Justia Oregon Supreme Court Opinion Summaries

In the Supreme Court of the State of Oregon, Inez Gollersrud and David Gollersrud, individuals, filed a case against LPMC, LLC, an Oregon limited liability company. The case revolved around the question of whether email communications between a client and their attorney, sent from and stored on the client’s employer’s email system, are confidential and protected by attorney-client privilege. The court was also asked to consider if an employee leaving those email messages on the employer’s email system upon ending employment constitutes a waiver of attorney-client privilege.The court held that communications between a client and an attorney for the purpose of facilitating professional legal services are presumptively confidential. The client’s mere use of an employer’s email system does not overcome this presumption. Additionally, it was determined that leaving emails on the employer's system does not establish actual disclosure of communications, a necessary condition for a waiver of privilege under OEC 511. The court concluded that the record was insufficient to demonstrate a lack of privilege or that such privilege had been waived. As a result, the court issued a peremptory writ of mandamus. View "Gollersrud v. LPMC, LLC" on Justia Law

In the case before the Supreme Court of the State of Oregon, the defendant, William Jack Parkerson, had been convicted of assault in the first degree and sentenced under Oregon’s dangerous offender statutes. The defendant appealed his sentence, arguing that the trial court had violated ORS 161.735 by sentencing him as a dangerous offender without reviewing new presentence investigation and psychological evaluation reports specifically prepared for this case. He also argued that the determinate part of his sentence exceeded the maximum sentence allowed by ORS 161.605 and OAR 213-008-0003(2).The Supreme Court of Oregon affirmed in part and reversed in part. The court agreed with the defendant that the trial court had erred in sentencing him as a dangerous offender using old presentence investigation and psychological evaluation reports. The court held that ORS 161.735 requires the court to consider new reports prepared for the case. Therefore, the case was remanded to the lower court for resentencing.However, the Supreme Court of Oregon disagreed with the defendant's argument that the determinate part of his sentence exceeded the statutory maximum. The court concluded that the maximum determinate part of a dangerous offender sentence that may be imposed is twice the presumptive sentence under the sentencing guidelines, and thus, the 260-month determinate part of the sentence imposed by the trial court did not exceed the maximum allowed by the statute. View "State v. Parkerson" on Justia Law

In the case brought before the Supreme Court of the State of Oregon, two petitioners, Hugh Ady and Reed Scott-Schwalbach, challenged the Attorney General's certified ballot title for Initiative Petition 30 (2024) (IP 30). IP 30 proposed to establish a program providing state funding to families incurring "qualified expenses" for educating their children outside of the public school system. The funding would have been provided through a new "Education Savings Account Program" and would have been available to households having an adjusted gross income of $125,000 or less.The petitioners raised several objections to the ballot title, which the court mostly rejected. However, the court agreed with petitioner Scott-Schwalbach that the "yes" result statement and the summary were inaccurate in stating that IP 30 "allows additional virtual charter programs." The court clarified that state law doesn't cap virtual charter programs, but rather enrollment in those programs. IP 30 proposed to increase the enrollment cap, not the number of programs. As such, the court referred the "yes" result statement and the summary back to the Attorney General for correction. View "Ady v. Rosenblum" on Justia Law

In the case of PNW Metal Recycling, Inc., et al. v. Oregon Department of Environmental Quality, the Oregon Supreme Court held that the Department of Environmental Quality's (DEQ) internal decision to adopt a new interpretation of a statute did not constitute a "rule" under the Oregon Administrative Procedures Act (APA).The case emerged when the DEQ changed its interpretation of the "auto-dismantler exception" in the solid waste management regulations. Previously, facilities dismantling and recycling used vehicles were not required to obtain a permit for solid waste disposal, even if they also disposed of non-vehicle solid waste. However, in 2018, the DEQ informed the petitioners that it had revised its interpretation of the relevant statutes, and the facilities would now be required to obtain permits.The petitioners, who operate such facilities, challenged this change, arguing that the DEQ's new position constituted a "rule", meaning it should have been adopted following the APA rulemaking procedures. The Court of Appeals agreed with the petitioners and held the DEQ's decision invalid.However, the Oregon Supreme Court vacated the decision of the Court of Appeals and dismissed the judicial review. The court reasoned that an agency's internal decision to adopt a new statutory interpretation is not, by itself, a "rule" under the APA. Instead, a "rule" is a more formal, generally applicable agency directive, standard, regulation, or statement that implements, interprets, or prescribes law or policy.The court highlighted that the APA provides different avenues for agencies to announce policy, not all of which require formal rulemaking. Specifically, an agency can announce a general policy applicable to a case and future similar cases during a contested case proceeding, without going through formal rulemaking procedures. The court concluded that the DEQ's revised interpretation of the auto-dismantler exception and its stated intention to require the petitioners to obtain a permit were precursors to an enforcement action that may lead to a contested case proceeding, not a rule. The decision of the Court of Appeals was vacated, and the judicial review was dismissed. View "PNW Metal Recycling, Inc. v. DEQ" on Justia Law

In the case before the Supreme Court of the State of Oregon, the parents of three children under the jurisdiction of the Department of Human Services (DHS) appealed the juvenile court's decision to change the placement preference for their children from the mother's home to foster care. However, while the appeal was pending in the Court of Appeals, the juvenile court issued additional decisions determining that substitute care was still the appropriate placement preference for the children. The Court of Appeals dismissed the appeal as moot due to these subsequent judgments, ruling that it could not conclude without speculation that the challenged judgments would have a practical effect on the parents' rights. The Supreme Court of the State of Oregon reversed the decision of the Court of Appeals, finding that the Court of Appeals had incorrectly placed the burden on the parents to prove that the appeal was not moot, rather than on DHS to prove that it was. However, the Supreme Court found that the juvenile court's subsequent dismissal of the dependency cases altogether did render the appeals moot, as the parents and the children were no longer wards of the court and the original substitute-care placement determination no longer had a practical effect on the parties. The Supreme Court therefore dismissed the appeals as moot. View "Dept. of Human Services v. T. J. N." on Justia Law

This case concerned the parentage of a child conceived through assisted reproductive technology (ART). Jordan Schnitzer wanted to have a son. Because he was single, he planned to use his own sperm, an egg donor, and a gestational carrier. Cory Sause contributed her eggs. A gestational carrier gave birth to a boy, S. Afterward, the gestational carrier, her spouse, and Schnitzer agreed that Schnitzer—and not the gestational carrier or her spouse— was S’s intended parent, and a declaratory judgment was entered to that effect. Schnitzer and Sause, however, disagreed about whether Sause was also S’s parent and about whether Schnitzer could prevent Sause from having a relationship with S. The trial court concluded that Sause was S’s legal parent based on her undisputed genetic connection to S; a divided Court of Appeals reversed. The Oregon Supreme Court disagreed with the trial court and concluded that, in the circumstances of this case, Sause’s genetic connection to S did not establish her legal parentage of S. The Supreme Court also concluded that Sause may have contracted with Schnitzer for certain non-parental rights with respect to S. "The extent of those rights is an issue that the trial court did not reach due to its conclusion that Sause was a parent." The Supreme Court therefore reversed the trial court's judgment and remanded for further proceedings to declare the legal parentage of S and to determine the extent of Sause’s nonparental rights with respect to S. View "In re: Sause and Schnitzer" on Justia Law

At issue in this case is whether ORS 12.115(1) applied to actions in which plaintiffs allege their attorney negligently caused injury consisting solely of financial loss—here, the cost to plaintiffs of attempting to defend themselves against a claim for unpaid federal taxes and the anticipated cost of paying that tax liability. To this, the Oregon Supreme Court concluded the legislature intended the phrase “negligent injury to person or property” in ORS 12.115(1) to include negligence claims seeking to recover for the kind of injury to economic interests that plaintiffs have alleged. View "Marshall v. PricewaterhouseCoopers, LLP" on Justia Law

C.P. struck the victim on her head with a mallet, causing significant injuries. The issue on review was whether the juvenile court misconstrued the governing statute, ORS 419A.258, in ordering disclosure of confidential records in youth’s file to the victim before youth’s delinquency dispositional hearing. The Oregon Court of Appeals concluded that the victim was unable to show that disclosure was “necessary to serve a legitimate need” of the requesting party, as required by ORS 419A.258(7). The Oregon Supreme Court concluded after review of the text, context, and legislative history of ORS 419A.258 that the statute, properly construed, gave juvenile courts some discretion in weighing the interests at stake before determining whether and to what extent disclosure was necessary to serve a legitimate need of the person seeking disclosure under the circumstances of a given case. The Supreme Court rejected the Court of Appeals’ interpretation of what was necessary to serve a victim’s legitimate need and concluded that the juvenile court in this case acted within the range of discretion granted by the statute in ordering disclosure to the victim. Accordingly, the Court of Appeals' judgment was reversed and the juvenile court's order was affirmed. court. View "Oregon v. C. P." on Justia Law

The matter underlying this mandamus proceeding was a legal malpractice action brought by Plaintiff-relator Thomas Hill against his former attorney, defendant Ronald Johnson, who had represented Hill in a marriage dissolution proceeding. Hill alleged that, at the conclusion of his dissolution proceeding, Johnson signed a stipulated supplemental judgment on his behalf without his knowledge or permission. According to Hill, the stipulated supplemental judgment provided Hill’s ex-wife certain proceeds out of his pension plan that exceeded the amount to which he had previously agreed. Hill alleged that, months later, when he learned that the stipulated supplemental judgment included the disputed pension proceeds, he asked Johnson to correct it. When that was not done to Hill’s satisfaction, he hired new trial counsel, Fowler, to repair Johnson’s alleged error. Fowler moved the trial court to invalidate the supplemental judgment. The trial court denied that motion. Hill then hired appellate counsel, Daniels, to repair Johnson’s alleged error by challenging the trial court’s order on appeal. In response to Hill’s complaint, Johnson issued Hill discovery requests seeking the production of documents. Those requests sought, among other things, the complete files of Fowler and Daniels related to their representations of Hill in the dissolution matter as well as documents related to any other attorney whom Hill had contacted to represent him in the dissolution proceeding, regardless of whether Hill had retained the contacted attorney. The issue presented for the Oregon Supreme Court's review was to define one boundary to the breach-of-duty exception to attorney-client privilege. Based on the text, context, and legislative history of OEC 503(4)(c), the Court concluded the breach-of-duty exception applied only to communications between the parties directly involved in the alleged breach. The trial court therefore erred when it applied the breach-of-duty exception to communications beyond that scope. View "Hill v. Johnson" on Justia Law

Defendant Deborah Reed moved to suppress evidence resulting from a police interrogation. In her motion, defendant asserted that police officers violated Article I, section 12, of the Oregon Constitution when they interrogated her in compelling circumstances without first advising her of her Miranda rights. The trial court denied the motion, ruling that the interrogation did not occur in compelling circumstances. The case proceeded to a bench trial, and the trial court convicted defendant of multiple drug offenses. Thereafter, defendant’s probation in an earlier case was revoked based in part on the evidence resulting from the interrogation and her new convictions. Defendant appealed both the judgment of conviction and the judgment revoking her probation, challenging the trial court’s conclusion that the interrogation did not occur in compelling circumstances. The appeals were consolidated, and the Court of Appeals affirmed both judgments. After review, the Oregon Supreme Court reversed and remanded, finding the interrogation occurred in "compelling circumstances." View "Oregon v. Reed" on Justia Law