Criminal Appeals
• Successfully obtained an order by the Indiana Supreme Court reaffirming the convictions and capital sentence of Kevin
Isom, who murdered his wife and two teenage stepchildren in Lake County in 2007.
• Persuaded the Indiana Supreme Court to uphold the murder convictions and life imprisonment without parole sentences
of child killers Dylan Tate and Ryan Ramirez (both crimes committed in Madison County).
• Won an appeal brought by John Larkin, who was convicted in LaPorte County for the 2012 killing of his wife, that
sought to overturn his manslaughter conviction.
• Achieved victories on several significant areas of criminal law and procedure, such as the exclusion of parents in
criminal trials when they are also witnesses (Byron Harris v. State), protecting the confidentiality of informants (State v.
Justin Jones), search and seizure of automobiles involved in crimes (James Combs v. State), Miranda warnings during
consensual interviews of witnesses (State v. Axel Diego), and the smell of marijuana as probable cause to support a
search warrant (Jesse Bunnell v. State).
Civil Appeals
• Persuaded the Court of Appeals of Indiana to overturn an injunction that barred the Department of Workforce Development
from withdrawing from the heightened unemployment benefits made available by the federal CARES Act during the
pandemic.
• Convinced the Indiana Supreme Court to uphold the General Assembly’s 2011 education reforms, which limit the topics of
collective bargaining between schools and teachers, to ensure that schools retain their authority to assign teachers based on
the best needs of schoolchildren.
• Won important appeals in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit that clarified immunity from suit for Indiana’s
prosecuting attorneys and protected state courts from federal lawsuits that try to interfere with Indiana’s child welfare courts.
• Presented arguments in still-pending cases on several significant legal questions, such as the legality of the City of Gary’s
“sanctuary city” policy under Indiana laws prohibiting that practice, Indiana’s ownership of its Lake Michigan shoreline, the
constitutionality of penalties levied against those who defraud Indiana’s unemployment compensation program, the financing
of county probation officers, and a constitutional challenge to certain alcoholic beverage regulations on out-of-state wine
distributors.
