Get above the noise
Log in for answers tailored to you — saved chats, your topics, and the full IJR suite.
Judge, Indiana Court of Appeals
Andrew T. Masterson v. State of Indiana
Indiana Court of Appeals · 2026-06-16
Andrew T. Masterson was serving a sentence for Level 4 felony dealing in methamphetamine when the trial court modified it in 2024 to allow community corrections placement, conditioned on his residence at a specific recovery house called Behind the Wire Ministries. After two contested positive drug screens at the facility led to his discharge—despite negative lab tests the next day—the State petitioned to revoke his placement, and the trial court found a violation based solely on his no longer residing there. Masterson appealed, arguing the violation finding was improper because the discharge was not his fault and the initial screens were unreliable. The Court of Appeals affirmed, holding under Woods v. State that lack of fault or volition is irrelevant to whether a violation occurred and bears only on the sanction; because the modification order required residence at the specific program and Masterson was discharged, the State proved a violation by a preponderance of the evidence.
criminal lawprocedure
Clifford Vance v. State of Indiana
Indiana Court of Appeals · 2026-05-27
In Clifford Vance v. State of Indiana, police officers conducted a late-night “knock and talk” at Vance’s motel room, entered after he consented, observed marijuana, and then obtained further consent to search by promising with “one hundred percent certainty” that he would not be arrested that night if he turned over everything; the search uncovered methamphetamine and other drugs, leading to Vance’s convictions for Level 2 felony dealing in methamphetamine and related offenses. Vance appealed, contending that the entry and search violated Article 1, Section 11 of the Indiana Constitution. The Court of Appeals reversed the convictions, holding that the search was unreasonable under the totality of the circumstances. Applying the Litchfield factors, the court found the officers’ degree of suspicion low because they acted on an unverified tip after a multi-hour delay without seeking a warrant, the intrusion moderate to high given the 3 a.m. uniformed encounter with a flashlight and subsequent coercive assurances, and the law-enforcement need only modest for the same reasons; therefore the drug evidence should have been suppressed and the convictions could not stand.
criminal lawprocedure
Jennifer Lynn Goetz v. James Lawrence Franklin Goetz
Indiana Court of Appeals · 2026-05-18
In this high-conflict post-dissolution case, Mother Jennifer Goetz sought to modify the dissolution decree's requirement that the parties' four children (three with dyslexia and ADHD) remain enrolled in Avon public schools after she relocated outside the district, while also challenging the calculation of Father's child support obligation, the denial of her attorney fee request, and a contempt finding against her; Father cross-appealed the denial of his request for sole legal custody over educational decisions. The Court of Appeals affirmed the trial court's rulings denying Mother's motion to change school placement, its child support order (based on Father's documented income with an annual true-up), its contempt finding against Mother for involving the children in the dispute, and its denial of attorney fees. It reversed only the award of joint legal custody as to educational decisions, instead granting Father sole legal custody in that limited area, because the parents' persistent conflicts and inability to cooperate on schooling—evidenced by Mother's confrontations with school staff, the GAL's reports, and the children's exposure to the dispute—made joint decision-making untenable and contrary to the children's best interests, while the children had made academic progress in their current schools.
family law
North River Insurance Company v. Landis+Gyr Technology, Inc.
Indiana Court of Appeals · 2026-05-13
The case involved Landis+Gyr Technology, Inc. seeking coverage under three excess liability insurance policies issued by North River Insurance Company (with claims handling by RiverStone) for roughly $7.6 million in costs to remediate TCE pollution at a former Indiana manufacturing site, where contamination had occurred over multiple years both before and during the 1976–1978 policy periods. The trial court granted partial summary judgment to Landis for over $10 million, but the Indiana Court of Appeals reversed and ordered summary judgment for the insurers on all claims. The court first found a conflict between Indiana’s “all sums” allocation rule (under which the insurer could be liable for the full amount up to policy limits) and New York’s “pro rata” allocation rule (under which the per-year share of costs fell below the policies’ $1 million attachment point, resulting in no coverage). It then held that Indiana’s choice-of-law analysis required application of New York law because the policies had been issued to a New York-based company, were brokered and delivered there, and listed New York as the primary insured location.
environmentbusiness & regulatoryproceduretorts & liability
Michael McCoy v. Douglas McCoy
Indiana Court of Appeals · 2026-05-08
The case concerned whether B. Alice McCoy had the testamentary capacity to execute a revocable trust and related estate-planning documents in August 2012, after her 2009 Alzheimer’s diagnosis; her son Michael sought to set the trust aside after her death, arguing incapacity, while his brother Douglas defended its validity. The trial court upheld the trust after excluding two 2012 emails from the drafting attorney that contradicted his deposition testimony denying prior knowledge of Alice’s cognitive decline. The Court of Appeals vacated that judgment, holding as a matter of first impression that Indiana Evidence Rule 806 permits impeachment of a hearsay declarant’s credibility when their deposition has been admitted in lieu of live testimony, and that the emails were also admissible under Rule 703 to assist the court’s evaluation of expert opinions on capacity. Because the emails directly addressed the central disputed issue and the trial court never reviewed them before excluding them on hearsay grounds, the court remanded for admission of the emails, reweighing of the evidence, and a new determination.
family lawpropertyprocedure
Terry L Hargis, Jr. v. State of Indiana
Indiana Court of Appeals · 2026-04-22
Terry L. Hargis, Jr. was convicted after a jury trial of two counts of Level 3 felony neglect of a dependent resulting in serious bodily injury to his infant son and found to be a habitual offender, leading to a 52-year sentence. On appeal, Hargis challenged his trial in absentia, argued that the two neglect convictions violated double jeopardy, and claimed his sentence was inappropriate. The Court of Appeals held that Hargis was properly tried in absentia and that he waived the sentencing claim by failing to present a cogent argument. It concluded that the two neglect convictions, which arose from the same course of conduct during the charged period, constituted double jeopardy, so it vacated one conviction and its sentence. The court remanded with instructions to attach the habitual-offender enhancement to the remaining conviction, resulting in a 36-year sentence.
criminal lawprocedure