by Mark Wilson
On September 25, 2019, a federal jury in Oregon ordered Multnomah County jail officials to pay $125,000 to a deaf man for refusing to accommodate his disability while he was in custody.
David Updike, 52, was born deaf and communicates through American Sign Language (ASL). He never ...
by Mark Wilson
The Oregon Court of Appeals held on July 31, 2019 that first-class mail is insufficient to allow a mailing date to serve as the filing date for a notice of appeal.
The timely filing of a notice of appeal is a jurisdictional prerequisite for an appeal under ...
by Mark Wilson
Michael Barton was sentenced to a six-year prison term by the Jackson County Circuit Court in April 2017, for second-degree robbery of a bank. Surveillance video immediately called his mental state into question when it showed Barton waiting politely while bank employees not only collected the ...
by Mark Wilson
On July 22, 2019, Oregon joined 22 other states and the District of Columbia in eliminating life without parole sentences for prisoners who committed their offenses as juveniles. The state enacted quite possibly the most progressive and broad juvenile justice reforms in the nation, ending the state’s ...
by Mark Wilson
In a case of first impression, the Oregon Court of Appeals held that entering a passcode into a smartphone is testimonial in nature and subject to the self-incrimination protections of Article I, § 12 of the Oregon Constitution and the Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution. ...
by Mark Wilson
The Oregon Court of Appeals reversed a first-degree failure to appear conviction, finding that the release agreement allowed for an appearance through counsel rather than personal appearance.
Zachary Michael Lobue was detained in jail when the State of Oregon charged him with possession of a stolen vehicle ...
by Mark Wilson
The Oregon Court of Appeals held on March 13, 2019 that a prisoner was guilty of the crime of identity theft because he used the personal identification numbers (PINs) of two other prisoners to access a jail telephone.
Michael Steven Connolly was confined at the Multnomah County ...
by Mark Wilson
An Oregon state court held on May 28, 2019 that prison officials were deliberately indifferent to a transgender prisoner’s physical safety when they failed to house her in a single cell or with other transgender or non-cisgender (gender non-conforming) cellmates.
Brandy Hall, 34, formerly known as Brandon ...
by Mark Wilson
The Oregon Court of Appeals reversed a trial court’s order revoking a criminal defendant’s probation, finding that the trial court abused its discretion.
Amanda DeeAnne Cooper pleaded guilty to four Oregon felonies and was sentenced to five years’ probation. The conditions of probation required her to participate ...
by Mark Wilson
In a 4-to-3 ruling, departing from its previous recent decisions, the Oregon Supreme Court held on May 23, 2019 that secretly recording a prisoner’s solicitation of another prisoner to kill two witnesses and assault a prosecutor in his pending criminal case did not violate his constitutional right ...
