State v. Partain

239 P.3d 232, 349 Or. 10, 2010 Ore. LEXIS 654
CourtOregon Supreme Court
DecidedSeptember 10, 2010
DocketCC 03P3038; CA A132336; SC S057581
StatusPublished
Cited by25 cases

This text of 239 P.3d 232 (State v. Partain) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Oregon Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
State v. Partain, 239 P.3d 232, 349 Or. 10, 2010 Ore. LEXIS 654 (Or. 2010).

Opinions

[12]*12GILLETTE, J.

This case concerns the propriety of a 600-month prison sentence imposed on a defendant in a sex abuse case, after the Court of Appeals had vacated the 420-month sentence that the trial court originally had imposed. On defendant’s appeal from the second sentence, the Court of Appeals reversed, holding that the trial court had violated the rule announced by this court in State v. Turner, 247 Or 301, 313, 429 P2d 565 (1967) — that, when a defendant is retried after a successful appeal of his or her conviction, the court in the second proceeding may not impose a harsher sentence than had been imposed in the original proceeding. State v. Partain, 228 Or App 329, 208 P3d 526 (2009). Before this court, the state argues that the rule from Turner either does not apply to the circumstances of this case or, in any event, should be abandoned in favor of a rule that permits imposition of a longer sentence on remand if the trial court is able to justify that sentence on nonvindictive grounds. We agree with the state that Turner should be abandoned. We also accept a version of the test that the state proposes, but we conclude that the question whether that test has been met requires further development of the record. We therefore affirm the decision of the Court of Appeals to remand the case to the trial court.

In 2003, defendant was convicted of multiple sex crimes — 12 in all — in a single proceeding. At sentencing, the trial court imposed various sentences and ordered that certain of the sentences be served consecutively to others. Altogether, the sentences required defendant to serve 420 months in prison. The judgment stated, with respect to each sentence, that defendant would not be eligible for any sentence reduction program.

Defendant appealed, arguing (1) that the trial court had erred in requiring that defendant serve the sentences imposed on four of the convictions consecutively to certain other sentences, and (2) that, with respect to the same four sentences, the trial court had erred in denying defendant eligibility for sentence reduction programs without making certain findings in open court that, under ORS 137.750, are required when sentences are so limited. At some point in the appeal, the state conceded error with respect to defendant’s [13]*13second argument, and joined with defendant in a motion to vacate the erroneous sentences and to remand the entire case for resentencing. The Court of Appeals granted the motion.

On remand, no new evidence or information was placed on the record. In entering its sentence on remand, the trial court discharged the four sentences that had been the focus of defendant’s appeal, but structured the remaining sentences in a way that resulted in an overall term of 600 months in prison. The court did not state any reasons for imposing the lengthier overall sentence.

Defendant appealed again, this time arguing that, because the total sentence imposed on remand was longer than the total sentence imposed in the original proceeding, the sentence violated the “no harsher sentence” rule of Turner (described more fully below, 349 Or at 15-16). Because Turner was a case involving a retrial rather than a resentencing, defendant also relied on a Court of Appeals decision — State v. Stockman, 43 Or App 235, 603 P2d 363 (1979) — that held that the Turner rule applied when a case was remanded after a successful appellate challenge to a sentence on grounds other than excessiveness. The state responded that the rules of Turner and Stockman have been legislatively superseded by a 1993 amendment to ORS 138.222(5)(a), which provides that, when a case is remanded because of a sentencing error, the sentencing court “may impose a new sentence for any conviction in the remanded case.” Or Laws 1993, ch 692, § 2(5). The state also suggested that Turner was directed only at sentences that are imposed by a court to punish a defendant for seeking appellate review and that, in this case, the new sentences were based solely on the abhorrent nature of the crimes.

The Court of Appeals rejected the state’s contention that the legislature impliedly repealed Turner and Stockman when it later amended ORS 138.222(5)(a). Partain, 228 Or App at 335. The court also rejected the state’s suggestion that Turner prohibits harsher sentences on remand only when the sentencing court’s motivation was to punish the defendant for appealing: It observed that, in Turner, this court explicitly described the rule as a prophylactic one, adopted to avoid the difficult task of determining a trial court’s motives. Id. at [14]*14335-36 (quoting Turner, 247 Or at 314). Ultimately, the Court of Appeals concluded that, under this court’s decision in Turner and its own decision in Stockman, the trial court had erred in imposing a greater total sentence on remand. Partain, 228 Or App at 336. We allowed the state’s petition for review.

The state argues that the Court of Appeals erred on two grounds: (1) the court failed to recognize that the Turner “no harsher sentence” rule is limited to cases in which the defendant has been retried after successfully challenging his or her conviction, and does not apply when a defendant is before a trial court solely for resentencing after successfully challenging the lawfulness of the original sentence-, and (2) the court also failed to recognize that, in light of certain changes in Oregon’s sentencing laws, the Turner rule is no longer viable. Both of those arguments call for a close examination of the Turner case, a task to which we now turn.

The defendant in Turner was convicted of assault and initially received a five-year sentence. He successfully appealed his conviction and the case was remanded for a new trial. In the second trial, defendant was convicted again, but this time the trial judge sentenced him to seven years in prison — two years more than the original trial court had imposed. The defendant appealed, arguing that the trial court could not constitutionally impose a longer prison sentence than the one imposed in the original trial.

In its opinion in Turner, the court described its overall methodology for analyzing the issue in terms of “weighting] the public interest in being protected from persons found guilty of crimes and the individual’s interest in exercising rights guaranteed him by constitution, statute or judicial decision.” 247 Or at 312. The court identified the individual defendant’s interest in terms of the statutory right of appeal, and it concluded that permitting a trial court to impose a more severe sentence after a successful appeal would have a “chilling effect” on a defendant’s exercise of that right. Id. at 313. The court did not, however, explain its reasoning or identify any source of law for the balancing approach that it adopted.

The court in Turner then considered the public interest at issue, i.e., an interest in allowing trial courts to impose [15]

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

Related

State v. Marks
347 Or. App. 199 (Court of Appeals of Oregon, 2026)
State v. McNutt
326 Or. App. 93 (Court of Appeals of Oregon, 2023)
Brown v. GlaxoSmithKline, LLC
523 P.3d 132 (Court of Appeals of Oregon, 2022)
State of West Virginia v. Nicholas Varlas
West Virginia Supreme Court, 2020
State v. Lobue
453 P.3d 929 (Court of Appeals of Oregon, 2019)
State v. Worth
452 P.3d 1041 (Court of Appeals of Oregon, 2019)
State v. Allen
432 P.3d 250 (Court of Appeals of Oregon, 2018)
State v. Sierra
399 P.3d 987 (Oregon Supreme Court, 2017)
Febuary v. State of Oregon
396 P.3d 894 (Oregon Supreme Court, 2017)
State v. Silver
391 P.3d 962 (Court of Appeals of Oregon, 2017)
State v. Robledo
386 P.3d 136 (Court of Appeals of Oregon, 2016)
State v. Criswell
386 P.3d 58 (Court of Appeals of Oregon, 2016)
State v. Bradley
383 P.3d 937 (Court of Appeals of Oregon, 2016)
Lake Oswego Preservation Society v. City of Lake Oswego
379 P.3d 462 (Oregon Supreme Court, 2016)
State v. Sierra
374 P.3d 952 (Marion County Circuit Court, Oregon, 2016)
State v. Zolotoff
365 P.3d 131 (Court of Appeals of Oregon, 2015)
State v. Febuary
361 P.3d 661 (Court of Appeals of Oregon, 2015)
State Of Washington v. Clifton Kelly Bell
Court of Appeals of Washington, 2013
State v. Young
266 P.3d 135 (Court of Appeals of Oregon, 2011)
State v. Simonson
259 P.3d 962 (Court of Appeals of Oregon, 2011)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
239 P.3d 232, 349 Or. 10, 2010 Ore. LEXIS 654, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/state-v-partain-or-2010.