Legal Question in Criminal Law in Wisconsin

Re: pre trial report

Court-ordered PSI reports are confidential and may not be made available to any person, with the exception of a defendant, his or her attorney and the prosecutor�s office, except upon specific authorization of the court. A defendant and/or his or her attorney have an absolute right to review the report prior to sentencing, and failure to permit a defendant and/or defense counsel to review it prior to the sentencing hearing is error. See State v. Skaff, 152 Wis. 2d 48, 447 N.W.2d 84 (Ct. App. 1989).

Be sure to keep an eye out for my upcoming feature article about pre-sentence investigation reports due to be published in the Fall 2009 edition on line and in print of WISCONSIN DEFENDER, the official publication of the State Public Defender.