A Wisconsin Supreme Court justice filed a brutal opinion last week, slamming his colleagues for not quickly hearing Mark Green's appeal of campaign funds once disputed by the State Elections Board.

In a concurring opinion over the case's dismissal, Justice David Prosser said the court "did not care" about justice.

"In the midst and aftermath of an important gubernatorial election, this court did nothing to ascertain and enforce rights, or to assure the integrity of the electoral process," Prosser wrote. "Instead, it used every imaginable pretext to avoid making a decision."

During his campaign for governor, Green was ordered by the Elections Board to divest himself of $468,000 in campaign funds from out-of-state political action committees. Green sued, eventually appealing the case to the Supreme Court, but he did not receive judgment before the Nov. 7 election.

Incumbent Democratic Gov. Jim Doyle defeated the Republican candidate with 52 percent of the statewide vote.

On March 12, 2007, the Supreme Court asked the parties if they would prefer delaying oral arguments in light of the creation of a Government Accountability Board, which will oversee the Ethics and Elections Boards this fall.

Four days later, Green and the Elections Board settled, agreeing the candidate acted on current interpretation of elections laws. Green was allowed to keep the disputed funds, provided he did not use the money for a 2010 bid for governor.

Defending the high court's actions in his opinion of concurrence, Justice Patrick Crooks called Prosser's claims "unfair and inaccurate."

"I have great respect for my colleagues on the Wisconsin Supreme Court, but it is for others, not for us, to judge whether we continue to be a 'great court.'" Crooks wrote. "What I observed in the handling of this case by my colleagues convinced me that each of them cared deeply about truth, justice and fairness for the parties."

Crooks pointed out much of the delay happened since the parties disputed the case's facts and the justices wanted to make sure everyone was on the same page before it discussed legal discrepancies.

"We did, of course, ultimately take the case once there were no factual disputes," Crooks wrote. "The fact is that this court spent many, many hours working on the petition asking to commence an original action."