“If equitable and legal causes of action or defenses are present in the same lawsuit, the court must examine several factors of each joined claim — its substance and character, the rights and interests involved, and the relief requested. After that examination, the trial court must decide whether core questions presented in any of the joined legal claims significantly overlap with the subject matter that invokes the equitable jurisdiction of the court. If so, equity subsumes those particular legal claims to obtain more final and effectual relief for the parties despite the presence of peripheral questions of a legal nature. Conversely, the unrelated legal claims are entitled to a trial by jury.”
In re: The Order of Contempt Against Benson, et al v. Co-Alliance, LLP, No. 55A04-1010-CC-64, ___ N.E.2d ___ (Ind. Ct. App., Sept. 6, 2011)
Trial court had jurisdiction to order an attorney to pay funds for attorney’s contempt in an action stayed by the bankruptcy court because the funds paid were not property of the bankruptcy estate, but the attorney’s personal money and for damages resulting from the attorney’s contempt.
Coleman v. State, No. 49A02-1101-CR-12, __ N.E.2d __ (Ind. Ct. App., Aug. 26, 2011).
For purpose of the consecutive sentencing statute, a conspiracy to commit a “crime of violence” is not itself a “crime of violence.”
Henderson v. State, No. 20A03-1102-PC-108, __N.E.2d__ (Ind. Ct. App., Aug. 29, 2011).
U.S. Supreme Court’s Gant, which did away with “brightline” rule allowing searches of passenger compartments at the time the driver was arrested even if driver was no longer within reaching distance of the vehicle, does not apply to a pre-Gant “brightline” search legal when made under the Court’s former New York v. Belton precedent.
Alter v. State, No. 85A04-1101-CR-44, __ N.E.2d __ (Ind. Ct. App., Aug. 31, 2011).
After conservation officer had been shown subject’s fishing license, further detention for questions based on officer’s hunch subject might have put marijuana in his duffle was unsupported by reasonable suspicion and required suppression of marijuana subject produced on officer’s command to “give me your marijuana.”