CourtCall and Judge Heather Welch

The past year has been brutal on almost every company in every industry.

Only a handful of companies have thrived during the pandemic, benefitting even more than before. Netflix, while we all sat at home with nothing to do. The RV industry in my hometown giving people the means to safe freedom. PPE manufacturers. And obviously Zoom. But also the Zoom equivalent for courts, CourtCall. 

Trust me, this post will be much more interesting than you might think. Because very few active parties from Indiana's highest courts can find a plausible argument for ignorance. They all know.

Welch's Significant Cases- How Does She Do It?

The comment originates with Wayne Turner, whose firm Hoover, Hull, Turner, LLP regularly finds itself in Judge Heather Welch's court. In a December 2017 review of the then pilot project for Commercial Courts, Turner offered the following suggestion:

Help the higher volume Commercial Courts to clear their dockets of matters from non-Commercial Court cases; I don't know how Judge Welch keeps up, but she does it somehow.

That's not even considering her numerous ongoing obligations and contributions to the broader legal profession detailed in this post Welch's Amazing Professional Contributions.

Let's see if maybe we can solve Mr. Turner's mystery for him.

Worse Than Regulatory Capture

In the realm of regulation and protecting the public interest, how could anything be worse than regulatory capture, right?

Excuse the crass word, but what if there was regulatory incest? Extend the proverbial fox hen house to having foxes protecting the hen house and judging claims of harm by hens against foxes. What I am suggesting isn’t an otherwise neutral third party that starts taking bribes, as if a cow favored foxes for some side benefit. 

What's His Goal?

It's a fair question. And sadly, for some, it may remain the only question. Seriously though, what does this guy want? He's not acting like the typical scorned litigant. What does he think he can get? What would make him go away? Does he even know? Is he even stable? All this talk about God, is he even fully sane? Sure, some of his filings, are not horrible. Others are what I expect from someone that can't accept defeat and leave well enough alone. Will he ever grasp that nobody is ever happy with the end result of a lawsuit? Still can't rule out the possibility that some attorney is helping him periodically. If I find out who...

Unfit, Incompetent, Biased? Should Welch CE Count?

I know, I said a post per week. This is a special post. It is less fact specific and more philosophical.

Right now, from 1:45pm to 5:15 pm, attorneys at the Indiana Bar Association Annual Conference in French Lick Indiana are sitting in a CE session on Rule 702 hearings. No idea what that is. But I do want to offer a question:

Are there minimum standards for someone to present continuing education to attorneys?

Here we have Judge Welch, who failed not once but twice to properly handle an Indiana Trial Rule 53.1 Precipe for transfer from her failure to rule in August / September of 2017. The second time, she denied a motion to correct error, which attached the exact instructions from the Supreme Court that the trial judge is not allowed to rule on this request. The detail and filings are in this previous post.

TR 53.1 and 53.2 - Missed the memo...

Much to say on this issue and my experience.

Let me again caution here that I am not an attorney by education or licensed to practice law. So if you find yourself in any legal conflict, please talk to someone who can appropriately guide you. Hopefully the following will encourage you even more to seek qualified representation.

About the Rules

Indiana Trial Rules 53.1 and 53.2, are commonly called "The Lazy Judge Rule[s]." They are simply meant to give clear guidance for next steps to parties before a court that is not providing a timely ruling. If a judge has not ruled on a motion within 30 days, or determined an issue held under advisement within 90 days, or has other waivers of the deadlines, a party can request transfer out of that court, which I did. Welch's response, according to the Indiana Supreme Court, constitute breach of judicial conduct, maybe even breaking the law. And she did it twice!