so. Brekken was finally released after he agreed to drive five hours to Milwaukee to testify before the John Doe Judge, which resulted in his providing to Landgraf the same information that he had initially provided. Brekken has subsequently sued Landgraf on several civil counts, including false imprisonment and abuse of process. In a hearing in that case in March 2013, Barron County Judge Timothy Doyle expressed his amazement at Landgraf’s behavior: 'Obviously a lot of what happened here was politically motivated and not—the conduct described is nothing that we as Wisconsinites should be proud of, bottom line . . . . Mr. Landgraf was behaving badly, probably for political reasons.'

”

Bruce Landgraf, Milwaukee County Assistant District Attorney

The same month Brekken was arrested, Bice blogged that a John Doe investigation was being conducted into Gardner and Wink. In October, the investigation was expanded again to include Rindfleisch, Russell and Russell's boyfriend, Brian Pierick.

November 1 searches

On November 1, 2010, one day before the election for governor, DA investigators executed warrants for the computers in the county executive's office. Warrants were also executed on Rindfleisch's home, car and the home of a friend where Rindfleisch stayed several days a week. The search warrants were signed based on testimony given by DA investigator Budde at a hearing in front of John Doe Judge Neal Nettesheim. This was the sixth time the scope of the John Doe had been enlarged. The same day, subpoenas were served for the Walker campaign's emails.

In December, after Walker won the election, the investigation continued with more search warrants and subpoenas. Darlene Wink's attorney, Christopher Wiesmueller, had his offices searched on December 6, 2010. The next day, search warrants were executed on Tim Russell's house and real estate office.

2010 election and Act 10

See also: Wisconsin Act 10 and Union protests in Madison, Wisconsin

The 2010 general election saw Republicans win control of all branches of the Wisconsin government for the first time since 1998, with Walker becoming the state's 45th governor. Throughout his campaign, Walker emphasized "the need to reduce taxes and the size of the Wisconsin government to stimulate a dismal state economy. He criticized the 2009-2011 state budget as being too large given the economic situation and pledged to diminish it if elected."

Approximately one month after his swearing in, Walker introduced Act 10, which sought to address a $137 million shortfall in the 2010-11 fiscal year. The bill included changes to collective bargaining rights for public employees.

The bill's proposal sparked outrage among public sector unions and their members, and from February through April of 2011, massive protests occurred at the Wisconsin State Capital in response to Act 10. Despite the public outcry, Walker signed Act 10 into law on March 11, 2011. Walker's support for Act 10 led to an attempt to recall him. The recall election took place on June 5, 2012, with Walker winning by a larger margin than in the 2010 election.

The Ruess Building lease

In 2005, Milwaukee County signed a lease with a private developer to house some county offices in Ruess Federal Plaza. In the summer of 2010, a request for bids for private office space went out. In the end, the county opted to move the offices back into a county-owned building, so none of the bids were accepted, including the bid to keep the offices in the Ruess building. Despite that, the John Doe was expanded again to look into the possibility that inside information was provided to some of the bidders. Two of Walker's close advisors, John Hiller, his campaign treasurer, and Jim Villa, his former chief of staff, were connected to the developer from whom the county leased the office space.

Landgraf had real estate broker Andrew P. Jensen, Jr., who was involved with the deal, arrested without being charged for "failure to cooperate" with the investigation in December 2011. Jensen was eventually cleared of any wrongdoing, but it took over a year for the DA's office to acknowledge it. No one was ever charged with any wrongdoing related to the lease.

Before Jensen's arrest, on September 14, 2011, the home of Cindy Archer, Walker's director of Administrative Services in Milwaukee County, was raided in connection to the Ruess lease. Archer had followed Walker to Madison to serve as the deputy secretary of the Department of Administration for the state and was instrumental in crafting Walker's Act 10.

Cindy Archer, Walker's former deputy secretary of the Department of Administration

Archer found approximately 12 police officers and FBI agents banging on her door in the early hours of September 14, battering ram in hand. According to an article by David French in National Review, Archer let investigators in while attempting to calm her distressed dogs: "I begged and begged, ‘Please don’t shoot my dogs, please don’t shoot my dogs, just don’t shoot my dogs.’ I couldn’t get them to stop barking, and I couldn’t get them outside quick enough. I saw a gun and barking dogs. I was scared and knew this was a bad mix."

After searching her entire home, the investigators left with her cell phone and computer. Archer was never charged with any wrongdoing.

Charges and convictions

In January of 2012, charges were filed against six individuals based on the John Doe I investigation, four of whom were not involved in the situation noted as the original purpose of the John Doe, the missing funds from the Operation Freedom event.

On April 11, 2011, William Gardner, who had donated to the campaigns of Walker and others, was charged with two felonies for making illegal contributions to a number of politicians, both Republican and Democratic. He pleaded guilty, and on July 7, 2011, he was sentenced to two years probation and 100 hours of community service. In addition, he paid a $166,900 fine to the GAB. Walker returned $43,800 in donations as a result of the Gardner probe.

On January 5, 2012, Kavanaugh, Russell and Pierick were charged. Russell, Walker's former deputy chief of staff, was charged with three felony counts for theft in relation to missing funds from Operation Freedom and transferring money into his private account from two different candidate campaigns. Kavanaugh, treasurer of MOPH when the funds went missing, was charged with five felony counts of embezzlement and fraud. Russell's boyfriend, Brian Pierick, was charged with two felony counts, enticing a child and exposing genitals. The charges were related to text messages he exchanged with a 17-year-old boy that had been discovered during the course of the sweeping John Doe investigation.

On January 26, 2012, Rindfleisch, Walker's deputy chief of staff, and Wink, a former aide, were charged. Rindfleisch faced four felony counts of misconduct in public office for responding to emails from a lieutenant governor candidate, Brett Davis, for whom she was doing fundraising work. Wink was charged with two misdemeanor counts of political solicitation by a public employee for organizing a fundraising event for Walker in 2009.

Sentences

Pierick, Russell, Rindfleisch and Wink cut plea deals that reduced the counts. Russell pleaded guilty to one felony count of theft. The other two counts were dropped. He was sentenced to two years in prison and five years of probation. Rindfleisch pleaded guilty to one felony count of misconduct in public office. She was sentenced to six months in jail and three years probation. Wink pleaded guilty to the two misdemeanor counts of political solicitation by a public employee. She was sentenced to one year of probation, 50 hours of community service and a $1,000 fine.Pierick pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor count of contributing to the delinquency of a minor. The case was tried in Waukesha County with the Milwaukee County DA appointed as a special prosecutor. He was sentenced to a $2,148 fine and 50 hours of community service.

Kavanaugh opted to go to trial, which began on October 8, 2012. Four days later, a jury convicted him of one felony count of theft. He was sentenced two months later to two years in prison, two years probation and restitution of $51,232.He was released in December 2013 after serving one year.

Kelly Rindfleisch, Walker's former deputy chief of staff

As part of the plea agreement, Rindfleisch was allowed to file an appeal based on motions that were denied by Milwaukee County Circuit Judge David Hansher. An appeal was filed shortly after her sentencing on the basis that the search warrants for her private email were overly broad. The District 1 Court of Appeals in Milwaukee denied her appeal, two to one. In December 2014, she filed an appeal with the Wisconsin Supreme Court.

In March 2015, the state Supreme Court declined to hear Rindfleisch's appeal. With her options exhausted, Rindfleisch began serving her six-month sentence in April 2015.

2010 and 2012 gubernatorial elections

See also: Wisconsin gubernatorial election, 2010 and Scott Walker recall, Wisconsin (2012)

The John Doe investigation was referenced by Walker opponents and media outlets numerous times during the 2010 gubernatorial election and the recall election against Walker in 2012.

In August of 2010, shortly before the Republican primary for governor, Dan Bice reported in his column for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel that Russell's work computer had been seized by DA investigators. In September 2010, two months before the election, Bice reported that Gardner and Wink were being investigated as part of a John Doe investigation. The day before the election, investigators opted to execute the warrants on the county executive offices and Rindfleisch's house and car, and to serve the subpoenas on the Walker campaign.

Dan Bice, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel columnist

As signatures to recall Walker were being collected in January 2012, Mike Tate, chairman of the Democratic Party of Wisconsin, sent a fundraising letter asking for money to "expose Scott Walker’s latest scandal involving more than $60,000 that was stolen from military veterans and their families.” Between February and May of 2012, Bice wrote five columns addressing the fact that Walker hired attorneys to help him navigate the investigation. On April 15, Bice penned an article about the John Doe probe hanging over the recall election. On May 28, just eight days before the recall election, Bice reported that the investigation had narrowed in on the purported bid-rigging of the Ruess Building Lease and that there was a "bombshell" email exchange. The Democratic Party used the article in a press release a day later as proof that Walker was the target of the John Doe.

Bice wrote another article on May 31 stating that documents released in the Russell case showed that Walker tried to stall the investigation. Walker's opponent, Tom Barrett, and the Democratic Party of Wisconsin continued to use the articles in the waning days of the recall to implicate Walker as a criminal.

The recall election took place on June 5, 2012, with Walker winning with a larger margin than in the 2010 election.

Lawsuits

See also: Christopher Brekken v. Bruce J. Landgraf and Christopher L. Wiesmueller v. Neal Nettesheim

Two lawsuits were filed against a prosecutor and the judge who presided over the John Doe I investigations. Christopher Brekken, owner of a Harley-Davidson dealership who was imprisoned after he was unable to produce a customer's credit card information, filed suit against Bruce Landgraf for prosecutorial abuse. The suit was dismissed by Judge Timothy Doyle, though Doyle stated his belief that the investigation was politically motivated.

In the second of the two, Darlene Wink's lawyer, Christopher Wiesmueller, filed a lawsuit against John Doe I Judge Neal Nettesheim for signing a warrant to search his offices. Wiesmueller based the suit on the belief that Nettesheim had violated his First and Fourth Amendment Constitutional rights. That suit is still pending.

John Doe II

Background

Protesters swarm the state capitol building in Madison in response to Walker's Act 10

Shortly after taking office in 2011, Governor Walker introduced a budget bill, Wisconsin Act 10, to address a shortfall in the 2010-11 fiscal year, which ended on June 30, 2011. The bill included changes to collective bargaining rights for public employees. Those changes resulted in massive opposition, including protests, a recall of state senators and a recall of Walker and his lieutenant governor, Rebecca Kleefisch. Walker won the recall election. During this time, the Milwaukee County DA, John Chisholm, continued the first John Doe investigation, eventually rolling that over into a second John Doe investigation.

Prosecution theory

On August 10, 2012, Milwaukee County DA John Chisholm asked for a second John Doe based on the theory that the Walker campaign had engaged in coordination with social welfare groups making independent expenditures during the recall elections. Independent expenditures are monies spent on political advertising in support of or against a particular candidate.

According to the Federal Election Commission (FEC), "When an individual or political committee pays for a communication that is coordinated with a candidate or party committee, the communication is considered an in-kind contribution to that candidate or party committee and is subject to the limits, prohibitions and reporting requirements of the federal campaign finance law. In general, a payment for a communication is 'coordinated' if it is made in cooperation, consultation or concert with, or at the request or suggestion of, a candidate, a candidate’s authorized committee or their agents, or a political party committee or its agents." Super PACs, PACs and social welfare groups, including 501(c)(4)s, are forbidden by law from coordinating with candidates and their campaigns.

Wisconsin Chief Justice Shirley Abrahamson appointed Judge Barbara Kluka as the John Doe II judge on September 5, 2012. That same day, Kluka granted the petition for a second John Doe investigation and signed a secrecy order. Email and phone records of targets were subsequently subpoenaed in September 2012. Then, in December, their bank records were subpoenaed.

Chisholm sought the help of then-Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen (R) in early 2013, but Van Hollen declined to be part of the investigation.

Despite having been involved in the probe since September 2012, the GAB board did not actually launch an investigation into the matter until June 2013. Six days later, the GAB met with Chisholm and district attorneys from four other counties to present evidence against some of the targets who were out of Chisholm's jurisdiction. Columbia County DA Jane Kohlwey, Iowa County DA Larry Nelson and Dodge County DA Kurt Klomberg all petitioned to launch John Does in their counties in July, followed in August by Dane County DA Ismael Ozanne. Abrahamson appointed Kluka as the John Doe judge for the four other counties; she immediately signed secrecy orders for those investigations. The five DAs sent a letter to Kluka asking that Francis Schmitz be named a special prosecutor and that the five John Does be combined into one, which she granted. Schmitz describes himself as a Republican and says he voted for Walker in 2012.

Shortly before becoming special prosecutor, the GAB had brought on Schmitz as a special investigator, along with Dean Nickel. On September 30, Kluka signed 30 subpoenas and five search warrants.

October raids

In the early morning hours of October 3, 2013, officers and Milwaukee County DA investigators carried out raids on several homes located in the four counties. The searches were carried out in what some close to the targets described as "paramilitary-style raids." On October 21, 2013, a second round of subpoenas went out for additional bank records.The same day, Bice broke the story about the raids in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. Two days after that, Kluka mysteriously recused herself as the John Doe judge.She was replaced by Judge Gregory Peterson on November 13.

Judge Gregory Peterson, John Doe II judge

Motion to quash

On October 25, 2013, several targets of the John Doe II investigation filed motions to quash the subpoenas they had been served. On January 10, 2014, Peterson granted the motion to quash the subpoenas based on the fact that the prosecution's theory of the crime was not, in fact, criminal under Wisconsin statutes. In the order, Peterson wrote that the "subpoenas fail to show probable cause that a crime was committed."

Schmitz took the unusual step of filing a supervisory writ, essentially appealing Peterson's decision, with the same appeals court that had denied a motion to stop the investigation. A John Doe investigation does not follow the same process as that of a normal appeal. The Wisconsin Supreme Court agreed In December 2014 to hear the case, which they combined with two others. On July 16, 2015, the state Supreme Court ruled 4-2 to halt the investigations.

Three Unnamed Petitioners v. Gregory A Peterson

See also: Three Unnamed Petitioners v. Gregory A. Peterson

In addition to the motions to quash the subpoenas, three unnamed petitioners filed an appeal on November 14, 2013, to shut down the investigation. The appeal was based on the belief that Wisconsin state law does not give the authority for one judge and one special prosecutor to preside over a multi-county John Doe. The Wisconsin Court of Appeals District IV denied the petition to stop the investigation on November 22, 2013, but ordered prosecutors to respond to the questions of the legal authority to assign one judge and one special prosecutor to multiple John Doe investigations and the scope of the secrecy orders. Then, in January 2014, the appeals court rejected the arguments of the unnamed petitioners, which allowed the investigation to continue.

The three unnamed petitioners took their suit to the Wisconsin Supreme Court, which agreed to take up the case in December of 2014, nine months after it had been appealed to the court. The case was combined with two others by the Supreme Court. Supreme Court Justice Ann Walsh Bradley had recused herself the previous March from the case because her son practiced at the same law firm as one of the attorneys involved in the case. On July 16, 2015, the state Supreme Court ruled on the case, demanding in a 4-2 decision that the John Doe investigation be halted.

Eric O'Keefe et al v. Francis Schmitz et al

See also: Eric O'Keefe and Wisconsin Club for Growth, Inc. v. Francis Schmitz, et. al.

Eric O'Keefe, director of Wisconsin Club for Growth

On November 18, 2013, the Wall Street Journal published an editorial on the John Doe investigations, headlined, "Wisconsin Political Speech Raid." Eric O'Keefe, one of the targets served a subpoena on October 3, 2013, had come forward to tell about what he considered the targeting of conservative organizations by the investigators. O'Keefe's organization, the Wisconsin Club for Growth (WCFG), was one of the targets of the investigation.

On February 10, 2014, O'Keefe filed a federal lawsuit stating that the investigation was used as an instrument to shut down conservative speech and therefore violated the targets' First Amendment rights. “This secret investigation and gag order on conservative activists is intended to stop their political successes in Wisconsin. The state cannot be allowed to silence political speech it does not like," said O'Keefe. The plaintiffs included both O'Keefe and the Wisconsin Club for Growth. He filed suit against Chisholm and Schmitz; two ADAs under Chisholm, Landgraf and David Robles; a GAB investigator, Dean Nickel; and John Doe II Judge Gregory Peterson. The lawsuit asked the federal courts to shut down the investigation and to award damages.

The suit was filed with the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin. It was assigned to Judge Rudolph Randa, who was appointed by former Governor Tommy Thompson (R). The prosecutors-turned-defendants suffered a series of losses, including an order in May 2014 for a preliminary injunction that halted the investigation. Randa had previously denied the prosecutors' motion to dismiss the case and their motion to stay the proceedings while they appealed that ruling.

In Randa's order for the stay, details of the raids on October 3, 2013, were revealed. Randa wrote:

“

Early in the morning of October 3, 2013, armed officers raided the homes of R.J. Johnson, WCFG advisor Deborah Jordahl, and several other targets across the state. ECF No. 5-15, O‘Keefe Declaration, ¶ 46. Sheriff deputy vehicles used bright floodlights to illuminate the targets‘ homes. Deputies executed the search warrants, seizing business papers, computer equipment, phones, and other devices, while their targets were restrained under police supervision and denied the ability to contact their attorneys.

”

Prosecutors filed an appeal with the Seventh Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals.

On May 28, 2014, it was reported that Schmitz was in negotiations with Steven Biskupic, the attorney for the Walker campaign.Other conservative targets were concerned they would be sold out as part of the deal and expressed anger and a feeling of betrayal. Schmitz ended the negotiations after they became public and there was a question as to whether they violated Randa's injunction order. Facing a possible contempt charge, Schmitz asked Randa to clarify if the injunction covered talks with attorneys representing targets who were not party to a suit. In Randa's filing in response, he wrote that the injunction was very clear and ordered Schmitz to provide copies of the injunction to all of the targets.

On September 9, 2014, the Seventh Circuit heard oral arguments on the appeal. During arguments, Judge Frank Easterbrook questioned the constitutionality of the secrecy orders, stating they were “screaming with unconstitutionality.” Judge Diane Wood focused on why the suit was filed in federal court. O'Keefe's attorneys pointed to the fact that the Wisconsin Supreme Court had yet to take up the cases filed in state court. Judge William Bauer also heard the case.

On September 24, the Seventh Circuit reversed the injunction order and dismissed the lawsuit, based on the concern that it constituted federal interference in a state case.

O'Keefe filed an appeal with the U.S. Supreme Court on January 21, 2015. On April 27, 2015, the U.S. Supreme Court "took no action" on whether to hear the lawsuit. According to attorney Andrew Grossman, "Nearly all cert petitions (petitions for review) get denied at their first conference. A hold indicates that a petition has the court's interest. It doesn't guarantee a grant, but it is a very positive sign for the petitioner." The Supreme Court declined to accept the lawsuit on May 18, 2015.

Disparate treatment

In O'Keefe's federal lawsuit, he pointed out a number of examples where left-leaning groups, individuals or candidates engaged in activities that were seemingly very similar to those that prompted the John Doe investigations but were either never investigated or dismissed by the GAB and Chisholm. The examples identified are listed below:

• In January 2010, Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett hired his former campaign spokesperson with a no-bid contract for $75 per hour, 15 hours a week with benefits. While employed by the city, he was also involved in private business and campaign work for Barrett. Correspondence related to campaign activity went to both his city email and his personal email. There was no investigation.

• In the midst of the first John Doe investigation, the Milwaukee DA's office received a complaint about a county employee, Chris Liebenthal, blogging on his county computer. Liebenthal's blog was used as a political tool by some on the left. After investigating and finding that he was conducting political activities, Chisholm stated that his office would treat it as a personnel matter rather than a criminal matter. O'Keefe's lawsuit notes, "The decision by … Chisholm and Landgraf to treat this conduct as a personnel matter is completely different from how they treated indistinguishable conduct by Wink and Rindfleisch. Each was charged criminally on multiple counts, and Rindfleisch was sentenced to jail time for similar conduct treated as a ‘personnel’ matter in Liebenthal’s case.”

Darlene Wink, former Walker aide

• In September of 2010, it was reported that unions and Democratic candidates were coordinating an attack on Walker for neglecting maintenance on county facilities. This was followed up by a union employee discussing unions coordinating with county board members to command local media coverage of the campaigns.

• One of the candidates in the 2011 round of recalls used school equipment to run her campaign. Although widely reported, no investigation was launched. The same candidate shared office space with a liberal group, We Are Wisconsin. A third used the same materials as independent groups. A fourth sat on the board of directors of another independent group.

• Three liberal-leaning groups coordinated for an event to kick off the recall effort against Walker. Unions, social welfare organizations, political candidates, the Democratic Party and Obama campaign advisers discussed the timing of the recall. It was suspected that one of Walker's opponents coordinated on the creation of an ad put out by an independent group because both her voice and image were used in the ad in a way that could only have been done if coordinated.

• An individual filed a complaint against the AFL-CIO for sending him materials constituting express advocacy, which is only allowed in cases of communication with members. The individual was not a union member. A union also paid another independent group for lobbying, but the group had no registered lobbyists.

• A state committee was fined $58,000 by the Federal Elections Commission (FEC) for violating campaign law. The state never investigated any possible state violations. In November 2013, Lisa Graves, director of the Center for Media and Democracy, admitted that the same type of activity occurred on the left but had never been investigated. She stated that “they’re advancing not just an ideological agenda but an agenda that helps advance the bottom line of their corporate interests. That’s quite a distinct difference from some of the funders in the progressive universe.”

Eric O'Keefe et al v. Government Accountability Board et al

On May 28, 2014, O'Keefe filed suit in state court against the Government Accountability Board and its director, Kevin Kennedy, for its involvement in the investigations. The lawsuit alleged the GAB had no statutory authority to participate in a criminal investigation.

The GAB fought to keep the documents related to the suit from the public eye, but Waukesha County Circuit Court Judge Lee Dreyfus ordered portions to be unsealed in December 2014. The documents showed that GAB staff continued to investigate conservative groups even after the board voted to shut down the investigation.

Dreyfus set a tentative trial date in September 2015.

Issue advocacy

See also: Issue advocacy and Express advocacy

In the months preceding the 2010 gubernatorial election, numerous conservative social welfare organizations in Wisconsin spent significant time and money—approximately $37.4 million—creating and disseminating political ads that criticized positions held by candidates. These ads helped Republicans win control of all branches of government in the state.

The 2010 election came on the heels of the landmark decision in the Citizens United Supreme Court case, which reaffirmed that the government's attempts to regulate independent expenditures violated the First Amendment. In response to that ruling, the GAB implemented rules to expand the definition of express advocacy to include issue advocacy. On May 14, 2014, the 7th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals ruled that those laws were unconstitutional in Wisconsin Right to Life v. Barland. Barland was the chair of the GAB at the time.

In 2014, there were several court decisions made that affected Wisconsin campaign finance law regulating issue advocacy. Issue advocacy refers to political advertising focused on "broad political issues rather than specific candidates." It does not attempt to persuade the public of particular electoral outcomes, but rather seeks to highlight broader political or social issues.

Judge Charles Clevert made a declaratory judgement on the case in February 2015 that granted a permanent injunction against the enforcement of the law. In October 2014, a conservative issue advocacy group, Citizens for Responsible Government (CRG), asked the federal court to stop the GAB from enforcing finance law that was constitutionally vague. Judge Randa, who was presiding over the case, granted a preliminary injunction the same month, and the following month, the GAB and CRG filed a joint motion stipulating the injunction would remain in place.

Potential Chisholm motive alleged

In September 2014, Stuart Taylor, of the American Media Institute, published an article in Legal Newsline detailing what his source described as Chisholm's potential motive for so doggedly pursuing the John Doe investigations. In the article, Taylor wrote:

“	Now a longtime Chisholm subordinate reveals for the first time in this article that the district attorney may have had personal motivations for his investigation. Chisholm told him and others that Chisholm’s wife, Colleen, a teacher’s union shop steward at a school in St. Francis, which is near Milwaukee, had been repeatedly moved to tears by Walker’s anti-union policies in 2011, according to the former staff prosecutor in Chisholm’s office. Chisholm said in the presence of the former prosecutor that his wife 'frequently cried when discussing the topic of the union disbanding and the effect it would have on the people involved … She took it personally.' Citing fear of retaliation, the former prosecutor declined to be identified and has not previously talked to reporters. Chisholm added, according to that prosecutor, that 'he felt that it was his personal duty to stop Walker from treating people like this.' [...] Still, Chisholm’s private displays of partisan animus stunned the former prosecutor. 'I admired him [Chisholm] greatly up until this whole thing started,' the former prosecutor said. 'But once this whole matter came up, it was surprising how almost hyper-partisan he became … It was amazing … to see this complete change.' The culture in the Milwaukee district attorney’s office was stoutly Democratic, the former prosecutor said, and become more so during Gov. Walker’s battle with the unions. Chisholm 'had almost like an anti-Walker cabal of people in his office who were just fanatical about union activities and unionizing. And a lot of them went up and protested. They hung those blue fists on their office walls [to show solidarity with union protestors] … At the same time, if you had some opposing viewpoints that you wished to express, it was absolutely not allowed.'	”
—Stuart Taylor

Mike Lutz, former Milwaukee police officer and whistleblower

Samuel Leib, Chisholm’s private lawyer, responded to the allegations, saying they amounted to a "baseless character assault" that "is inaccurate in a number of critical ways." He provided no specifics. He added that "John Chisholm’s integrity is beyond reproach."

One of Chisholm's previous supervisors, former Milwaukee County District Attorney E. Michael McCann (D), also rejected the notion that Chisholm's motivations were partisan, saying, "I knew who on my staff were the political people, and John Chisholm was not one of them until he ran for office."

Dan Bice, of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, exposed the anonymous whistleblower as Mike Lutz, a former Milwaukee police officer who had worked in Chisholm's office as an unpaid community service special prosecutor between late January and early August 2011, "just as Walker took the reins as governor and just as all hell broke loose in Wisconsin." Lutz had also been a close family friend of Chisholm and his wife, Colleen, as Lutz's policing partner was Colleen's brother, Jon Osowski.

After Taylor's article was published, Bice showed up on Lutz's doorstep on the evening of September 11, banging on the door loudly enough to wake and upset Lutz's 12-year-old daughter and prompt Lutz's neighbor, an off-duty policeman, to come outside with a gun drawn to investigate the disturbance.

In his column the next day, Bice revealed that Lutz was, indeed, Taylor's source and also disclosed that Lutz suffered from PTSD after being shot on the job. Bice wrote that Lutz was formerly close to the Chisholm family before a falling-out ensued. Bice detailed an alleged voicemail in which an apparently intoxicated Lutz leveled death threats against Chisholm and his family. Lutz considered a libel suit against the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel as a result of the claims made in the article.

On July 26, 2015, Lutz committed suicide in the presence of Menomonee Falls police officers following a "brief tactical situation." According to Wisconsin Watchdog reporter M.D. Kittle, "Multiple sources tell Wisconsin Watchdog that Lutz lived an agonized life in the years after he was shot while on the job in 2005. Things got worse, those sources say, after he went public about Milwaukee County District Attorney John Chisholm’s 'hyper-partisan' pursuit of Republican Gov. Scott Walker."

State Supreme Court halts investigation

On July 16, 2015, the Wisconsin Supreme Court ruled in a 4-2 decision to officially halt the John Doe II investigation. The court combined three cases—Two Unnamed Petitioners v. Gregory A. Peterson and Francis D. Schmitz (Two Unnamed Petitioners); Three Unnamed Petitioners v. Gregory A. Peterson (Three Unnamed Petitioners); and Francis D. Schmitz v. Gregory A. Peterson (Schmitz v. Peterson)—into one, thereby simultaneously ruling on all three. In its ruling, the Supreme Court criticized Schmitz's handling of the case and declared the actions of Chisholm and Schmitz were violations of the targets' First Amendment rights to political speech.

Addressing the case of Two Unnamed Petitioners—which required the court to interpret Wisconsin's campaign finance law—the court ruled "that the definition of 'political purposes' in Wis. Stat. § 11.01(16) is unconstitutionally overbroad and vague under the First Amendment to the United States Constitution and Article 1, Section 3 of the Wisconsin Constitution because its language 'is so sweeping that its sanctions may be applied to constitutionally protected conduct which the state is not permitted to regulate.'"

Special prosecutor Schmitz maintained a two-fold theory in rationalizing the launch of a second John Doe investigation: "(1) that the independent groups and the candidate committee worked 'hand in glove' such that the independent groups became mere subcommittees of the candidate's committee, thus triggering reporting and disclosure requirements under Wis. Stat. §§ 11.10(4); and (2) that the coordinated issue advocacy amounted to an unlawful in-kind contribution to the candidate committee under Wis. Admin. Code § GAB 1.20."

Schmitz essentially alleged coordination between the Walker campaign and various social welfare groups on issue advocacy, as opposed to express advocacy. Issue advocacy is, as the Supreme Court reiterated, "beyond the reach of Ch. 11;" therefore, the court "invalidate[d] the special prosecutor's theory of the case, and [...] grant[ed] the relief requested by the Unnamed Movants." The court further noted "the special prosecutor's legal theory is unsupported in either reason or law," thereby declaring an official end to the John Doe II investigation.

Regarding the second case, Schmitz v. Peterson, the court ruled "that the special prosecutor has failed to prove that Reserve Judge Peterson violated a plain legal duty when he quashed the subpoenas and search warrants and ordered the return of all property seized by the special prosecutor." The court found that Peterson, in his capacity as John Doe II judge, operated within "his discretion" under the John Doe statutes. The court denied Schmitz's supervisory writ and affirmed Peterson's original motion to quash the subpoenas.

Finally, in regards to the case of Three Unnamed Petitioners, the court upheld the ruling made by the lower court of appeals, stating:

“	We hold that the Unnamed Movants have failed to prove that either Reserve Judge Kluka or Reserve Judge Peterson violated a plain legal duty by: (1) accepting an appointment as a reserve judge; (2) convening a multi-county John Doe proceeding; or (3) appointing a special prosecutor. Although the circumstances surrounding the formation of the John Doe investigation raise serious concerns, and although the appointment of the special prosecutor may well have been improper, such concerns do not satisfy the stringent preconditions for a supervisory writ.	”
—Wisconsin Supreme Court

In its dissent, the court noted "These writings have far-reaching implications, not just for the John Doe investigation underlying the instant cases but also for this state's electoral process, future John Doe proceedings, and criminal proceedings generally." Those supporting the dissenting opinion contended that the majority opinion misinterpreted both Wisconsin's campaign finance law and the First Amendment. Particularly, the dissenting judges believed the "absolutist position" the majority took on Chapter 11 campaign finance laws was too broad in regards to issue advocacy, writing, "Thus, within the realm of issue advocacy, the majority opinion's theme is 'Anything Goes.'"

Justice Michael Gableman wrote the majority opinion, which was supported by Justices David Prosser, Patience Roggensack and Annette Ziegler. Justices Shirley Abrahamson and N. Patrick Crooks dissented. Justice Ann Walsh Bradley recused herself due to the fact her son works at the same law firm that represented one of the John Doe targets.

In its ruling, the court ordered that "everything gathered as potential evidence—including thousands of pages of emails and other documents—be returned and all copies be destroyed." Wisconsin Attorney General Brad Schimel (R) said the court's decision "closes a divisive chapter in Wisconsin history."

Supreme Court reaffirms its decision

On December 2, 2015, the Wisconsin Supreme Court reasserted and clarified its July decision that the John Doe investigations were unconstitutional. The court barred Francis Schmitz from continued involvement in the case.

The opinion read:

“	…(W)e now issue a legal ruling and order that, because of the invalidity of his appointment, Attorney Schmitz must cease taking any actions as the John Doe II special prosecutor as of the date of this opinion and order, except for the actions this court directs below to conclude the John Doe II investigation.	”

Schmitz had filed motions in August requesting that the Supreme Court reconsider the July decision and stay an order to return and destroy evidence that Schmitz had collected for the investigation.

The majority of the court, including conservative justices Michael Gableman, David Prosser, Pat Roggensack and Annette Ziegler, wrote, “We conclude that Attorney Schmitz’s motion does not present any grounds to reconsider our prior decision." While the court reaffirmed the decision, it modified its order that Schmitz return and destroy evidence. The court ruled that Schmitz must return all documents, electronic files and computer hardware to their rightful owners within 30 days. The court told Schmitz to gather all documents, electronic data and copies related to the investigation from anyone who had access, index the evidence and submit it, under seal, to the Supreme Court clerk.

Schmitz had asked that Gableman and Prosser recuse themselves because their election campaigns benefited from millions of dollars spent by at least three of the groups under investigation. The court denied the recusal request. The court said that the revised order will allow prosecutors enough time to ask for a review of the case.

Because Schmitz is no longer allowed to serve in his role as special prosecutor, he may not participate in further legal action related to the case. The court wrote that the "prosecution team" could appeal the case to the U.S. Supreme Court. Justice Shirley Abrahamson, the lone dissenting justice in the 4-1 decision, wrote that the court's opinion does not define "prosecution team," making that part of the ruling unclear. Abrahamson called for the investigation to continue, saying prosecutors had yet to determine whether coordination on "express advocacy" took place.

Investigators ask federal judge to overrule Wisconsin Supreme Court

John Doe investigators made a motion in federal court to overrule the Wisconsin Supreme Court's ruling that they must turn over evidence from their investigation into Governor Scott Walker's recall campaign. The investigators made the motion on December 21, 2015, in front of U.S. District Judge Lynn Adelman, a former Democratic state senator and a Bill Clinton (D) appointee. They requested that Adelman order the continued sealing of records from the secret criminal investigation, including some that "show evidence of criminal activity."

The investigators said the state Supreme Court's order was "unfair" because it inhibits their ability to respond to a July lawsuit by Cindy Archer, the Walker aide whose home was raided in September 2011.

Previously, Milwaukee County District Attorney John Chisholm, Dane County District Attorney Ismael Ozanne and Iowa County District Attorney Larry Nelson, all Democrats, filed a motion to intervene in the Supreme Court's decision to remove special prosecutor Francis Schmitz from John Doe II. The district attorneys made up three of the five district attorneys originally involved in the John Doe case.

Public reaction

Media reaction

Dan Bice and the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Dan Bice is a columnist for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. Since the beginning of John Doe I, Bice wrote extensively on the investigations, with the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel breaking nearly every story regarding the John Does. Concerns were raised that this is contrary to the very nature of John Doe investigations, as they command secrecy.

Bice denied that he received information from a source within the John Doe investigations, saying, "I have said in other forums that I don’t know of anyone who broke the law by talking to me for my story." However, Rick Esenberg, president and general counsel of the Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty, doubted Bice's claims, noting, “We know that [the leaks appear to be coming from those subject to secrecy] because the reporter in the paper has told us he will not release certain emails discussed because of the secrecy order. It’s not OK to talk a little bit about something you’ve been ordered not to talk about at all."

David French, in writing about the home raids for National Review, relayed Cindy Archer's account and her recollection that a reporter had been tipped off about the raid on her home and was present during it. M.D. Kittle, who has been covering the John Doe saga for Watchdog.org and the Wisconsin Reporter, wrote, "Supporters of the Democrat-launched political John Doe probes into conservatives have argued secrecy is key to its success, denouncing any leaks that undermine the prosecutors’ case. But Archer’s suspicion that a reporter was present was apparently right – and indicates that secrecy is a tactic rather than a principle: a Milwaukee Journal Sentinel article published on the day of the raid, Sept. 14, 2011, indicates that a Journal Sentinel reporter arrived in time to see 'about a dozen law enforcement officers, including FBI agents' raid Archer’s home."

On February 10, 2014, Bice revealed on his blog that O'Keefe and Rindfleisch were targets of the second John Doe. This started a pattern of leaks to the paper of information that appeared to be damaging to Walker. In February 2014, the private emails of Rindfleisch were released to the public in digital, searchable form. Reporters lined up to get access to the emails that covered everything from coordinating schedules with the campaign to emails with her siblings regarding her father's death. In June, the Journal Sentinel, along with other media outlets, reported that Walker was at the center of a "criminal scheme." Shortly after, an attorney for Schmitz warned the media not to jump to conclusions, and they were forced to back down on the claim.

Eric O'Keefe and Mike Lutz appear on The Kelly File with Megyn Kelly on April 23, 2015

In August, more documents were released by the court; however, documents that were to remain sealed were made publicly available for a short period of time before the mistake was corrected. This occurred at 4:30 pm. By 5:40 pm, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel had printed a story on the documents that had been unsealed by accident, again implying Walker was involved in criminal behavior.

Other outlets

In November 2013, the Wall Street Journal was the first media outlet to break the news on the behavior of the prosecutors and investigators overseeing the probe. They followed up with several editorials focusing on the alleged violations of free speech that resulted because of the prolonged investigation. The Wisconsin Reporter also covered the investigation extensively, writing close to 200 articles about the investigation and what the court cases revealed about the political nature of it. Bureau Chief M.D. Kittle has provided a majority of the coverage for the Reporter and its affiliate, Watchdog.org.

In April 2015, David French wrote an article for National Review entitled "Wisconsin’s Shame: 'I Thought It Was a Home Invasion,'" which, coupled with the fact Walker launched a presidential bid, catapulted the story onto the national media stage. By interviewing the targets of the raids and describing their version of events in detail, French's article humanized a story that had previously played out in the media as a politically-fueled campaign finance skirmish. As a result, many national conservative media outlets, including Fox News and TheBlaze, picked up the story.

Public figure reaction

Two state legislators spoke out about what they saw as the abuses of the John Doe law. Both Senator Tom Tiffany (R) and Representative Dave Craig (R) called for a review into the GAB's role in the investigation. When their requests for information from the GAB went unanswered, Senator Tiffany asked former Attorney General Van Hollen to compel the agency to provide the information. However, Van Hollen issued an opinion that the GAB did not have to turn over information regarding the investigation.

The lawmakers also called for a special legislative panel to investigate the activities of the GAB. At the beginning of the session in 2015, they introduced a bill to reform how John Doe investigations are conducted, addressing the issue of gag orders by limiting them to the investigators, but allowing the targets to speak out.

A former FEC official, Hans von Spakovsky, spoke out several times about the potential dangers of John Doe investigations and the impact they could have on free speech.

Constitutional implications

First Amendment rights

Had it moved forward, O'Keefe's petition to the U.S. Supreme Court would have had First Amendment implications for any investigatory body that wanted to use this type of probe to prevent organizations from participating in issue advocacy. The lawsuit was based on a First Amendment violation.

In the Wisconsin Supreme Court's 4-2 ruling on three lawsuits—Two Unnamed Petitioners v. Gregory A. Peterson and Francis D. Schmitz; Three Unnamed Petitioners v. Gregory A. Peterson; and Francis D. Schmitz v. Gregory A. Peterson—the majority opinion stated that the actions of Chisholm and Schmitz were violations of the targets' First Amendment rights to political speech. This ruling officially put an end to the John Doe II investigation.

Fourth Amendment rights

Rindfleisch appealed her case based on a violation of her Fourth and Fourteenth Amendment rights. That appeal was denied by the 1st District Court of Appeals, and the Wisconsin Supreme Court subsequently declined to hear the case. The case addressed the need for specific, narrow warrants in order to obtain digital files, as opposed to the general warrants used in both investigations.

Timeline

See also: Timeline of John Doe investigations related to Scott Walker

John Doe I began after funds were found missing from an annual charitable event, Operation Freedom, put on by then-County Executive Scott Walker. 2007 to 2009 In 2007, the Military Order of the Purple Heart (MOPH) took over financial responsibility for the event called Operation Freedom. In 2008, a member of Walker's staff, Darlene Wink—who would subsequently be charged with two misdemeanors during John Doe I—noticed funds were missing from the 2007 event and reported this to Walker's chief of staff, Tom Nardelli. The case was eventually turned over to the Milwaukee County district attorney's office in 2009. 2010 In May 2010, the district attorney’s office asked to launch a John Doe investigation of the missing funds. Within a short period of time, the investigation was expanded to include Walker's staff, a major donor and campaign violations. By this time, Walker was a candidate for Wisconsin governor. The investigation lasted three years and resulted in the convictions of six people, four of which were not related to the missing funds on which the investigation was started. On November 2, 2010, Republicans won control of all branches of the Wisconsin government for the first time since 1998. 2011 On January 3, Scott Walker was sworn in as governor of Wisconsin, after having won the November 2010 election. From February through April, protests occurred at the Wisconsin State Capital in response to Act 10. Act 10, which sought to and ultimately succeeded in limiting collective bargaining by public sector unions, was vehemently opposed by unions and their supporters. 2012 In January 2012, charges were announced against the six persons targeted by John Doe I. This announcement came on the heels of the newly launched recall effort against Walker and his lieutenant governor, Rebecca Kleefisch (R), due to their support of Act 10. In August 2012, the first investigation, John Doe I, was rolled over into a second John Doe investigation, John Doe II. The investigation was based on a theory that Governor Walker’s campaign had illegally coordinated with conservative groups engaged in issue advocacy during the recall elections. 2013 On October 3, 2013, investigators served search warrants on several homes and subpoenaed records from 29 conservative organizations. On October 25, 2013, three targets of the subpoenas filed a motion to have the subpoenas quashed. 2014 In January 2014, the judge overseeing the investigation granted that motion, stating that the prosecutors’ theory of criminal activity was false. In February 2014, the special prosecutor filed an appeal to a higher court, but the investigation was effectively stalled. Between February and October 2014, a series of lawsuits were filed, one against the John Doe prosecutors for a violation of free speech and several against the agency that oversees campaign finance law, the Government Accountability Board (GAB), for trying to enforce allegedly unconstitutional regulations of issue advocacy groups, on which the prosecutors based their prosecution. On November 6, 2014, the unconstitutionality of the regulations was stipulated to by the agency in one case, and a federal judge issued a permanent injunction against the agency from enforcing the regulations in another. The legality of the investigation is now before the Wisconsin Supreme Court. 2015 In January 2015 the question of constitutional violations in the investigation was appealed to the United States Supreme Court in O’Keefe v. Chisholm. In April 2015, writer David French penned an article for National Review describing the experiences of the John Doe targets. This article, coupled with the fact Governor Walker was entertaining (and eventually launched) a presidential bid, catapulted the John Doe story into the national spotlight. After Walker responded to the National Review article, Chisholm suggested Walker could be prosecuted for his remarks, saying, "As to defamatory remarks, I strongly suspect the Iowa criminal code, like Wisconsin's, has provisions for intentionally making false statements intended to harm the reputation of others." Chisholm's reaction led to media articles questioning the DA's grasp of the First Amendment and free speech rights. On April 27, 2015, the U.S. Supreme Court "took no action" on whether to hear the lawsuit. According to attorney Andrew Grossman, "Nearly all cert petitions (petitions for review) get denied at their first conference. A hold indicates that a petition has the court's interest. It doesn't guarantee a grant, but it is a very positive sign for the petitioner." On April 27, 2015, the lawsuit was "distributed for Conference of May 1, 2015." The Supreme Court has yet to decide whether to accept the lawsuit. On May 18, 2015, the U.S. Supreme Court declined to accept the lawsuit. On June 30, 2015, Cindy Archer filed a civil rights suit against John Chisholm. On July 16, 2015, the Wisconsin Supreme Court ruled in a 4-2 decision to end the John Doe investigations. On December 2, 2015, the Wisconsin Supreme Court reaffirmed and clarified its July 16 decision. On December 29, 2015, investigators filed a motion in federal court to overrule the Wisconsin Supreme Court.

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See also

• Wisconsin
• Scott Walker
• John Chisholm
• John Doe investigation
• Timeline of John Doe investigations related to Scott Walker