THREE VIE FOR VACANT BRANCH 6 JUDGESHIP

Special to the Readers of Milwaukeeworld.com

By Michael Horne

and the Milwaukee World Hound Dog Team

Governor Jim Doyle appointed Milwaukee County Circuit Court Judge Kitty K. Brennan [UW ‘77] to a seat on District I of the Wisconsin Court of Appeals on August 21^st, 2008, replacing the late Judge Ted E. Wedemeyer, Jr. However, the governor did not choose to name a replacement for Brennan on Branch 6 of the Milwaukee court.

I asked him why last night, Wednesday, September 24^th, 2008, and the governor said, “I’ve learned that when you appoint a judge, you make one friend and a dozen enemies.”

So, with a vacant seat waiting to be filled, three candidates have emerged to replace Brennan.

One is Ellen R. Brostrom [UCLA ‘95], an attorney at Reinhart Boerner & Van Deuren, where her resume notes that she has a long involvement with social issues dating back to her work in a soup kitchen in Massachusetts, where she graduated with honors from Boston College.

Bostrom, who is exceedingly diminuitive, (you could easily stuff her inside Rebecca Dallet, by far the tiniest of Milwaukee’s 47 judges) is also energetic and athletic. Former Ald. Michael S. D’Amato said, “I see her running past my house all the time. She does triathalons.” D’Amato, Brostrom and others were attending a fundraiser for Doyle at Good Life that evening. She told the governor that she is the daughter of Supreme Court Justice Patience D. Roggensack [UW ‘80]. It’s kind of fun to know that we live in a world where judgeships can descend through the matrilineal line of a family.

Also at the party was Daniel J. Gabler [Marquette U ‘91] another candidate to replace Brennan. He’s working in the District Attorney’s office as a prosecutor and is the former president of the Brady Street neighborhood association. Another candidate, not present at the event, is his law school classmate Christopher R. Lipscomb, [Marquette U ‘91], an attorney in private practice. The primary election is February 17^th, 2009, and the general election is April 7^th, 2009. Judges serve a six year term.

Brennan will have to get cracking over at the appeals court as well, since her term ends July 31, 2009, and as a newbie she might attract a rival, however unlikely that might be.

Since Brennan was chief judge in Milwaukee County, and therefore carried no caseload (the post is administrative), there is little practical effect of its remaining vacant until next year. The Supreme Court chose Jeffrey A. Kremers, Branch 26, to be the new chief judge; his caseload has presumably been dispersed among his colleagues.