Terry A. Crone

Ed Carpenter Racing, LLC sued Milton “Todd” Ault, III (a Nevada resident) and VForward2, LLC for $8.4 million, alleging breach of an unsigned personal guaranty by Ault, breach of an unsigned 2024 IndyCar sponsorship agreement by VForward2, or alternatively unjust enrichment. The trial court dismissed the complaint with prejudice against both defendants, finding lack of personal jurisdiction over Ault under Trial Rule 12(B)(2), failure to state a claim under 12(B)(6), and judgment on the pleadings under 12(C), primarily because the documents were unsigned, negotiations did not create binding contracts, and Ault lacked sufficient minimum contacts with Indiana. The Court of Appeals affirmed the dismissal in part, holding that Ault had no substantial connection to Indiana to support jurisdiction and that the unsigned agreements provided no basis for claims against either defendant. It reversed in part, ruling that the dismissal against Ault must be without prejudice because lack of jurisdiction is not an adjudication on the merits and the trial court lacked power to address the 12(B)(6) and 12(C) motions once jurisdiction was absent.

business & regulatoryprocedure

The case arose after Jennifer Pennington suffered a head injury while swimming in a pool owned by Memorial Hospital of South Bend (Beacon), leading her and her husband to sue Beacon for negligence in the pool’s design, maintenance, and operation. Beacon sought to raise an affirmative defense blaming nonparties Spear Corporation and Panzica Building Corporation (the pool’s designers and builders) for any fault, but the trial court had previously granted summary judgment to those entities, a ruling later affirmed by the Indiana Supreme Court. On remand, the trial court allowed Beacon to amend its answer to reassert the nonparty defense and present evidence and argument at trial that Spear and Panzica were at fault. The Court of Appeals held that this was error, because a nonparty defense under the Comparative Fault Act requires proof of fault, and the prior adjudication had already determined that Spear and Panzica were not negligent; the court further concluded the error was not harmless given Beacon’s extensive focus on those parties at trial. The judgment was therefore reversed and the case remanded.

torts & liabilityprocedure

Darryl Brent Waltz sued Velox Express, Inc., and its president James Gibson, alleging that Gibson had mismanaged the closely held logistics company and committed acts including breach of fiduciary duty, theft, fraud, and failure to pay dividends, which harmed both the corporation and Waltz as a co-owner and shareholder. Velox and Gibson moved for summary judgment, arguing that the claims were derivative rather than direct and were therefore barred once the company formed a special litigation committee (SLC) to review them. The Court of Appeals of Indiana reversed the trial court’s denial of the motion. It held that Waltz’s claims arose from his status as a shareholder and were derivative in nature, that the SLC (composed of a disinterested attorney and minority shareholders) had investigated in good faith and concluded that pursuing the claims was not in Velox’s best interest (except for one resolved matter), and that Indiana Code section 23-1-32-4(c) therefore precluded Waltz from litigating the claims independently. The court remanded with instructions to grant summary judgment to Velox and Gibson.

business & regulatoryprocedure

In this case, Eric Wilson was convicted of Class C misdemeanor operating a vehicle while intoxicated after a traffic stop led to field sobriety tests and a blood draw showing amphetamine and methamphetamine in his system. Wilson appealed, arguing that the stop by a Morgan County sheriff’s deputy was unconstitutional because it lacked reasonable suspicion. The Indiana Court of Appeals reversed the conviction, holding that the stop violated both the Fourth Amendment and Article 1, Section 11 of the Indiana Constitution. The court reasoned that the deputy’s observations of Wilson’s “jerky” body movements, fidgeting, and unusual turns—without any erratic driving or traffic violation—amounted to no more than a hunch, insufficient for reasonable suspicion under the totality of the circumstances, and that the Litchfield factors weighed against the stop’s reasonableness.

criminal lawcivil rights

This case arose from environmental contamination of commercial property in Anderson, Indiana, caused by tetrachloroethylene releases from a dry-cleaning business operated by William and Betty Scott until 2006; after Shepard Wrex Management, LLC acquired the property at a tax sale in 2019 and refused access, the Scotts sued for an injunction to continue an IDEM-approved remediation system, and Shepard Wrex counterclaimed for an Environmental Legal Action, civil and criminal trespass, and declaratory relief on abandonment of the system. The trial court denied the injunction request and Shepard Wrex’s counterclaims for ELA, trespass, and criminal trespass (while granting the declaratory judgment), and the Court of Appeals affirmed. The appellate court held that the trial court’s judgment was not contrary to law, reasoning that the Scotts retained a good-faith, bona-fide claim of right to access the property to fulfill their ongoing IDEM remediation obligations, which precluded liability on the counterclaims and showed no criminal intent for trespass.

environmentpropertytorts & liabilitycriminal law

Joshua Carter appealed his 24-year sentence after pleading guilty but mentally ill to multiple counts of Level 4 felony child exploitation and Level 5 felony possession of child pornography, arguing that the trial court abused its discretion by relying on improper aggravating factors and rejecting mitigators, that the sentence was inappropriate under Indiana Appellate Rule 7(B), and that the court erred by merging rather than vacating certain convictions. The Court of Appeals affirmed the aggregate sentence, which consisted of consecutive terms after the trial court merged some counts, and remanded with instructions to vacate the merged convictions instead. The majority found that any misstatement about a prior conviction was harmless because a valid related prior offense supported the aggravator, that the trial court properly considered the nature of the offenses and other factors, and that the sentence was not inappropriate given the multiple victims and offenses. The court also held that merging convictions without vacating them was improper and required correction on remand.

criminal law

In this small claims case, speech therapist Jamie Hammond sued Patricia Davidson for $1,692 in unpaid copays after providing therapy services to Davidson’s child over several months; Davidson disputed the bill and refused payment. After Hammond filed the claim, Davidson timely requested a jury trial in the Perry Circuit Court’s small claims division, but the court did not rule on the request and instead deemed it waived because Davidson had not paid the statutory fee to transfer the case to the plenary docket. The Court of Appeals reversed the small claims court’s judgment in Hammond’s favor, holding that the Indiana Small Claims Rules require the court to first rule on a jury trial request before any obligation to pay the transfer fee arises. Because the court skipped that step, it improperly found a waiver and proceeded to a bench trial. The case was remanded with instructions to vacate the judgment and issue a ruling on the jury trial request.

procedure

A jury convicted Davon Nathaniel Jones of murder and armed robbery after finding that he arranged a marijuana purchase with Amarion Holmes via Facebook Messenger as a pretext for robbery, lured Holmes to an alley in Hammond, Indiana, and fatally shot him. Jones appealed, claiming the trial court wrongly admitted certain evidence and should not have given the jury instructions on accomplice liability. The Indiana Court of Appeals affirmed both convictions. It held that the accomplice-liability instructions were proper because Jones’s messages with a friend named Jay showed planning and possible participation by another person, satisfying the legal standard that some evidence of a second participant warrants such instructions. The court also concluded that any evidentiary rulings Jones challenged did not constitute reversible error.

criminal lawprocedure

The case involved an appeal by S.C. challenging a decision of the Review Board of the Indiana Department of Workforce Development. The Indiana Court of Appeals reversed the Review Board's ruling in a short order issued on July 5, 2012. Judge Crone authored the reversal, with Judges Vaidik and Bradford concurring, though the excerpt provides no underlying facts, issues, or legal analysis supporting the outcome.

labor & employment

In Kranz v. Meyers Subdivision Property Owners Ass'n, lakefront owners Gunther and Carol Kranz challenged an administrative decision by Indiana's Natural Resources Commission allowing non-lakefront easement holders in their subdivision to install a group pier on Bass Lake, a public freshwater lake, and requiring the Kranzes to relocate their own pier for safety reasons. The NRC had adopted an administrative law judge's findings that the easement included pier rights and that moving the Kranzes' pier would resolve proximity hazards, after the Department of Natural Resources initially denied a permit. The Kranzes sought judicial review, arguing lack of jurisdiction over property rights, arbitrary application of agency rules, insufficient evidence, and an unconstitutional taking. The Court of Appeals affirmed the trial court's upholding of the NRC decision, holding that the agency possessed authority to address property interests to the extent needed for permitting, that substantial evidence supported the safety determination, and that relocating the pier on public waters did not deprive the Kranzes of all or substantially all economic use of their property.

propertyenvironmentprocedurebusiness & regulatory

In Stansbury v. State, a criminal defendant appealed a trial court judgment to the Indiana Court of Appeals under case number 15A05-1111-CR-585. The three-judge panel, in an unpublished memorandum decision issued on May 31, 2012, affirmed the lower court's ruling and remanded the matter for further proceedings. Judges Friedlander and Barnes concurred in the result reached by Judge Crone. No substantive facts, issues, or legal analysis appear in the excerpted decision.

criminal lawprocedure

The case Hall v. Hall was a domestic relations matter (docketed as DR-479) appealed to the Indiana Court of Appeals after a trial court ruling. In an unpublished memorandum decision issued on May 16, 2012, the appellate court reversed the lower court's judgment and remanded the case for further proceedings. The panel consisted of Judge Crone, who authored the decision, along with Judges Vaidik and Bradford, both of whom concurred. No substantive reasoning or facts from the underlying dispute appear in the provided excerpt.

family law

In Ware v. State, the defendant appealed a criminal case to the Indiana Court of Appeals under case number 49A04-1109-CR-495. The court issued an unpublished memorandum decision on May 16, 2012, in which Judge Crone, joined by Judges Vaidik and Bradford, affirmed the trial court's ruling. No further details regarding the underlying facts, legal issues raised on appeal, or specific reasoning are contained in the decision excerpt.

criminal law

In Collins v. State, an Indiana criminal appeal docketed as No. 48A05-1109-CR-490, the Court of Appeals reviewed a lower-court ruling in a case brought against defendant Collins. On May 10, 2012, a three-judge panel issued an unpublished memorandum decision that remanded the matter for further proceedings. Judge Crone wrote the decision, in which Judges Baker and Brown concurred. The ruling appears at 968 N.E.2d 342.

criminal law

In Hutcherson v. State, Dontevius Hutcherson was convicted of murder, attempted murder, and robbery after a trial in which witness Victor Lee testified that he could not recall the contents of a prior police statement implicating Hutcherson in the shootings and robbery, and, because Lee was illiterate, the prosecutor read the statement aloud to him in front of the jury to refresh his recollection. Hutcherson appealed, claiming the procedure violated his constitutional right to confront and cross-examine Lee. The Indiana Court of Appeals affirmed the convictions, holding that Hutcherson was afforded a face-to-face opportunity to question Lee and therefore suffered no confrontation violation. The court further reasoned that any error in reading the statement before the jury was harmless because the statement was merely cumulative of other testimony, including identifications by the surviving victim and observations by another eyewitness.

criminal lawprocedure

The case Kirk v. State was a post-conviction appeal filed in the Indiana Court of Appeals under case number 49A04-1111-PC-609. The court issued an unpublished memorandum decision on April 30, 2012, affirming the trial court's ruling in favor of the State. Judge Crone authored the decision, with Judges Vaidik and Bradford concurring, resulting in a unanimous outcome. The excerpt provides no further factual background or legal analysis. As a memorandum decision, it indicates the appellate panel found no reversible error in the lower court's handling of the petition.

criminal law

John Ludack was convicted after a jury trial of two counts of class A felony child molesting involving his girlfriend’s ten-year-old daughter, found to be a habitual offender, and sentenced to an aggregate term of 130 years. On appeal he contended that a detective’s testimony—that Ludack neither admitted nor denied the allegations during a post-arrest interview but instead asked to stop speaking—violated his Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination, and that his sentence was inappropriate. The Indiana Court of Appeals affirmed the convictions and sentence. It held that defense counsel opened the door to the challenged testimony by first asking whether Ludack had made any admissions, and that the detective’s response therefore created no fundamental error. The court further concluded that Ludack had not shown his sentence was inappropriate in light of the offenses and his character.

criminal lawprocedure

In Hawkins v. State, the defendant appealed from a trial court ruling in a post-conviction proceeding (case No. 49A04-1108-PC-424). The Indiana Court of Appeals reviewed the matter and issued an unpublished memorandum decision affirming the lower court's outcome. Judge Crone authored the decision, in which Judges Vaidik and Bradford concurred. No underlying facts, claims, or legal analysis appear in the excerpt provided.

criminal law

Anthony Hogan was convicted of class A felony criminal deviate conduct, attempted rape, and being a habitual offender after a jury trial in which his statement to police was used only to impeach his testimony. He sought post-conviction relief, claiming ineffective assistance of trial and appellate counsel for failing to challenge the statement as involuntary, failing to ensure a proper waiver of his right to a jury trial on the habitual-offender count, and failing to request a jury instruction on the lesser-included class B felony. The post-conviction court denied the petition, and the Court of Appeals affirmed. The court held that Hogan presented no evidence the statement was involuntary, that counsel had advised him of his jury-trial right and he knowingly agreed to admit the enhancement as part of a sentencing deal, and that counsel’s reasonable “all-or-nothing” strategy explained the lack of a lesser-included-offense instruction, so no prejudice or deficient performance was shown.

criminal lawprocedure

The case involved a dispute between the owners of lakeside property (the Beemsterboers, beneficiaries of Trust No. 6011) and the neighboring Heil's Haven Condominiums Homeowners Association over several recorded easement agreements created when the properties were divided decades earlier. These agreements addressed shared use of a water pump and sidewalk, a septic system, a replacement walkway, and an encroachment area. The Association sued to stop the Beemsterboers from making improvements that allegedly violated its easement rights, and the trial court granted an injunction. On appeal, the court affirmed in part and reversed in part, holding that the Water and Walkway Easement had terminated due to the Association's acquisition of alternative lakefront access, that the Beemsterboers could make improvements without infringing the remaining Septic Easement or Replacement Walkway Easement, and that the trial court's handling of the Association's own encroachment was appropriate.

property