Justia Constitutional Law Opinion Summaries

Under section 6(6) of Ballot Measure 49 (2007), certain "owners" of property may file a claim to establish up to three home-site approvals, notwithstanding existing land use restrictions that would otherwise preclude such development. At issue in this case was the meaning of the term "owner" as it is used in that section. Specifically, the issue was whether the term includes a seller of property under a land sale contract who retains legal title to the property. The Court of Appeals concluded that, as the term is used in Ballot Measure 49, the term "owner" means only the purchaser of property under a land sale contract and does not include the seller of the property who retains title. Upon review, the Supreme Court reversed the Court of Appeals: "In short, there is no persuasive evidence that the voters intended the three categories of owners under ORS 195.300(18) to be mutually exclusive. To the contrary, the phrasing of that definition, along with other definitions in the same section, and other related provisions of the law make clear that those definitional components were intended to be inclusive." View "Burke v. Oregon" on Justia Law

A criminal defendant who was released from custody pursuant to a security release agreement, sought the writ of mandamus to compel the judge who set the terms of the agreement to modify a condition that forbade him from having contact with his father. In his mandamus petition, and again in his brief on the merits to the Supreme Court, Defendant made two legal arguments: that the trial court had no statutory authority to impose the condition and that, if the relevant statute permitted the condition, it was unconstitutional. At oral argument, however, Defendant conceded that a "no contact with witnesses" condition could be lawfully imposed in some circumstances and argued, instead, that the condition was improper in this case because it was not supported by evidence in the record. Because Defendant's argument to the Supreme Court was not the argument that he raised in his mandamus petition, it did not present the legal question posed by the Court's issuance of the alternative writ. Accordingly, the Court exercised its discretion to dismiss the alternative writ of mandamus that it previously issued.

In this case the issue before the Supreme Court concerned an action under ORS 30.866 in which a plaintiff sought both a stalking protective order and a judgment for compensatory money damages, whether the parties are entitled to a jury trial on the claim for money damages. Plaintiff in this case filed a petition under ORS 30.866, alleging that the defendant had engaged in knowing and repeated unwanted sexual contact with her in the two years preceding the filing of the petition and that that contact had caused plaintiff reasonable apprehension regarding her safety. Plaintiff claimed that she was entitled to three forms of relief: a stalking protective order enjoining defendant from engaging in certain conduct; an award of compensatory damages for lost sick and annual leave, lost wages, and counseling expenses; and an award of reasonable attorney fees. Defendant asserted that he was entitled to a jury trial on plaintiff's claim for compensatory money damages. The trial court disagreed and conducted the trial on all three claims without a jury. The court found in favor of plaintiff, issued a stalking protective order, entered a general judgment for compensatory damages in the amount of $42,347.78, and entered a supplemental judgment for reasonable attorney fees. Defendant appealed and the Court of Appeals affirmed, holding that defendant had neither a statutory nor a constitutional right to a jury trial. The court reasoned that the text of ORS 30.866 contains "no reference that conveys any kind of indication that the legislature intended to confer a right to a jury trial." Upon review, the Supreme Court reversed the appellate court on the jury trial issue, and remanded the case for further proceedings.

Ann Sacks Tile and Stone, Inc.; Canac Kitchen US Limited; and Koehler Rental Power, Inc. appealed a general tax judgment against them directly to the Supreme Court. The Department of Revenue responded with a motion to determine jurisdiction, asking the Court to determine whether a defect in the manner in which the companies had served their notice of appeal on the department deprived the Supreme Court of authority to decide the appeal. The companies asserted that the defects did not deprive the court of jurisdiction. Upon review, the Supreme Court concluded it indeed lacked jurisdiction over the case, and accordingly dismissed the appeal.

ORS 742.061 authorizes an award of attorney fees to an insured who prevails in "an action * * * in any court of this state upon any policy of insurance of any kind or nature * * *." A later enacted statute, ORS 742.001, provides that ORS chapter 742 "appl[ies] to all insurance policies delivered or issued for delivery in this state * * *." The question in this case was whether ORS 742.001 precluded awarding attorney fees to an insured who prevailed in an action in an Oregon court on an insurance policy that was issued for delivery and delivered in the State of Washington. The trial court concluded that it did and entered a supplemental judgment to that effect. The Court of Appeals affirmed. Considering the text, context, and legislative history of Chapter 742, the Supreme Court concluded that the legislature did not intend that ORS 742.001 would limit the scope of ORS 742.061. "For us to hold otherwise, we would have to turn an expansion of the state's authority to impose substantive regulations on insurers transacting business in Oregon into a limitation on the remedial and procedural rules that affect insurers appearing in its courts. * * * we would have to read a limitation into the text of that section that the legislature did not include. We may not do that." The Court reversed the appellate court and remanded the case for further proceedings.

The issue before the Supreme Court in this case was whether defendant filed his notice of appeal from a supplemental judgment awarding restitution within the time allowed by ORS 138.071(4), which requires that the notice of appeal be filed not later than 30 days after "the defendant receives notice that the judgment has been entered." The Court of Appeals concluded that defendant's notice of appeal from the supplemental judgment was untimely and dismissed that appeal for lack of jurisdiction. Upon review, the Supreme Court also concluded that defendant's notice of appeal was not timely filed, and therefore affirmed the decision of the Court of Appeals.

Defendant Terry Haynes was charged with murder and manslaughter. Defendant filed two pretrial motions to exclude evidence, the first seeking to exclude evidence of five allegations of prior bad acts, and the second seeking to exclude his interview with the police. The trial court granted Defendant's motion to exclude his prior bad acts in its entirety, and granted in part and denied in part Defendant's motion to exclude the police interview. The State sought direct review of both rulings. Upon review, the Supreme Court concluded that the state did not adequately preserve any of the arguments that it advanced on appeal with regard to the admissibility of the prior bad acts. In addition, the Court declined to consider the State's argument with regard to the partial exclusion of the interview because it assigned error to an order that the trial court did not make. Accordingly, the Court affirmed the trial court's orders and remanded the case to the trial court for further proceedings.

The issue on appeal before the Supreme Court concerned the meaning of "aggrieved person" as that term was used in ORS 133.721(1), the statute that defines the class of persons who may seek suppression of evidence obtained pursuant to an order for a body wire or wiretap. Defendant was charged with various crimes arising from the murder of Asia Bell. Before trial, defendant filed motions to suppress certain evidence intercepted pursuant to a body wire order and a wiretap order. Specifically, through the body-wire order the police had obtained conversations that referred to defendant and indirectly suggested that he was involved in Bell's death. Based on that information, the police obtained the wiretap order, and, through the wiretap, intercepted conversations in which defendant made incriminating statements. The trial court denied defendant's motions to suppress. A jury convicted defendant of murder, conspiracy to commit murder, and two counts of attempted aggravated murder. On appeal, the Court of Appeals affirmed. It held that defendant could not challenge the body-wire order because he was not an "aggrieved person" within the meaning of ORS 133.721(1). As to the wiretap order, the Court of Appeals acknowledged that defendant was an "aggrieved person" who could challenge that order, but noted that defendant's only argument to exclude the incriminating communications obtained pursuant to that order was that the order was based on information obtained through the allegedly invalid body-wire order. It rejected that argument. The Court of Appeals also rejected defendant's argument that the trial court committed prejudicial error in excluding certain evidence that defendant sought to introduce. Upon review, the Supreme Court affirmed the decision of the Court of Appeals.

In this case, a trial court found that defendant's statements to private investigators were induced by the investigators' promises of leniency and other benefits and therefore suppressed those statements and a second set of inculpatory statements that defendant made to a police officer on the same subject. The state appealed the suppression order. Upon review, the Supreme Court affirmed the trial court: "the state [had] the burden to produce evidence that the coercive influence under which the prior confession was made had sufficiently dispelled to render the subsequent confession [to police] voluntary. . . .The trial court did not err in reaching that conclusion or in suppressing those statements."

The state charged Defendant Ronald Leistiko with, among other things, three counts of first degree rape. Each count involved a different victim and arose out of a separate incident. The state offered evidence that defendant had forcibly compelled a fourth woman to engage in sexual intercourse with him. The trial court ruled that the fourth woman's testimony was admissible, and the jury convicted Defendant of two of the three counts of rape. On appeal, the Court of Appeals upheld the admission of the fourth woman's testimony, relying in large part on The Supreme Court's decision in "Oregon v. Johnson" (131 P3d 173 (2006)). The Supreme Court allowed Defendant's petition for review and reversed the Court of Appeals decision in part. "[The Court] recognize[d] that inferring a plan or design from prior similar acts to prove that a defendant acted consistently with that plan is vulnerable to the claim that the prior bad acts are merely propensity evidence. . . .[T]he fourth woman's testimony was not sufficiently similar for it to be admissible to prove intent. It necessarily follows that her testimony also was not sufficiently similar for it to be admissible to prove a plan that would permit the jury to infer that defendant acted consistently with that plan - namely, that he forcibly compelled each of the victims to engage in sexual intercourse with him. None of the grounds that the state has advanced justified admission of the fourth woman's testimony. The trial court erred in admitting it."