Kaehne & Barrette Criminal Defense Firm

There is a certain clarity that comes from a law firm that does exactly one thing. Kaehne & Barrette Criminal Defense Firm does not handle divorces, draw up wills, or take on business disputes. It defends people accused of crimes in the state of Wisconsin, and it has spent years building the kind of institutional knowledge — familiarity with local judges and prosecutors, command of constitutional challenges, fluency in pretrial motion practice — that only comes from doing that work exclusively and continuously.

Brett Kaehne graduated cum laude from the University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh before earning his law degree at the University of Arkansas's Leflar Law Center, where he won honors at the National Institute for Trial Advocacy's Tournament of Champions. He spent the first years of his career founding and growing his own criminal defense firm in Sheboygan, before joining forces with Melissa Barrette in 2019 to establish the current firm. Together they have built a team that approaches every case collectively — meeting as a group to discuss strategy, identify constitutional vulnerabilities, and develop the arguments most likely to produce a dismissal or acquittal. Both Kaehne and Barrette serve on the legal committee of NORML, reflecting a commitment to criminal justice reform that extends beyond their client files. The firm handles drug offenses, DUI, violent crimes, sex offenses, white-collar matters, and the full range of misdemeanor and felony charges across Wisconsin.