• May 15, 2011
  • KSN TV
  • -
  • by Craig Andres

Topeka, Kan. – A controversial proposal in Kansas to restrict private health insurance for abortions has passed and is expected to be signed into law by Governor Brownback. The measure prohibits insurance companies from automatically covering abortions in their health plans, except to save a woman’s life. Individuals and employers wanting the coverage would have to buy separate abortion-only policies.

Some legal analysts say the measure could be challenged.

“This Kansas legislation has to be examined for unconstitutional gender discrimination in violation of the equal protection clause,” explains legal analyst Dan Monnat. “The Kansas legislature has singled out a medical procedure that only a woman can need and then cut off access to it based solely on emotional, religious and political considerations.”

Lawmakers who voted in the bill call it a fair measure.

“We also succeeded in passing legislation (HB 2075) that will, among many other amendments to the Insurance Code, provide for optional insurance coverage through riders for certain abortions, if an individual feels compelled to acquire such coverage,” explains Republican Dennis Hedke of Wichita. “Pro-life advocates were also likely pleased to learn that state monies will no longer be expended to provide insurance coverage to state employees seeking an abortion, unless the procedure is necessary to protect the life of the mother.”

Kansans for Life, a group that is strongly opposed to abortions, is calling this a big win.

“And [sic] abortion is not health care, so I’m glad that they just took that out of there,” says David Gittrich of Kansans For Life. “If you want a rider for abortion you can still get it, but for the vast majority of Kansans who don’t want to pay for abortions, and don’t want it as part of their health insurance, now they can have that taken out of there.”

The House approved the measure 86-30 on Friday morning, sending it to Governor Sam Brownback. The Senate passed it Thursday night, 28-10. House members’ action came only hours after they had blocked its passage. The House voted 70-51 early Friday morning against the measure, but it later reconsidered and launched another debate.

The anti-abortion language is bundled with other insurance regulatory changes in a single bill. House members initially objected, not over the abortion language, but over other insurance proposals.

Governor Brownback is expected to sign it into law.

See video at KSN

KSN TV – Craig Andres

  • Apr 23, 2011
  • The Wichita Eagle
  • -
  • by Carrie Rengers
 “… he spoke with conviction and passion about the value of the American Constitution and the rule of law in the United States, and you couldn’t help thinking that if you ever got into serious trouble with the police, you’d want him at your side.”

– Stephen Singular, author of the new “The Wichita Divide: The Murder of Dr. George Tiller and the Battle Over Abortion,” on Tiller attorney Dan Monnat

The Wichita Eagle – By Carrie Rengers
  • Mar 29, 2011
  • Monnat & Spurrier

The International Who’s Who of Business Crime Lawyers 2011 has named Dan Monnat one of the world’s leading practitioners in business crime defense. The publication is a strategic research partner of the American Bar Association’s Section of International Law.

Monnat has practiced in Wichita for nearly 35 years, handling criminal and white-collar criminal cases attracting international attention. Last fall, he was named a Fellow of the International Academy of Trial Lawyers.

“It’s a supreme honor to be recognized among this worldwide group of exemplary lawyers,” Monnat said. “Legal actions in Kansas can have potential global impact. That’s why we work so diligently to protect jurisprudence in Kansas, in the hope that it may become a model internationally.”

  • Mar 25, 2011
  • KSN TV

A teacher convicted of having sex with a student will try to get the law tossed out, saying the student was an adult and the sex shouldn’t be criminal. The teacher is 30 years old. The student was 18. And a state law makes sex between the two a felony. But the teacher’s lawyer says the law is unconstitutional and will fight to get it erased from the law books.

Attorneys for 30-year-old Charles Edwards are not fighting his firing from the Wichita School District. But they say his arrest on criminal charges is unconstitutional. Edwards taught vocal lessons at Northwest High School and had sex with an 18-year-old student.

Kansas law bans any sex between any kind of law enforcement officer and inmates. There’s also a clause saying it’s criminal if the offender is a teacher or a person in position of authority and the person with whom the offender is engaging in consensual sexual intercourse is a student enrolled at the school where the offender is employed. Edwards’ attorney says his client pleaded guilty to the charge so they could begin appealing the law.

“How far do we want the state to pry into our individual consensual sexual relationships?” said legal analyst Dan Monnat, who is not representing Edwards.
Monnat says Edwards may have a case against the constitutionality of the law.
A Supreme Court ruling declaring laws banning gay sex between consenting adults may apply to this case. Monnat says just because people may find a relationship inappropriate, doesn’t mean it should be against the law.

“There may be all kinds of consensual sexual relations that the public finds in bad taste, but does the public want to send those persons to prison?” he said.
Edwards will be sentenced on the conviction in May. His lawyer is expecting probation because of his client’s clean criminal record. The appeals process is expected to take about a year

See video at KSN

KSN TV

  • Jan 27, 2011
  • Monnat & Spurrier

10 N 1358 (Newton, Kan., Mun. Ct. Jan. 27, 2011): Trial judge suppressed all evidence of driving under the influence of alcohol; criminal case dismissed with prejudice; driver’s-license suspension dismissed, and client’s driving privileges restored

  • Dec 11, 2010
  • by Roxana Hegeman

A federal judge on Friday threw out an indictment against a Kansas tobacco wholesaler and business associates who were charged with trying to avoid paying $25 million in cigarette taxes to the state of Oklahoma and Indian tribes.

U.S. District Judge Monti Belot in Wichita ruled that the defendants had met their burden in showing indictment against them was unconstitutionally vague and should be dismissed.

Belot also derided the government’s case — saying it was based on the government’s opinion and not on any federal, Kansas or Oklahoma statute.

The decision clears all charges against Gary Hall, the president and owner of Sunflower Supply Co. in Galena, along with seven other people. Also cleared were Discount Tobacco Warehouse Inc. of Joplin, Mo., and Rebel Industries Inc. of Galena.

Charges were dismissed without prejudice, meaning prosecutors could seek another indictment. They also could appeal Belot’s decision, but the judge “strongly discouraged” prosecutors from seeking reconsideration.

“We will have to review his action and evaluate it,” said Jim Cross, spokesman for the U.S. attorney’s office in Kansas.

Jim Pratt, one of the defense attorneys representing Hall, said they still were reviewing the decision and had no immediate comment.

The 43-count indictment filed in October 2008 included charges of conspiracy to divert cigarettes, mail and wire fraud, record-keeping violations of the Cigarette Trafficking Act, interstate transportation in aid of racketeering, transporting contraband cigarettes, conspiracy to commit money laundering, money laundering, and engaging in unlawful monetary transactions. The government also had sought asset forfeiture.

The indictment alleged that from January 2005 through May 2007, the defendants defrauded the state of Oklahoma and Indian tribes that share revenue from cigarette taxes. Prosecutors contended Hall’s companies stamped cigarettes for sale at smoke shops in lower tax rate areas when they actually were sold at shops with higher tax rates.

Belot noted in his 43-page decision that the cigarettes had tax stamps and that records were made and maintained. Those records also were accurate, the judge said.

“The crimes charged are founded not upon facially-false entries on records but instead upon the government’s and its case agent’s opinion regarding what the records should have shown: the ‘ultimate destination’ of the cigarettes,” Belot wrote.

But such language was nowhere in any federal, Kansas or Oklahoma statute or regulation during the relevant period. Belot said “especially troubling to the court” was the government’s admission that it had decided the term “destination” really means “ultimate destination” — in other words, the place where the cigarettes were sold to the consumer — by its use of a dictionary definition.

Belot said the court had never encountered such an approach, saying it would mean that if the court allowed the jury to hear the agent’s opinion then it would have to instruct the jury on the government’s interpretation of a statute by inserting a dictionary definition.

The investigation started in 2006 after the Kansas Highway Patrol stopped a vehicle in Coffeyville that was allegedly carrying cigarettes worth more than $200,000 without appropriate tax stamps. Federal and state agents raided Sunflower and Rebel Industries in May 2007.

In October 2009, Belot also tossed much of the evidence after ruling that a Kansas Highway Patrol officer had no reason to suspect the driver of a U-Haul van that was found to be loaded with cigarettes was violating any laws, and the search was therefore illegal.

By ROXANA HEGEMAN

  • Dec 02, 2010
  • The Wichita Eagle
  • -
  • by Ron Sylvester

A judge said Wednesday that if prosecutors take Sam Holton to trial on double murder charges, they will do so without most of the evidence seized at his house — and his confession.

Sedgwick County District Judge David Kaufman ruled that Wichita police illegally entered Holton’s home in Mulvane to arrest him in connection with two killings last Thanksgiving.

In doing so, Kaufman said, detectives tainted any evidence they would later obtain, including Holton’s admission that he was involved in the shooting deaths of Adrian Jackson and Jessie Foust near Central and Hillside in Wichita.

Kaufman said detectives entered the Mulvane house without a warrant or consent of the residents and illegally arrested Holton, 18.

The judge suppressed property from the dead couple’s home found inside Holton’s house.

Kaufman also suppressed evidence police took from the house of Trevor Cox, 17, after Holton took detectives there. That includes the   murder weapon: a 9mm handgun retrieved from Cox’s  closet.

Kansas law states residents must give explicit permission to police before they enter a home, Kaufman said.

“They weren’t asked to come in, and they didn’t ask if they could come in,” Kaufman said.

Sal Intagliata, Holton’s lawyer, asked the judge to suppress the evidence during a hearing last week. Intagliata said that by entering the house without permission, Wichita police violated search and seizure protections under the Fourth  Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.

After such a violation, all further evidence and statements become suspect. Courts have compared it to picking “fruit from a poisonous tree.”

Kaufman agreed.

Although the judge ruled Holton made a voluntary confession at police headquarters, and that police acted properly in interviewing him, the illegal entry made the subsequent statements inadmissible during trial.

Prosecutor Marc Bennett, however, still has statements made to police by Joshua Duque, 16, who is also charged with murder and robbery in the case. Duque has been ordered to stand trial as an adult.

Holton’s trial was set for next week, but Bennett said he will ask for a continuance to pursue his options.

But Bennett is left with little more from the house in Mulvane than a pair of Jackson’s earrings and a piece of paper listing other evidence from the dead couple’s house. Holton’s mother, who put together the list, gave those items to police  before they went inside.

Bennett had argued that Holton’s mother invited police into the house. But Rebecca Flagler testified at last week’s hearing that she did not give detectives permission to go inside.

Kaufman pointed out that while detectives said a supervisor told them they had consent to search the house, no one testified who it was that gave them permission.

Jackson, 26, and Foust, 25, were found dead by a family member on Thanksgiving 2009. Their children, ages 4 and 1, were unharmed and had apparently been left overnight with the bodies of their slain parents.

Holton and Duque gave police conflicting accounts of what happened, according to testimony from detectives in previous court hearings.

Detectives testified that Holton said he and Cox went to the house on North Chautauqua the night before Thanksgiving. Holton said Cox shot Jackson multiple times and then ordered Holton to shoot Foust to stop her screaming.

The same detectives said Duque told them he went to the house with Holton. Duque said he took a gun into the house but never fired it. Duque said he heard the gunshots from another room.

Cox pleaded guilty to aiding a felon and misdemeanor theft.

For story click here.

The Wichita Eagle – By Ron Sylvester

  • Nov 15, 2010
  • Monnat & Spurrier

Dan Monnat has been named a Fellow of the International Academy of Trial Lawyers, a prestigious invitation-only organization. Membership in IATL is by peer and judicial review, and limited to only 500 active trial lawyers in the United States, plus 100 Fellows from more than 30 countries worldwide.

The Academy honors only those who have achieved a career of excellence through superior skill in trial and appellate practice. Fellows must distinguish themselves by promoting the best interests of the justice system and exhibiting unimpeachable personal and professional character and integrity.

“One of the Academy’s missions is to honor and protect the American jury system and elevate the standards of integrity and civility in the legal profession and judiciary,” Monnat said. “I am honored to play a role in protecting our system of jurisprudence. I am also encouraged by the Academy’s China Program, which brings young Chinese lawyers to the U.S. to learn about our system of justice. These lawyers then return to China to develop legislative and economic infrastructure, helping that great country become a nation ruled by sound and predictable legal principles.”

  • Nov 01, 2010
  • Missouri & Kansas Super Lawyers
  • Oct 04, 2010
  • Monnat & Spurrier