Supreme Court Open Hearing on Tuesday March 17th, 2015 at 2:00 PM. Does this mean that the Petition 09-07 is moving along again?

First, the rule amendment they're discussing is NOT expunction in the form you're probably thinking of. SCR 72.06 sets forth what county clerks are supposed to do with paperwork for expunged files. There's a petition to modify that Supreme Court Rule, so it's purely a procedural matter, NOT changing what cases can or can't be ordered expunged by court. SCR 72 simply deals with the length of time cases show up on CCAP and are kept in records offices. Second, Supreme Court Rules are set by the Supreme Court and govern the legal system, so this would be approved or rejected by the Wisconsin Supreme Court, not the legislature. The Legislative Committee is the subcommittee on the State Bar that deals with changes to the Rules. Frankly, while SCRs must be signed off on by the Supreme Court, I'm not sure how much the Court really reviews them versus simply deferring to whatever is the accepted game plan presented to them.

Both the Court and the Legislature have some say over this. The petition you are asking about has to do with how courts handle things. The legislation concerns what can be expunged in Wisconsin.

Legislative action would be required in order to change current law in such matters, which means getting a bill before the WI State legislature rather than the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court is a different branch of government altogether, which does not pass laws, but instead administers them through the court system. Talk to your state senator or representative if you would like to see this long overdue legislation proposed again (although it has not done well on past attempts). If any answer on helps you, mine or someone else's, please mark it as "helpful" or "best answer" to help know which answers to show others. Answering this question does not make me your attorney, but you can post comments here for clarifications, etc. You can also see past answers to similar questions on at. View over fifteen years of past answers at http://www.attorneyqna.com/attorneys/53401-wi-jay-nixon-1529181/answers.html?sort=recency. See 15 years of past answers at http://www.lawguru.com/answers/atty_profile/view_attorney_profile/jknixon . Answers may contain attorney advertising materials. .

Unfortunately, the petition is now closed and the Supreme Court decided not to take any action. The petition asked the Court to modify its own rules on expunction, but they recently declined to make any change, and left it up to the legislature to modify statutes to accomplish the same result. It is disappointing that they punted on this issue. It had been pending for two years while they considered it.