Federal Appeals Lawyers

Federal appeals are unforgiving. Deadlines are strict. Issues are complex. Appellate judges expect professional, experienced advocates familiar with their court. Once the case reaches the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, it will be decided almost entirely on the briefs — before some of the most demanding judges in the country. There is no room for imprecision.

Federal appellate work is part of this firm’s identity. Strang Bradley was co-founded by Wisconsin’s first Federal Defender, and our attorneys’ federal appellate experience includes representing the lead defendant in United States v. Booker, the 2005 U.S. Supreme Court decision that struck down the mandatory Federal Sentencing Guidelines. Few firms in Wisconsin maintain a comparable federal appellate practice.

Federal Appeals We Handle

• Direct appeals from federal criminal convictions — trial error, suppression rulings, sufficiency of the evidence
• Federal sentencing appeals — Guidelines calculation errors, procedural error, and substantive unreasonableness
• Appeals from the denial of motions to suppress evidence or dismiss the indictment
• Civil appeals in the Seventh Circuit, including civil rights judgments under Section 1983
• Government appeals — defending favorable rulings and judgments our clients have already won
• Petitions for rehearing and rehearing en banc, and petitions for certiorari to the U.S. Supreme Court

What Makes Federal Appeals Different

Federal appellate judges expect rigorous treatment of the standard of review, scrupulous accuracy about the record, and candor about adverse authority. Briefs that overreach lose credibility — and cases.

Preservation matters, too. Issues not properly raised in the district court are reviewed only for plain error, a far steeper hill. Part of our record review is identifying which issues were preserved, which were not, and how to frame each to give the appeal its best chance.

Why Choose Strang Bradley for a Federal Appeal

We write better. Simple as. And in federal appellate practice, that’s significant. Our attorneys have briefed and argued in the Seventh Circuit and the U.S. Supreme Court, and we bring the same discipline to every appeal: complete record review, ruthless issue selection, and briefs built to persuade judges who read closely. We keep our caseloads low, so we can give our appellate clients the attention they deserve.