Michael Martin Mihm
How Judge Mihm decides
Patterns drawn from this judge's own signed orders. Every observation links to the order it came from.
What persuades
Public-employee First Amendment retaliation is decided at the Garcetti threshold: speech made pursuant to the employee's official duties is unprotected. A school principal who discovered and reported misuse of a fund she was responsible for overseeing spoke as an employee, not a private citizen, so no reasonable jury could find protected speech.
“no reasonable jury could conclude that McArdle was acting as a private citizen when she discovered Davis' alleged criminal activity and reported this activity to District supervisors.”
A False Claims Act complaint survives Rule 12(b)(6)/9(b) when the relators allege the fraudulent scheme with concrete particulars -- named employees, dated internal emails and operations directives, specific sites and dollar amounts -- rather than conclusory fraud. The detailed cross-leveling/over-reservation allegations against the defense contractor were enough.
“KBR's Motion to Dismiss (ECF No. 38) is DENIED.”
At the pleading stage, he will treat university catalogs and program materials as plausible evidence of an implied promise for in-person instruction and campus services, leaving the precise contractual terms for a developed record.
“The Court finds that Plaintiff has alleged sufficient facts at this early stage to adequately allege a claim for breach of contract.”
Procedural preferences
At summary judgment he repeatedly stresses how favorable the standard is to the non-movant: he must view facts in the light most favorable to the non-movant and may not weigh the evidence, so ambiguous statements and suspicious timing can defeat the motion even when the movant's narrative is plausible.
“Discounting the words on their face, however, would mean the Court was weighing the evidence rather than viewing it in the light most favorable to Plaintiff.”
On an unsettled point of Seventh Circuit law (whether Ortiz v. Werner abolished the direct/indirect-method distinction in employment cases) he took the narrower reading -- siding with Judge Shadid's interpretation that Ortiz is about how to weigh evidence, not a merger of the proof frameworks.
“This Court disagrees with their characterization, as it believes Judge Shadid's interpretation in Davis is correct. Ortiz is about evidence.”
He permits contract and unjust-enrichment theories to proceed in the alternative while the existence or scope of the alleged contract remains disputed.
“Especially since the existence of the underlying contract is in dispute, it would be premature for the Court to dismiss Plaintiff's unjust enrichment claim pled in the alternative to her breach of contract claim.”
Cautions
A summary-judgment movant cannot win by resting on its own self-serving construction of the underlying complaint's allegations and resolving factual disputes in its favor. He denied two insurers' coverage MSJs precisely because they argued from the pleadings rather than evidence while disputed facts remained.
“Defendants cannot simply rely on the allegations of the underlying complaints as construed by them and resolve all factual disputes in their favor, yet that is precisely what Defendants are asking the Court to do in the present Motions.”
A procedural-due-process claim fails as a matter of law without a constitutionally protected property interest. A non-renewed / at-will employment position (here, a contract validly noticed for non-renewal) carries no such interest, so he grants summary judgment on the due-process count without reaching the process given.
“Even if the Court agreed Plaintiff could only be reassigned for cause while the contract was operative, Plaintiff's reassignment could not have violated his due process rights because the contract was, in fact, not operative. Accordingly, Plaintiff had no property interest to protect.”
The burden of proof stays where it belongs. Ordering the Government to file supplemental briefing in a habeas case does not shift the burden -- a pro se petitioner who offers only unsupported assertions, without record evidence (e.g. a plea transcript), fails to carry it.
“The Court, out of an abundance of caution and to be able to consider Petitioner's claim to the fullest extent, ordered supplemental briefing on the issue from the Government; it did not shift the burden to the Government. The burden of proving his case remained with Petitioner.”
A cat's-paw retaliation theory needs evidence that the subordinate actually harbored discriminatory animus and that the subordinate's scheme proximately caused the decisionmaker's action; suspicion and unflattering remarks are not enough.
“The record fails to demonstrate that Dean Radson influenced Provost Zakahi, the decisionmaker, to remove Plaintiff as chair.”
Signed rulings
A grounded sample of orders signed by this judge, with the verbatim dispositive language.
“St. Paul's Motion for Summary Judgment [# 139] is DENIED, and Federal's Motion for Summary Judgment [# 148] is DENIED.”
“Davis' Motion for Summary Judgment [# 57] is GRANTED.”
“Individual Defendants' Motion for Summary Judgment [# 58] is GRANTED. This case is now terminated.”
“For the reasons set forth below, KBR's Motion to Dismiss (ECF No. 38) is DENIED.”
“Defendant's Motion for Summary Judgment (ECF No. 63) is DENIED IN PART and GRANTED IN PART. Summary judgment is denied as to Counts I and II and granted as to Count III.”
“For the reasons set forth above, the Court DENIES Petitioner's Petition for Writ of Habeas Corpus under 28 U.S.C. 2241 (ECF No. 1). This matter is now terminated.”
“Because it is within this Court's broad statutorily prescribed purview to do so, the Court hereby GRANTS the Government's Motion for Appointment of Receiver [# 145].”
“Accordingly, the Court GRANTS summary judgment in favor of the Defendant on Counts IV and V.... Ford's Motion is DENIED insofar as it relies on Sec. 5/2-604.1.”
“For the reasons set forth below, the Motion to Dismiss is DENIED [# 64].”
“Plaintiff's Motion [# 8] is GRANTED and [# 10] Defendant's Motion [# 10] is DENIED.”
“Oak Leaf's Motion to Dismiss/Strike Defendant's Motion for Preliminary Injunction Based on Court's Lack of Authority [# 31] is GRANTED.”
“This Court GRANTS State Farm's Motion... the Court GRANTS State Farm's Motion to Dismiss [# 9].”
“The Court DENIES Johnson's Motion to Reconsider [# 27 and # 28].”
“For the reasons set forth below, the Motion to Remand [# 8] is DENIED and the Motion to Stay [# 12] is GRANTED.”
Caseload & timing
From public federal docket records for this judge.
Median case duration in the sampled dockets: 175 days (N = 19).
Median motion-to-ruling time: 105 days (N = 16).
The 2014 case cohort and current assignment list are descriptive rather than an exhaustive census. Several litigated civil cases settled after discovery, but the contested-case sample is too small and targeted to support a settlement rate. No administrative case-disposition baseline is available.
Put Judge Mihm's record to work
Ezel drafts and answers grounded in this exact profile: how Judge Mihm actually rules, not a generic AI guess.
Opens in Ezel Pro. Every answer is grounded in Judge Mihm's own signed orders and cites them.