Justia Oregon Supreme Court Opinion Summaries

The primary question in this case was whether a workplace injury that Plaintiff Nancy Petock characterized as an aggravation or worsening of an earlier compensable injury can give rise to a new three-year period in which she could demand reinstatement or reemployment. The trial court held that it could not and granted Defendant Asante's (dba Asante Health System) summary judgment motion. Although the Court of Appeals agreed with the trial court that an aggravation of an earlier injury cannot give rise to new reinstatement rights, it concluded that there was a disputed issue of fact as to whether Plaintiff had sustained a "new and separate injury" in 2005 that would give rise to those rights, and remanded the case. On review, Plaintiff argued that the Court of Appeals erred in holding that an aggravation of an earlier injury cannot give rise to a right to reinstatement under ORS 659A.043 or a right to reemployment under ORS 659A.046. Though the Supreme Court disagreed with some of the appellate court's reasoning, it affirmed the decision to reverse the trial court for further proceedings: "Even if defendant were correct that the same facts cannot give rise to an aggravation claim and a compensable injury claim (a proposition with which [the Court] noted our disagreement), [the Court] fail[ed] to see the relevance of that proposition in the context of defendant's summary judgment motion. On this record, Plaintiff was free to argue that her 2005 injury was a compensable injury." View "Petock v. Asante" on Justia Law

Plaintiffs Ursula White, Bruce Reiter and Margaret Retz, one retired member and two active members of the Public Employees Retirement System (PERS) challenged certain actions of the Public Employees Retirement Board (PERB) alleging that those actions violated PERB's fiduciary duty to manages PERS for the benefit of PERS members. Specifically, Plaintiffs alleged that PERB breached its duty when it settled "City of Eugene v. Oregon." Respondent PERB argued that it settled that case pursuant to the "PERS Reform and Stabilization Act of 2003" and by court order, and was consistent with it's charged fiduciary duties. The trial court entered judgment in favor of PERB, and Plaintiffs appealed. The Court of Appeals certified the appeal to the Supreme Court, which concluded that there were disputed factual issues with respect to one of the Plaintiffs' claims, and that the trial court erred in granting judgment in PERB's favor. The Court reversed that part of the trial court opinion directed at that Plaintiff, and remanded the case. View "White v. Public Employees Retirement Board" on Justia Law

In 2004, Defendant Nicholas Rainoldi was convicted of first degree forgery and identity theft, and was sentenced to 24 months' probation. On the judgment, the trial judge wrote "misd. treat. on completion of probation." Defendant completed probation in May 2006. Several months later, Defendant attempted to purchase a shotgun from a gun show. As part of that transaction, Defendant completed the background check form indicating he had never been convicted of a felony. Based on the background check, Defendant's application to purchase the gun was denied. Two police officers were at the gun show, and cited Defendant for attempted unlawful purchase of a firearm and attempted felon in possession of a firearm. The State then charged Defendant by information with those offenses, alleging Defendant "knowingly" attempted to purchase an "intentionally" attempted to own a firearm. The issue on appeal before the Supreme Court was whether Oregon law requires proof that Defendant knew he had been convicted of a felony before he possessed or attempted to possess a firearm. The Court of Appeals held that Oregon law requires proof of such knowledge, and that the trial court erred in failing the deliver a jury instruction to that effect. The Supreme Court disagreed, finding the legislature clearly intended to dispense with the culpable mental state requirement as to the element that a defendant "has been convicted of a felony." Accordingly, the Court concluded that the trial court did not err in denying Defendant's request for an instruction that it could not convict unless it found he knew he was a felon at the time he attempted to purchase the gun. View "Oregon v. Rainoldi" on Justia Law

Petitioners Fred Girod, Rod Monroe, David Schamp, Cary Johnson, Hobart Kytr and Steven Fick sought review of the Attorney General's certified ballot title for Initiative Petition 21 (2012), arguing that the ballot title did not satisfy the requirements of ORS 250.035(2). Initiative Petition 21 would amend a number of statutory provisions pertaining to the commercial harvest and sale of salmon from the Oregon portion of the Columbia River. In this case, the Supreme Court found that in stating that the measure "may affect Columbia River Compact, tribal fishing rights, and fishing management agreements," it merely speculated that there was a possibility that the measure may affect the various laws and agreements listed in entirely unspecified ways. A possibility that enactment of a measure may produce unspecified consequences is not an "effect" within the meaning of ORS 250.035(2)(d). The summary therefore did not substantially comply with the statutory requirement to state the "effect" of the measure, and, for that additional reason, the Court held that ballot title must be referred back to the Attorney General for modification. View "Girod v. Kroger" on Justia Law

A jury awarded the Estate of Jesse Williams (the Williams estate) compensatory damages and $79.5 million in punitive damages for Philip Morris, Inc.'s (Philip Morris) fraud and negligence leading to the smoking-related lung cancer death of Jesse Williams. After over a decade of appeals, during which the case has been before this court multiple times, the punitive damages award now has been affirmed. Philip Morris has paid the compensatory damages and part of the punitive damages to the Williams estate, but has refused to pay the 60 percent of the jury's punitive damages award that is allocated to the state under Oregon's split recovery statute. The state and the Williams estate have sought to force Philip Morris to pay that 60 percent share, either to the state, as the statute directs, or alternatively, to the Williams estate. The trial court ruled that the state had released its claim to those punitive damages in a settlement agreement in another action, and that the Williams estate also has no right to the portion of the punitive damages award allocated to the state under the statute. The state and the Williams estate appealed that ruling to the Court of Appeals, which certified the appeal to the Supreme Court. Upon review, the Supreme Court held that state's statutory right to a share of punitive damages is not a "released claim," as that term is defined in the settlement agreement in the other action, and therefore, the state did not release its right to pursue payment of its statutory interest in 60 percent of the underlying case's punitive damages award when it settled that other action. The Court therefore reversed the trial court and remanded the case for further proceedings. View "Williams v. RJ Reynolds Tobacco Company" on Justia Law

This matter came to the Supreme Court on a "request" that it enforce, on its own motion, an alternative writ of mandamus that it previously issued in connection with Defendant Gary Haugen's death-warrant proceeding. After that writ issued, the Court determined that it had been complied with, and then sua sponte dismissed it. The request to enforce the dismissed writ was premised on an assertion that the trial court did not comply with the writ. The trial court held a hearing on whether to issue the death warrant. Defendant was represented by two lawyers, but before the hearing, Defendant made clear he wanted to represent himself and waive all future challenges to his conviction and sentence. Defense counsel objected, believing Defendant not competent to be executed. The trial court then asked Defendant a series of questions to evaluate his competency. Finding Defendant competent, his counsel was withdrawn but placed on "standby." After validly waiving his rights, the trial judge issued the death warrant and set a date for Defendant's execution. The Oregon Capital Resource Center (OCRC) attempted to participate by filing a writ of mandamus contending that the trial court discharged Defendant's counsel and issued a death warrant without a sufficient inquiry into Defendant's competence. Upon review, the Supreme Court concluded that OCRC had not made the necessary showing that it had any legal authority to bring the proceeding on Defendant's behalf. Furthermore, however, Defendant's former lawyers had authority to challenge Defendant's competency to discharge them. Finding no error in the trial judge's inquiry as to Defendant's competence to represent himself, the Court denied OCRC's request and affirmed the trial court's judgment. View "Oregon v. Haugen" on Justia Law

Petitioner Marco Montez sought review of an appellate court decision that denied him post-conviction relief. The post-conviction court had rejected Petitioner's claim that he received ineffective assistance of counsel during the penalty phase retrial proceeding that resulted in him receiving the death penalty. In his petition for reconsideration, Petitioner contended that one of the Justices on the Supreme Court should not have participated in the decision to deny review of the appellate court's decision. Petitioner pointed out that the Justice in question served on the Court of Appeals at the time of his appeal, and that the then-judge recused himself from considering Petitioner's appeal. Though the record in this case provided no explanation for the judge's decision to recuse himself from considering Petitioner's post-conviction appeal at the Court of Appeals, the Judge/Justice recused himself from the Supreme Court's review of Petitioner's appeal. As such, the Court concluded that Petitioner's arguments about the Justice's previous participation in the Court's decision to deny review was made moot. The Court subsequently allowed Petitioner's petition for reconsideration. View "Montez v. Czerniak" on Justia Law

Petitioners Gail Rasmussen and Bethanne Darby sought review of the Attorney General's certified ballot title for Initiative Petition 18 (2012). If approved by the voters, Initiative Petition 18 would enact a prohibition on the imposition of any state or local estate tax, inheritance tax, tax on property transferred in connection with a person's death, or tax on the transfer of property between family members. The proposed measure would supersede current statutes that imposed those taxes, and it would exclude from its prohibition certain statutes that imposed fees relating to attendant transactions following a person's death. Petitioners argued that the certified "yes" and "no" vote result statements did not comply with the applicable statutory standards. Upon review, the Supreme Court found that indeed the certified statements were inaccurate, and the Court "invited" the Attorney General to address and correct the problems with the narrative. View "Rasmussen v. Kroger" on Justia Law

Pursuant to ORS 742.061, Plaintiffs Zidell Marine Corporation petitioned to recover attorney fees that they incurred for the preparation of appeals before both the Court of Appeals and Supreme Court. Defendant Lloyds of London contended that as a result of a 2005 amendment to the statute, Zidell could not recover fees incurred after the effective date of the amendment. In the alternative, Lloyds argued that Zidell was only entitled to fees for work it did to establish Lloyds had a duty to defend, or that the billing records Zidell submitted did not support its request for fees. Upon review of the applicable legal authority, as well as the billing records and the Lloyds insurance contract, the Supreme Court held that Zidell could recover the attorney fees in incurred to establish Lloyds' duty to defend and for the preparation of the fee petition. View "ZRZ Realty v. Beneficial Fire and Casualty Ins." on Justia Law

Two cases involving ORS 135.747 were consolidated in this opinion. In the first case, the State charged Defendant Vladmir Glushko with one count of attempt to elude, one count of reckless driving and one count of driving under the influence (DUI). Defendant pled not guilty, but entered a diversion agreement as to the DUI charge. The court received notice that Defendant failed to attend a "victim impact panel" as a part of his diversion program. Subsequently, Defendant was ordered to court to "show cause" as to why his diversion should not be revoked. Defendant failed to appear at the show cause hearing, and accordingly, the court revoked the diversion and issued a warrant for Defendant's arrest. In the second case, Defendant Harold Little was cited for DUI and ordered to appear for arraignment. Defendant appeared, and at that time, the court entered a release order which required Defendant to appear one week later. Defendant failed to appear and the court issued a warrant for his arrest. Both Defendants appealed, arguing that the trial courts erred in denying their respective motions to dismiss. Both argued that under ORS 135.747 whether or not they were deprived of their statutory right to a speedy trial "hinged" on the delay between the dates the courts issued arrest warrants and the dates the warrants were executed. This delay would be grounds for dismissal of the charges against them. The appellate court affirmed both cases without opinion. The issue before the Supreme Court was whether Defendants' failures to appear at scheduled hearings was "consent" to delay as used in the statute, and if not, whether the delay was reasonable nonetheless. Upon review, the Court concluded that although Defendants did not consent to the delays that occurred in their cases as a result of their failures to appeal, the delays were reasonable. The trial courts therefore did not err in denying Defendants' motions to dismiss on statutory speedy trial grounds. View "Oregon v. Glushko" on Justia Law