Judge McGinnis Charges: Investigation, Complaints, and Resignation

Judge Mark McGinnis was not criminally charged. On August 29, 2025, La Crosse County District Attorney Tim Gruenke, appointed as special prosecutor, announced that no charges would be filed over McGinnis’s December 2021 decision to jail a cement contractor to collect a private debt. Two days earlier, McGinnis had submitted his resignation from the Outagamie County Circuit Court to Governor Tony Evers, effective February 1, 2026.¹²

Why the Special Prosecutor Declined to Charge

Gruenke concluded after reviewing reports and transcripts that “a crime did not occur, and no criminal charge is warranted.” He cited three factors: the age of the incident, McGinnis’s acknowledgment through his attorney that he “could have handled the matter differently,” and separation-of-powers concerns about the executive branch investigating judicial decisions made from the bench.¹

Charging a judge for bench conduct, Gruenke said, would raise “unique questions of whether a judge’s legal errors during a court hearing should result in criminal investigation.” He added: “This didn’t seem like the case that should test those parameters.”²

The case was handled by a special prosecutor because the Outagamie County District Attorney’s office had declared a conflict of interest. Gruenke was appointed in March 2024 after Wisconsin Watch reporter Jacob Resneck first disclosed the incident in January 2024 and the Wisconsin Department of Justice opened a criminal investigation.³⁴

Legal experts told Wisconsin Watch that if any charge had been pursued, it most likely would have been misconduct in public office under Wisconsin Statute 946.12, which prohibits public officials from knowingly exceeding their lawful authority. Those same experts said they were unaware of any Wisconsin judge ever being criminally charged for actions taken from the bench. Civil rights attorney Jeff Scott Olson described holding judges accountable for on-the-bench conduct as “almost completely impossible” because of broad judicial immunity. Defense attorney Mike Balskus, a former prosecutor, said local prosecutors are reluctant to bring such cases because judges can make their professional lives difficult.⁴

Gruenke acknowledged that McGinnis’s resignation was a “factor” in the decision not to prosecute but said it was “not a definitive one.”²

What McGinnis Did at the 2021 Hearing

Tyler Barth, a 32-year-old cement contractor from Fremont, appeared before McGinnis on December 20, 2021, for a routine probation review hearing tied to an unrelated felony conviction for fleeing an officer. During the hearing, McGinnis accused Barth of stealing several thousand dollars from a cement contracting customer, Paula Dorsey. Barth had accepted a $7,000 deposit from Paula Dorsey’s husband, Wayne Dorsey, for a concrete job at the couple’s lakefront cabin in Oneida County and had delayed the work, citing frozen ground. He had not been arrested, charged, or formally accused of theft through any normal legal channel. Local police in Hortonville and Grand Chute had treated the dispute as civil and declined to pursue criminal charges.⁴⁵

McGinnis gave Barth roughly 13 minutes to repay the money. The transcript records the judge saying: “It’s, like, 11:02, so that’s going to be paid back by 11:15 today.” When Barth asked for 24 hours, McGinnis ordered him jailed for up to 90 days, to be released only once he repaid the deposit. Barth spent three days in jail before defense attorney Kirk Everson persuaded McGinnis to walk the sentence back. Barth repaid the full deposit by April 2022 and was ordered to attend weekly probation review hearings for six months after his release.⁵¹

John P. Gross, director of the Public Defender Project at the University of Wisconsin Law School, told Wisconsin Watch that using a criminal hearing as a “cudgel” to settle a civil contract dispute was improper. “If he was liable in the civil matter for a breach of contract — that’s not a reason to revoke his probation in criminal court. He didn’t commit a new crime,” Gross said.⁴

The Courthouse Connection

Paula Dorsey worked in the same Outagamie County courthouse as McGinnis, though for a different judge. Weeks before the hearing, Wayne Dorsey had texted Barth: “You do know that my wife works for a judge.” He followed up: “We are personal friends with half the lawyers in the valley… Do the right thing and keep your good name for your new business and I promise you you will get the $6500 back in the spring because I want this done ASAP.” Barth reported that Paula Dorsey was in the courtroom when McGinnis ordered him jailed. Wayne Dorsey later denied his wife had used courthouse connections to recover the money, telling Wisconsin Watch, “My wife doesn’t even work for Judge McGinnis. I’m not even sure how we got the money back. But we did.”⁴

Everson filed a motion on January 6, 2022, asking McGinnis to recuse himself, citing the judicial code of conduct provision that “a judge may not lend the prestige of judicial office to advance the private interests of the judge or of others.” McGinnis consulted the Wisconsin Judicial Commission. Executive director Jeremiah Van Hecke responded on March 3, 2022, that he did not see a “clear basis for recusal” so long as the judge was not the employee’s direct supervisor, was not a witness to the dispute, and did not have a close personal relationship with her. McGinnis denied the motion and continued to preside over Barth’s probation hearings for seven more months.⁴⁵

Whether the Judicial Commission independently investigated McGinnis remained unclear as of his resignation. Commission proceedings are confidential unless a formal complaint is filed or the judge waives confidentiality, and no public filing was reported.⁶

Resignation and Replacement

McGinnis submitted his resignation letter to Governor Evers on August 27, 2025, effective February 1, 2026. He said the decision had been made “several years ago” and was unrelated to the investigation, citing pension and benefit reasons tied to turning 55 and reaching his 21st year of service. He said he planned to pursue legal consulting and judicial education work.²

On November 7, 2025, Governor Evers appointed Whitney Healy to fill the Branch 1 seat. Healy’s term runs through July 31, 2027.⁷

Earlier Complaints Against McGinnis

The Barth matter was not the first time McGinnis’s conduct drew scrutiny. He was elected in 2005 and served two decades on the bench.

Contempt Sentence Reversed on Appeal

In June 2017, McGinnis held defendant Brian Mitchell in contempt for rolling his eyes, shuffling papers, and giving the judge what McGinnis described as a “fuck-you look.” He sentenced Mitchell to six months in jail and imposed a $5,000 fine as a purge condition, along with written and oral apologies. Wisconsin law caps summary contempt at 30 days and $500. The state conceded the sanctions were an “unauthorized penalty,” and the Wisconsin Court of Appeals summarily reversed. Mitchell had already served 42 days. The underlying human trafficking charge was dismissed less than a month after his release. The appeals court also noted that McGinnis had failed to give Mitchell a chance to speak before imposing sanctions and had not made a clear record of the specific actions constituting contempt.⁸⁹¹⁰

Truancy Court

McGinnis founded a truancy court program with the Appleton Area School District in 2009. In November 2018 the district hired outside attorney Duane McCrary to review it. McCrary reported that students described the experience as “traumatic,” that McGinnis called students “stupid,” was “intensely angry,” and bullied students who could not easily communicate. The review also found that McGinnis had threatened students with electronic monitoring after being told by the Court of Appeals he lacked statutory authority to do so. McCrary recommended removing McGinnis from the program. The school board suspended the court for the remainder of 2018–19, and Chief Judge James Morrison of Wisconsin’s Eighth Judicial District subsequently ended court participation, shutting the program down.¹¹¹²

Substitution Requests and Appellate Rebukes

A 2015 Post-Crescent investigation found that over a four-year period, attorneys filed 1,130 substitution requests against McGinnis, triple the volume of any other circuit court judge in Wisconsin. A Wisconsin Watch analysis of the five years leading to January 2024 found him still leading Outagamie County, accounting for nearly 20% of substitution requests across the county’s seven branches. In 2009, an appeals court admonished him as “objectively biased” after he threatened a defendant with a maximum sentence if probation was violated. In a separate case, a Court of Appeals panel overturned a prison sentence after finding McGinnis showed “improper bias” by declaring his intent to send the defendant to prison before hearing sentencing arguments.⁴⁸

Financial Disclosures

McGinnis owns a commercial building in Grand Chute that he has leased to the Wisconsin Department of Corrections since 2008, in a 15-year deal worth $2.7 million. Internal DOC emails described the arrangement as “problematic” because DOC employees regularly appear in court. McGinnis said the Judicial Commission approved the deal, though the commission declined to release its guidance, citing confidentiality. The lease was renewed in May 2023 and could reach $4.4 million by 2042. A 2015 report also found McGinnis had failed to disclose $18,450 in income from the city of Appleton between 2007 and 2011 for police training on his Statements of Economic Interests.⁵¹³

Can Barth Still Sue?

After Gruenke’s announcement, Barth said he intended to seek an attorney to explore a civil lawsuit now that the criminal investigation was resolved.⁶ Legal experts cautioned that broad judicial immunity makes civil damages against a judge for conduct on the bench extremely difficult to obtain.⁴

McGinnis left the bench without facing criminal charges, public disciplinary action, or formal sanctions from the Judicial Commission.

1
WBAY. Resigning Outagamie Co. Judge Mark McGinnis Won’t Face Charges for Jailing Man Over Private Dispute
2
FOX 11. Outagamie County Judge Mark McGinnis Resignation Letter to Governor Tony Evers
3
Wisconsin Watch. Special Prosecutor Expected to Announce Decision on Whether to Charge Wisconsin Judge
4
Wisconsin Watch. Wisconsin Judge Under Investigation for Jailing Man Over Dispute With Courthouse Employee
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Wisconsin Public Radio. Wisconsin Judge Under Investigation for Jailing Man Over Dispute With Courthouse Employee
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Wisconsin Watch. Wisconsin Judge Will Resign, Won’t Face Criminal Charges for Jailing Cement Contractor
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Urban Milwaukee. Gov. Evers Appoints Whitney Healy to the Outagamie County Circuit Court
8
Wisconsin Justice Initiative. An Outagamie County Judge’s Justice: 42 Days in Jail for Eye-Rolling and Paper-Shuffling
9
Wisconsin Court of Appeals. State v. Mitchell, 2017AP1743-CR
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Wisconsin Justice Initiative. Outagamie Judge McGinnis Issued Contempt Penalty Far Beyond What the Law Allows
11
Post-Crescent. Reviewer Recommends Removing Judge Mark McGinnis From Truancy Court
12
WBAY. Judicial Court Ends Participation in Appleton School Truancy Court
13
Urban Milwaukee. Did Judge Violate Disclosure Law?