Case Title: State v. Knight

Citation: 

Docket Number: S54423

State: oregon

Court: Oregon Supreme Court

Date: 2007-12-06T00:00:00Z

Document:
FILED: December 6, 2007
IN THE SUPREME COURT OF THE STATE OF OREGON
STATE OF OREGON,
Respondent on Review,
v.
ROY NORMAN KNIGHT,
Petitioner on Review.
(CC 03023540C; CA A122440; SC S54423)
En Banc
On review from the Court of Appeals.*
Argued and submitted June 19, 2007.
Tammy W. Sun, Deputy Public Defender, Salem, argued the cause and filed the
brief for petitioner on review.  With her on the brief was Peter Gartlan, Chief Defender,
Legal Services Division, Public Defense Services.
Anna M. Joyce, Assistant Attorney General, Salem, argued the cause and filed the
brief for respondent on review.  With her on the brief were Hardy Myers, Attorney
General, and Mary H. Williams, Solicitor General.
GILLETTE, J.
The decision of the Court of Appeals and the judgment of the circuit court are
reversed.  The case is remanded to the circuit court for a new trial.  
Linder, J., dissented and filed an opinion, in which Kistler and Walters, JJ., joined.
*Appeal from Malheur County Circuit Court, J. Burdette Pratt, Judge. 209 Or App
562, 149 P3d 164 (2006).
GILLETTE, J.
In this criminal case, defendant challenges a trial court's decision to allow
the jury to hear a recording of defendant making disparaging comments about his attorney
and threatening to "sign [his] kids over to the state" if his mother did not retain a different
attorney for him.  Defendant contends that his comments about his attorney were
inadmissible under the evidence code and that allowing the jury to hear them violated his
constitutional right to counsel.  The Court of Appeals decision affirmed the trial court's
judgment.  State v. Knight, 209 Or App 562, 149 P3d 164 (2006).  We allowed
defendant's petition for review and now agree with his argument that admission of his
recorded comments was error and grounds for reversal.  Accordingly, we reverse the
decision of the Court of Appeals and the judgment of the trial court.
Defendant was charged with sexual abuse in the first degree, ORS 163.427,
and unlawful sexual penetration in the second degree, ORS 163.408.  The alleged victim
was the 13-year-old daughter of defendant's girlfriend.  At trial, the victim testified that
defendant had taken her and defendant's nine-year-old son camping; that he had arranged
to sleep with her in the back of the car -- a station wagon -- while his son slept in the front
seat; and that, during the night, defendant had put his hand down her pants and inserted
his finger into her vagina.  Defendant testified in his own defense.  Generally, defendant
presented himself as a caring person and a good father who always did his best to
accommodate the demands of his children.  He testified that (1) the victim and his son
had begged him to take them camping and he had agreed to take them because he was a
good father, kept his promises, and wanted to "do the right thing for [his] kids"; (2) both
children had wanted to sleep in the back of the car with him and that, rather than allowing
his natural biases in favor of his own child to dictate the result, he had tried to keep things
pleasant and fair by having the children resolve the dispute with a game of "odd man out"
(which the victim won); (3) he had never touched the victim and thought that she had
fabricated the sexual abuse story in order to alienate her mother and defendant so that she
could go live with her grandmother; and (4) he was a "serious parent," loved his children
"very much," wanted to fulfill the expectations of his own and his girlfriend's children
and wanted them to have good childhoods, and felt that "if you screw up your kids, you're
better off not living."  
After hearing defendant's testimony, the prosecutor announced that she
wished to impeach defendant's various statements about his love and concern for his
children by introducing a tape recording of a telephone conversation that defendant had
with his mother while he was in jail awaiting trial.  Because its admissibility was in
question, the trial court first listened to the recording out of the presence of the jury.
In the recording, defendant was trying to persuade his mother to hire a
private attorney for him, so that he would not have to go to trial with the attorney that the
court had appointed.  We quote from the recorded conversation at considerable length:  
"Defendant:  Yeah, but listen, that's not going to save my ass.  I've
got papers here to sign my kids over to the state.
"Mother:  Why's that?
"Defendant:  Because I'm preparing to go -- I am preparing myself to
go to prison because of this shit getting all fucked up.
"Mother:  Yeah.
"Defendant:  If you and Jodie cannot get me a good lawyer, I'm
going to go do my fucking time, I'm going to sign my kids over to
the State of Oregon, and you guys will never fucking see me again.
"* * * * *
"Mother:  Yeah, but Roy, we have done everything that we can.
"Defendant:  No.  No.  When I've got a different fucking lawyer,
then you've done everything you can.  If it was you, I would do
anything.
"* * * * *
"Mother:  You cannot -- you cannot let them pay the dues for all of
this, Roy.
"Defendant:  Listen, I'm not taking it out on my kids.  I'm not.  That 
-- I'm telling you what I'm going to do, and you can count on it.  If I
go to court with this fucking attorney, I'm fucked.
"* * * * *
"Mother:  I -- I have done everything.  And I told the investigator
yesterday that we'll all give testimony.
"Defendant:  Okay.  Listen.  Listen.  I don't care what you can't do.  I
don't care what you've done -- what you have done.  I'm telling you if
I go to trial with this fucking attorney, I'm signing my kids over to
the state, and I'm going to go and do my time, and then I'm going to
live in Mexico.  I am not going to live in America with a fucking sex
beef on me at 55 years old.
"Mother:  Well Roy, we're not going to go that road because that's
not going to happen.
"Defendant:  Bullshit.  That is some fucking bullshit.  I'm going to go
to jail with this motherfucker.
"Mother:  Well, Roy, I can't (INAUDIBLE) the system.
"Defendant:  No.  All I'm looking for is go find a lawyer.  I don't
give a fuck if it's goddamn Mr. Magoo and on his first case.  I'll pay
for whatever it takes when I get out of here.  I can't do anything here. 
I cannot do anything here."
Defendant went on to suggest that his mother should sign a promissory note or a lien, or
even rob a bank, to get money to hire a different lawyer for him.  He ended the
conversation by warning his mother that "if I go down for this, I'm turning my kids over
to the state." 
Upon hearing the recording, defendant's lawyer objected that "this should
not come in."  He insisted that the jury would conclude that defendant's derogatory
comments were directed at him and that it would be extremely difficult for him to
advocate for defendant in front of jurors who knew that defendant had "called [him] every
name in the book" and did not believe that he was competent.  In addition to those
concerns, defendant's lawyer concluded by arguing that "it's unfair prejudice because it
directly impedes my ability as an attorney under the Sixth Amendment to advocate on
behalf of my client." 
The trial judge then offered his own view, which was that much of the
recorded conversation was inadmissible and that the only part that was relevant was
defendant's comment "about signing his kids over to the state if she doesn't get him
another attorney."  The court indicated that it was inclined to allow the state to ask
defendant if he had made that statement, but to allow the jury to hear the recording if, and
only if, defendant denied making the statement.  
Defendant's lawyer was not satisfied with that solution.  Without agreeing
that even that limited portion was admissible, the lawyer suggested that, if defendant
denied making the statement and the state wished to use some part of the recording to
impeach him, the state should be permitted to use "a portion [that is] only about this most
recent thing, that he's going to sign the kids over to the state."  He noted that, even if there
were grounds for using some part of the tape to impeach defendant's statements, "[t]here's
no way I can be an effective advocate for my client with all that garbage on that tape." 
The prosecutor then suggested that she could "redo" the tape to include "just the
admissible stuff" and use that for impeachment.  After a fairly prolonged discussion as to
what that might mean, the court generally agreed that "if you can sanitize it [to include
only] the comments that he makes [that] are obviously admissible," the recording could be
used to impeach defendant's statements.
Thus, as we read the transcript to this point, we understand the position of
defendant, prosecution, and trial judge to be as follows:
Defendant:   The tape was irrelevant (and, therefore, inadmissible) as
impeachment on a collateral matter.  The state should not be permitted to use the tape but,
if it was, the permissible inquiry should be limited to an inquiry whether defendant made
the one statement concerning releasing custody of his children to a state agency.  Then, if
defendant denied making the statement, the recording of the statement could be used to
impeach defendant's statement in his direct testimony that he "loved his kids."  If, on the
other hand, defendant admitted making the statement, that would be the end of the matter
-- defendant's admission would obviate any need for the tape.
Prosecutor:   The prosecutor felt that she was entitled to impeach
defendant's self-serving statements respecting his love for his children and his concern for
their welfare.  The tape recording of defendant's threat to abandon his children to state
custody was one such method of impeachment; she wished to use it.  She agreed with
defendant's counsel that there were parts of the tape that were inadmissible, although she
did not specify which ones.  She was willing to prepare a redacted transcript of the tape
that would limit defendant's statements to those respecting his willingness to have his
children placed with a state agency.
The Judge:   The trial judge, having heard the entire tape, was satisfied that
significant parts of the tape were prejudicial and inadmissible.  The judge was of the
view, however, that the prosecutor was entitled to ask defendant if he had made the
statement in question.  If defendant denied doing so, the judge was prepared to admit a
limited version of defendant's statement, establishing that it had been made.
It was then that things fell apart.  After the jury returned, the prosecutor
asked defendant whether he had "threatened to turn [his children] over to the State of
Oregon if [he] didn't get [his] way."  When confronted with that question, defendant
acknowledged that he had made such a statement, but then attempted to explain.  He
stated that he believed that the state would provide his children with a "decent life," that
he did not want to impose his children on his aging mother or his sister if he went to jail,
and that it was "[t]hrough love for my children and ultimate care for my family [that] I
said that if I go to prison I will sign my children over to the state." 
At that point, the prosecutor insisted that defendant's explanation had
"opened the door" to evidence that previously had been inadmissible, and asked the
court's permission to play the entire conversation for the jury.  When the judge indicated
that he was going to grant the prosecutor's request, defendant's attorney responded:  
"Judge, there is no way that I can actively represent my client.  I
mean, you know, he's going to make statements and he's gonna fly
off and do what he wants to * * *, but if you look at [Oregon
Evidence Code Rule] 403 there is no way I can represent him now. 
Because that tape comes in, and all he's gonna do is whine and whine
and whine about his boys.  I can't effectively advocate for him under
those circumstances.  Now his decision to open this door is
incredibly unwise, but when you look at the totality of it, it's so
prejudicial, judge, that I'm denied the right of being a lawyer that he's
guaranteed by the Oregon Constitution and the Federal Constitution. 
His comments about his lawyer just take the rug out from underneath
me." 
The trial judge was not persuaded by defense counsel's concern and
suggested that defendant had only himself to blame for any diminution in his lawyer's
effectiveness.  The judge explained his position:
"[Defendant] has now testified that the reason he made those
statements [about signing over his children] was because he was
concerned about his children [and] didn't want to burden his mother. 
I think that brings in the entire tape to show the context of his
statements.  I think the tape as I heard it certainly indicates
something other than what he's just testified to, so I think that makes
the entire tape admissible.  The fact that he makes derogatory
statements about his attorney, while unfortunate, * * * -- it's
inescapable.  I don't think we can avoid that at this point because it
is admissible.  I think that the entire tape is admissible.  * * *   I
realize that it makes your job harder, but I don't think it eliminates
your ability to represent him.  And the fact is that if -- if it's harder
now for you to represent him, it's because of the things that he has
done." 
(Emphasis added.)  The trial judge thus overruled defense counsel's objection to
admission of the recorded conversation.  He also denied a motion for mistrial that defense
counsel raised when it became clear that the jury would hear the entire conversation.  
After the jury had heard the recorded conversation, defendant again
attempted to explain.  Defendant told the jury that his statements about signing his
children over to the state were "the worst thing I've ever done in my life," that he had
acted out of desperation, and that he "[couldn't] bear to live without [his] kids."  Later in
the proceeding, he suggested that the recording did not reflect his true character:  "I've
been an excellent father my entire life, for 10 years now, excellent, and with one
statement they're going to take it all away from me.  It's not fair."  In spite of his
explanations and entreaties, the jury found defendant guilty of both charges.   
Defendant appealed, arguing that allowing the jury to hear his denigrating
statements about his attorney violated OEC 401, OEC 403, and his constitutional right to
counsel under the Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution and Article I, 
section 11, of the Oregon Constitution.  The Court of Appeals rejected all of defendant's
arguments, electing to discuss only one -- defendant's contention that admission of the
statements violated OEC 403 -- in its written opinion.  With respect to that argument, the
Court of Appeals held that defendant's derogatory statements were important, because
defendant's credibility was directly at issue and the statements "illustrated to the jury that
the context of the statements about his children was different from what defendant had
portrayed in his testimony."  Knight, 209 Or App at 572.  The Court of Appeals also
accepted, with little discussion, the trial judge's view that, although admission of the
statements made trial counsel's job harder, it did not entirely "eliminate" counsel's ability
to represent defendant.  Id. at 572-73.  Ultimately, the court concluded that the recording's
potential for unfair prejudice did not outweigh its probative value, and that the trial court
had not erred in admitting it or in denying defendant's motion for a mistrial.  Id. at 573-74.
Before this court, defendant reargues that the trial court's decision to allow
the jury to hear him disparage his attorney violated OEC 403 and also violated his
constitutional rights to counsel and due process.  As is our ordinary practice, we consider
defendant's statutory argument first.  Before we turn to that argument, however, we first
must deal with a jurisprudential concern -- the state's contention that defendant's
argument, as he now formulates it, is not preserved.
The state begins with the assertion that, in his brief to this court, defendant
argues that certain of defendant's statements to his mother (specifically, four statements
that contained derogatory references to his attorney) (1) were inadmissible, but
acknowledges that other parts of the recorded conversation were admissible.  The state
argues that that particular objection (to those four statements) was not preserved because,
before the trial court, defendant's objection was directed at the recorded conversation as a
whole. The state contends that, under our usual preservation rules, the present, narrower
objection is not preserved.  The state cites State v. Brown, 310 Or 347, 359, 800 P2d 259
(1990)  (quoting Sproul v. Fossi, 274 Or 749, 755, 548 P2d 970 (1976)):"'[W]hen evidence is offered as a whole and an objection is made to
the evidence as a whole and is overruled, the trial court will
ordinarily not be reversed on appeal if any portion of the offered
evidence was properly admissible, despite the fact that other portions
would not have been admissible had proper objections been made to
such portions of the offered evidence.'"  
In our view, however, the state misunderstands defense counsel's objection
in the trial court when it suggests that the objection was directed only to the recording as a
whole.  From the beginning, defense counsel's objections to the recording were focused,
inter alia, on defendant's derogatory comments respecting the quality of counsel's
representation.  Counsel specifically mentioned the difficulty of advocating in front of
jurors who knew that defendant had "called him every name in the book."  As our earlier
summary demonstrates, the trial court initially appeared to understand and agree with
defense counsel's focus:  It suggested that the only part of the conversation that was
relevant and admissible was defendant's comment "about signing his kids over to the state
if she doesn't get him another attorney."  Later, the discussion turned to the possibility of
redacting inadmissible material from the tape and defense counsel agreed that that should
be done because "there's no way I can be an effective advocate for my client with all that
garbage on that tape."  The prosecution even offered to redact the material about which
counsel was objecting.  In that entire exchange, defense counsel clearly was referring to
defendant's derogatory comments about him.   
The state acknowledges the foregoing history, but argues that, after
defendant "explained" his statements, defense counsel abruptly changed gears, conceding
that defendant had "opened the door" to admission of the entire recording and arguing
only that he could no longer effectively advocate for his client "[b]ecause that tape comes
in."  But we do not read defense counsel's words as conceding the legal point, i.e., that
defendant had opened the door to admission of the entire recording.  Rather, we read
them as acknowledging the trial judge's announced course, viz., that he had decided to
admit the entire recording.  And, while defense counsel perhaps did concede that
defendant's explanation had opened some door, he continued to focus his objection on a
single aspect of the recorded conversation:  "His comments about his lawyer just take the
rug out from underneath me." 
What is more, it is clear that the trial judge understood defense counsel's
response as continuing his previous objection to a specific kind of statement contained in
the recording, i.e., the derogatory statements about defendant's lawyer.  The judge
explained:  "The fact that he makes derogatory statements about his attorney, while
unfortunate, * * * it's inescapable.  I don't think we can avoid that at this point because it
is admissible." 
When read in the context of the trial judge's comments, defense counsel's
prior objections, the prosecutor's remarks, and the prior discussion about editing the
recording to remove irrelevant and unfairly prejudicial material, the state's
characterization of defense counsel's last objection -- as dropping defendant's narrower
objection to admission of his derogatory statements in favor of a broad objection to the
conversation as a whole -- cannot be sustained.  Defendant's objection then was the same
objection that he is raising now. (2)  The issue is preserved.
Having disposed of that preliminary issue, we turn to the merits of
defendant's statutory argument -- that defendant's derogatory statements about his lawyer
were inadmissible under OEC 403.  OEC 403 provides:  
"Although relevant, evidence may be excluded if its probative value is
substantially outweighed by the danger of unfair prejudice, confusion of the
issues, or misleading the jury, or by considerations of undue delay or
needless presentation of cumulative evidence."
In State v. Mayfield, 302 Or 631, 645, 733 P2d 438 (1987), this court described how trial
courts should decide whether evidence is admissible under OEC 403: 
"First, the trial judge should assess the proponent's need for the * * *
evidence.  * * * In the second step the trial judge must determine
how prejudicial the evidence is, to what extent the evidence may
distract the jury from the central question whether the defendant
committed the charged crime.  The third step is the judicial process
of balancing the prosecution's need for the evidence against the
countervailing prejudicial danger of unfair prejudice, and the fourth
step is for the judge to make his or her ruling to admit all the
proponent's evidence, to exclude all the proponent's evidence or to
admit only part of the evidence."
We first consider the state's need for the evidence.  The state asserts that,
although it initially sought to put the objectionable statements in evidence to impeach
defendant's self-portrayal as a good parent, the real value of those statements, in the end,
was to impeach defendant's overall credibility.  The state contends that defendant's
credibility was an especially important issue in the case, because defendant had testified
that he had not sexually abused the victim and the jury needed to evaluate the credibility
of that testimony.  Although the trial court never specifically articulated its analysis in
those terms, it did suggest that the state was entitled to show that defendant was not
speaking truthfully when he explained to the jury his reasons for telling his mother that he
would sign his children over to the state.  Implicit in that suggestion is a conclusion that
defendant's credibility was an important issue in the case.  
We agree that, once defendant testified that he had not abused the victim,
his credibility became relevant.  And, although we are hesitant to do so, we also shall
assume -- no contrary argument having been made in this case -- that the four statements
that defendant identifies as objectionable had some relevance to that issue, insofar as they
show that defendant attempted to mislead the jury about another matter, i.e., his reason
for telling his mother that he would sign his children over to the state. (3)  In any event,
the state cannot deny that the recorded conversation impeached defendant's testimony on
an issue that was -- at best -- not central to the state's case.  Moreover, the state probably
could have obtained the desired result, i.e., impeachment, without using statements that
directly attacked defendant's lawyer.  Ultimately, the record establishes that the statements
at issue, even if they had some value to the state's case, were by no means essential. 
We turn to the second step in our OEC 403 analysis -- assessing the danger
of unfair prejudice or distraction that is inherent in the evidence at issue.  Defendant
contends, as he did in the trial court, that admitting his statements about his attorney
would be extremely prejudicial, because the jury would assume that the statements were
about trial counsel and would conclude that trial counsel was not zealously defending
defendant and that defendant believed trial counsel to be incompetent.  The trial judge
appeared to acknowledge those dangers, but he placed a fairly low value on them.  He
suggested that, because admitting the statements did not entirely "eliminate" defense
counsel's ability to advocate for defendant, and because defendant had brought the
problem on himself with his testimony, there was no real cause for concern.   The Court
of Appeals agreed with that assessment.  Knight, 209 Or App at 572-73.
The state has added its own list of reasons for downplaying the degree of
unfair prejudice involved in admitting defendant's statements about his lawyer.  The state
suggests that defendant is wrong in suggesting that jurors necessarily would infer that
defendant's comments were about trial counsel and that it is "equally possible" that the
jury would conclude that defendant's mother had acceded to defendant's demands and
hired a new attorney to represent him at trial.  The state also contends that, even if the jury
did conclude from the statements that defendant believed that trial counsel was
incompetent or that trial court was not zealously representing defendant, there was little
likelihood that that conclusion would change its ultimate decision about defendant's guilt
or innocence.  Finally, the state suggests that, "to the extent that defendant was prejudiced
[by admission of the statements], it was by his own actions."
We think that the trial court, the Court of Appeals, and the state all have
vastly underestimated the level of unfair prejudice inherent in allowing the jury to hear a
defendant make these kinds of statements about his lawyer.  First and foremost, we
emphasize that the only reasonable reading of the record is that defendant's references
were to his present lawyer.  We reject the state's argument that it somehow was "equally
possible" that the jury would believe that all of defendant's profane diatribe was directed
at some previous counsel for defendant.  This counsel was the one whom the jury saw; the
record contains no reference to any previous counsel.  
We also think that it is important to note that defendant's persistent
references to trial counsel as "this fucking attorney" and "this motherfucker" undoubtedly
focused the jury's attention on defendant's personal and professional conflict with trial
counsel -- a conflict that had no relevance to any issue before the jury.  Equally
importantly, hearing defendant's remarks inevitably affected the jury's own perception of
the competence and zealousness of defendant's trial counsel and, ultimately, of the
strength of defendant's case.  After the jury heard that defendant was unimpressed with
his lawyer's ability, his cause was sunk.  No juror thereafter was going to view defense
counsel as more credible and persuasive than the prosecuting attorney.  To put the matter
another way: Whether or not the foregoing effects entirely "eliminated" trial counsel's
ability to represent defendant, we think that it is inescapable that they did sufficient
damage to compromise defendant's constitutional right to representation and the overall
fairness of defendant's trial.  Cf. In re Ochoa, 342 Or 571, 574, 157 P3d 184 (2007)
(judge's belittling and critical comments to and about a defendant's trial counsel
jeopardized the defendant's right to a fair trial).  In short, the record shows that the
potential for unfair prejudice that attached to defendant's recorded statements was
extremely high. 
That brings us to the third step of the OEC 403 analysis -- the balancing
test.  In Mayfield, 302 Or at 647, we indicated  that "trial judges are granted broad
discretion when findings are made on the record to back up this discretionary call."  In the
present case, however, the record is sparse in that regard.  In fact, the most reasonable
reading of the record is that the trial judge did not engage in a weighing process at all, but
merely concluded that, because the recorded conversation contradicted defendant's sworn
testimony, the jury must unavoidably hear everything in the recording, including all of
defendant's derogatory remarks about his attorney.  
Notably, the Court of Appeals concluded (and the dissent agrees) that the
record was sufficient to show that the trial judge engaged in balancing and that the judge
found that the probative value of defendant's derogatory statements about his attorney was
not significantly outweighed by the danger of unfair prejudice.  However, and even if we
were to agree that the record is sufficient to suggest that the trial judge did consider the
issue, we cannot agree with the Court of Appeals (or the dissent) that the trial court's
ultimate conclusion -- that the statements' probative value was not outweighed by the
potential for unfair prejudice -- is justified by the evidence in this record.  Indeed, the
danger of unfair prejudice that attaches to a defendant's relentlessly profane and
derogatory statements about his own lawyer is so devastating to counsel's credibility and
to any defense theory that he might advance that it is difficult to imagine that such
statements could ever be sufficiently probative to tip the balance toward admissibility
under OEC 403.  Certainly, the statements at issue here, which had only modest -- if any -- value to the state's case, are not that probative.  We conclude, in other words, that, to the
extent that the trial judge exercised his discretion in the present case to weigh probative
value and unfair prejudice, his ultimate evaluation was an abuse of that discretion.   
We turn to the final step of the trial court's task under OEC 403 -- the
decision whether to admit or exclude the evidence altogether or to admit only part of it. 
Defendant contends that, if the trial court wished to permit the state to impeach
defendant's "explanation" of his statements about signing his children over to the state, it
should have redacted the recorded conversation to exclude the statements that explicitly
refer to defendant's lawyer in a derogatory way.  He contends that excluding those
statements would not have significantly reduced the recording's value to impeach
defendant's prior testimony because, after redacting the statements that disparaged
defense counsel, it still would contain statements showing defendant's real reason for
threatening to sign away his children (to induce his mother to hire an attorney for him).  
As noted, the state argues that defendant did not preserve any claim that
part, but not all, of the recorded conversation was inadmissible.  We already have rejected
that argument.  ___ Or at ___ (slip op at 11-13).  The state also contends that defendant's
suggested redaction would render harmless any error in admitting the four derogatory
statements that he focuses on.  The state is wrong.  On the scale of unfair prejudice, there
is a world of difference between a criminal defendant's statement that he needs "a good
lawyer" and a statement that he would be "fucked" if he went to trial with "this fucking
lawyer."     
We conclude that the trial court abused its discretion, and therefore erred in
failing to exclude defendant's derogatory statements about his attorney under OEC
403. (4)  Because that error was prejudicial and grounds for reversal, we need not
consider defendant's alternative constitutional claims.
The decision of the Court of Appeals and the judgment of the circuit court
are reversed.  The case is remanded to the circuit court for a new trial.
LINDER, J., dissenting.
It will come as a surprise to the trial judge in this case to learn that he erred
by failing to redact from the recorded conversation the four statements that the majority
sets out in footnote 1 of its opinion.  ___ Or at ___ n 1 (slip op at 10 n 1).  The Court of
Appeals will be equally surprised.  Until defendant filed his petition for review with this
court, defendant did not identify those four statements as ones that could be and should be
selectively removed from the recording to reduce any prejudice to his defense. 
Defendant's objection, instead, ran to the entire recording.  Defense counsel argued that
there was a "huge amount of stuff" and "a lot of inadmissible material" in the recording
that would reflect his client's bad opinion of him.  Defense counsel identified one, and
only one, way to redact the recording to make it less objectionable -- by playing "a portion
only" in which defendant had said he was "going to sign the kids over to the state."  In
defense counsel's view, the jurors should "just hear that."  If they heard the rest, the "ball
game" was over -- he could not be an effective advocate for his client "with all that
garbage" on the recording.
The majority, by its holding in this case, makes it the trial court's
responsibility to sort through the garbage to decide what is admissible and what is not. 
That traditionally has not been, and should not be, a trial court's responsibility.  If
evidence is admissible in part and inadmissible in part, a party may not object to it as a
whole; instead, an objecting party must identify with particularity the inadmissible parts. 
See, e.g., State v. Brown, 310 Or 347, 358-59, 800 P2d 259 (1990) (objecting party has
the responsibility of segregating inadmissible portions of testimony from admissible
ones); Brown v. J. C. Penney Co., 297 Or 695, 704-05, 688 P2d 811 (1984) (same rule for
exhibits).  The majority does not quarrel with that settled principle.  Remarkably,
however, the majority finds it satisfied here.  It does so because defense counsel asserted,
as his reason for objecting to the entire recording, that the recording contained derogatory
statements that would make it difficult for him to advocate for his client.  ___ Or at ___
(slip op at 11).  From that much, without more, the majority asserts that it has "every
confidence" that the trial court knew defense counsel wanted four specific statements
redacted from the recording and defense counsel did not need to identify them with any
particularity.  ___ Or at ___ n 2 (slip op at 13 n 2).
I respectfully disagree.  In my view, the record supports neither half of the
majority's confident assertion -- it does not support that defendant wanted four specific
statements redacted from the recording; it does not support that the trial court would have
understood that.  Defendant's recorded conversation with his mother was replete with
statements reflecting his dissatisfaction with his lawyer and his insistence that his mother
hire a different lawyer for him.  Some of the statements reflected defendant's
dissatisfaction directly (e.g., by calling his counsel a "motherfucker").  Others reflected
his dissatisfaction indirectly (e.g., by demanding that his mother get him a "good
lawyer").  But in the context of the recording as a whole, the statements all had the same
flavor, and defense counsel's objection encompassed them all when he argued that the
recording contained a "huge amount" of derogatory statements and was full of "all that
garbage."  Defense counsel's obvious point was that the recording was infused with
objectionable statements.  The trial court expressly agreed.  As a result, when the issue of
the recording's admissibility first arose, the trial court ruled that no part of the recording
would be admitted, except for the one portion in which defendant said he would
relinquish custody of his kids to the state, which would be admissible if defendant denied
making the statement. 
In effect, at that point, the trial court agreed with defendant that all but a
small portion of the recording was more prejudicial than probative, and would not be
admitted.  There was no reason, given that ruling, for defendant to urge that the rest
should be admitted only if some or all of defendant's statements about his lawyer were
redacted.  There was no reason, as well, for the trial court to consider redacting any of the
remainder of the recording.  In fact, defense counsel did not so argue, and the trial court
never considered the possibility of redacting any particular derogatory statements.  Later,
when defendant admitted making the statement and went on to give an explanation for
why he said it, one that the recorded conversation flatly belies, defense counsel agreed
that the explanation opened the door to the admission of the entire conversation, which
revealed defendant's real reason for making the threat.  If defense counsel had in mind
that the trial court should redact specific derogatory statements, defense counsel logically
would have voiced any proposal to redact them at that time.  But defense counsel did not
do so.  Instead, as the quotation set forth in the majority opinion reveals, defense counsel
argued only that he could not effectively advocate for his client if "that tape comes in"
because "the totality of it" made it too prejudicial.  ___ Or at ___ (slip op at 7).  For the
trial court and the parties the issue of the recording's admissibility at that point was an all
or nothing proposition.  Defense counsel objected to the entire recording because of the
derogatory statements it contained; defense counsel never suggested that there was a way
to cure or minimize the prejudice by redacting those statements. (5) 
Now, for the first time on review in this court, defendant argues that four of
his statements should have been redacted from the recording, and the state then could
have been permitted to impeach his testimony with the rest.  Aided by a written
transcription of the recording that was prepared for the appeal (but was not available at
trial), defendant proposes that four of the statements that directly attack his trial counsel's
competence could have been redacted from the recording, and the indirect attacks could
remain so that the recording retains some evidentiary value. (6)  At trial, however, no
such proposal was ever made.  There was no written transcript that anyone could dissect
with surgical precision; the trial court and the parties had only the oral recording, which
was played once outside of the presence of the jury so that the trial court could rule on
defendant's motion.  No one parsed the conversation or defendant's statements the way
that the appeal has permitted.  The record simply provides no basis to conclude, as the
majority does with "every confidence," that the trial court understood that defense counsel
wanted the court to redact the four specific statements defendant identifies in his briefing
to this court.
The issue properly before us, therefore, is not whether the trial court should
have redacted the four statements from the recording before admitting it.  Rather, the
issue properly before us is the same one that the trial court and the Court of Appeals were
asked to decide -- whether the trial court abused its discretion in concluding that the
recorded conversation as a whole, which included the derogatory statements, was more
probative than prejudicial under OEC 403. (7) 
In making that OEC 403 assessment, the trial court did not err.  As a
starting point, it is worth remembering (as the majority notes as well) that trial courts are
granted broad discretion in performing the necessary balancing under OEC 403, as long
as they make findings to back up their discretionary call.  State v. Mayfield, 302 Or 631,
647, 733 P2d 438 (1987).  This case well illustrates the importance of the deference we
give to a trial court's superior position to make the assessment that OEC 403 requires.
The first factor in the OEC balancing -- the relevancy of the evidence -- is
readily satisfied.  See Mayfield, 302 Or at 645 (identifying test).  This was purely a
credibility dispute:  everything turned on whether the jury believed the victim or
defendant.  Defendant offered the jury only one reason to believe him -- at great length
and in great detail, he portrayed himself as a devoted, ethical, and sacrificing parent who
would never do anything to harm his kids or those of his live-in girlfriend (i.e., the
victim).  That defense made it relevant for the state to show that defendant was willing to
callously relinquish his kids to state custody.  When asked whether he made the
statement, defendant readily admitted it and then, without prompting by his counsel,
insisted on explaining why.  The recording, by showing the context in which the
statement was made, revealed the actual reason -- i.e., defendant told his mother explicitly
that he would sign his children over to the state as a way of punishing her if she did not
somehow hire a different attorney for him, despite her financial inability to do so.  From
the recording, the jury could conclude that the explanation defendant gave on the stand
and under oath was a blatant lie, but one that continued defendant's self-portrayal as a
saint-like father and family man -- i.e., he could not burden his aging mother or his sister
with the care of his children, and he was willing to turn them over to the state solely out
of love for them and for the rest of his family.  The fact that his real reason was extortion
and self-interest directly impeached defendant on an issue he had made central to his
defense.  The recording was, for that reason, directly and powerfully relevant.
The second OEC 403 inquiry is the danger of "unfair prejudice" inherent in
the evidence.  Mayfield, 302 Or at 645.  The majority, based on its reading of the record,
concludes that the trial court placed a low value on the fact that defendant's derogatory
statements might impair defense counsel's ability to represent his client effectively.  I
disagree.  To the contrary, the trial court recognized the danger, and said so expressly. 
Because of that danger, the trial court initially ruled that the recording could not come in
at all, except for the limited portion in which defendant said he would relinquish custody
of his kids to the state (and then, only if defendant denied making the statement).  The
trial court admitted the evidence only after defendant insisted on giving an explanation to
the jury that directly furthered his defense and that was, point blank, directly contradicted
by the recording.  In doing so, the trial court expressly found that defendant had brought
the problem on himself, a finding that has direct bearing on the degree to which any
prejudice inherent in the derogatory statements was "unfair."
The majority says little about defendant's role in bringing on the problem
himself.  The trial court's finding takes on particular significance, however, when viewed
in the broader context of defendant's pretrial conduct before the same trial judge. 
Defendant's trial counsel was not the first attorney appointed to represent him.  Months
before the trial, his first counsel moved to withdraw because of defendant's unhappiness
with his representation.  The trial court was not initially satisfied that defendant had
articulated an adequate basis for the court to give him substitute counsel.  Defendant's
first counsel, however, asked to be heard on the matter.  After explaining that he was
usually resilient in the face of such motions, he could not personally look past "some of
the things that [defendant] has said both in telephone calls to his family and [in] letters
regarding my abilities."  Because of defendant's statements, defense counsel feared that
he would not zealously represent defendant and that defendant's case would be
prejudiced.  Counsel's representations in that regard convinced the trial court that counsel
should be permitted to withdraw.
In the months that followed, defendant persistently tried to remove the next
attorney appointed for him and have the court appoint one that he had identified as
acceptable to him.  The trial court repeatedly emphasized to defendant that he was entitled
to competent counsel at public expense, not to an attorney of his choosing.  Although
defendant's second counsel (his eventual trial counsel) asked to withdraw because his
client lacked confidence in him, the trial court denied the motion and advised defendant
that the court was not going to continue appointing attorneys for defendant until
defendant finally found one that he would accept.  Sometime between that admonition
and the scheduled trial date, defendant spoke with his mother from jail to coerce and
intimidate her into retaining an attorney for him.  As he had with his first attorney,
defendant criticized and insulted his appointed counsel's abilities in highly derogatory
terms.  The recording of the conversation was the one that would later be the source of
controversy at trial.
By the morning of trial, defendant's mother had retained an attorney to
represent defendant, one that defendant approved of, but who would take the case only if
the trial was continued.  Defendant's second counsel moved for a continuance.  He also
moved to withdraw, both because of defendant's desire to be represented by retained
counsel and because defendant and his family had made serious accusations of dishonesty
against counsel.  The trial court denied the motions for a continuance and for withdrawal
of counsel.  Defendant responded by explaining that he "desperately" needed retained
counsel to represent him and that he could not go to trial with the appointed second
counsel.  Despite defendant's protestations, and within moments of them, the trial began.
Thus, when defendant took the stand, he had nothing to lose and possibly,
in his mind, had everything to gain by admitting that he was willing to give custody of his
kids to the state, and then giving an explanation that was flatly contradicted by the
recording.  On the one hand, if he got away with the contradiction, it bolstered his
defense.  On the other, if the state introduced the entire recording to impeach him, the
prejudice of his derogatory statements might well work to his benefit.  Those kinds of
statements had, after all, caused the trial court to permit his first attorney to withdraw;
defendant was "desperate," after all, not to go to trial with his second appointed counsel.
Again, one of the reasons for giving trial courts broad discretion in applying
the OEC 403 balancing test is that they are in the better position to make the exact kind of
assessment that the trial court made in this case.  The derogatory statements that
defendant made about his attorney may have had some tendency to reduce the jury's 
opinion of defense counsel's skills. (8)   But the trial court was in an excellent position
to assess the degree to which defendant brought on that prejudice through his own
conduct and choices.  The trial court's finding that defendant did so should weigh heavily
in the calculus, especially on this record.
The third step of the OEC 403 analysis requires balancing the probative
value versus the prejudicial effect of the proffered evidence.  Mayfield, 302 Or at 645. 
The majority largely dismisses the trial court's assessment, stating that "the most
reasonable reading of the record is that the trial judge did not engage in a weighing
process at all" and, instead, "merely concluded" that the jury "must unavoidably hear
everything in the recording[.]"  ___ Or at ___ (slip op at 17).  The majority's analysis is
constructed on a false premise.  Again, the issue of redaction of select statements was
never presented to the trial court.  Defense counsel's objection was to the entire recording,
because the derogatory statements were so pervasive and numerous.  The trial court,
confronted with an all or nothing choice to make, struck the balance accordingly.  The
trial court did not abdicate its responsibility to make the needed assessment.
That leaves only the fourth and final step under OEC 403 -- for the trial
court to make a ruling to admit all or part of the proponent's evidence.  Mayfield, 302 Or
at 645.  Because defendant did not preserve an argument that the recording was
admissible if four of the derogatory statements were removed, the trial court properly
considered only whether to admit the recording in toto.  In making its OEC 403 ruling,
the trial court correctly exercised sound discretion and did not err.
I would affirm defendant's conviction and the decision of the Court of
Appeals.  I therefore respectfully dissent.
Kistler, J., and Walters, J., join in this dissent.
1. The statements are:
(1)  "When I've got a different fucking lawyer, then you've done
everything you can."
(2)  "If I go to court with this fucking attorney, I'm fucked."
(3)  "I'm telling you that if I go to trial with this fucking attorney, I'm
signing my kids over to the state, and I'm going to go and do my time, and
then I'm going to live in Mexico.  I am not going to live in America with a
fucking sex beef on me at 55 years old.
(4)  "I'm going to go to jail with this motherfucker."
2. To the extent that the state is arguing that defendant's objection in the trial court
was insufficient to preserve his present objection because it was couched in terms of a
category of statements (derogatory statements about defendant's lawyer) rather than a
specific identification of the objectionable statements, we are unpersuaded.  The concept
of a "derogatory statement" is a simple one and we have every confidence that the trial
judge understood what defense counsel intended, even without a particularized
identification of the objectionable statements.     
3. Our hesitation is due to the fact that, seen in retrospect, it appears to us that
defendant's self-serving statement was a collateral matter as to which no impeachment
should have been permitted at all.  The alleged victim in this case was not one of
defendant's children.  Thus, whether or not defendant loved his own children was a red
herring.  Certainly, the tape was not independently relevant in the state's case.  
See State v. Gibson, 338 Or 560, 572, 113 P3d 423, 429, cert den, 546 US 1044 (2005) (witness
may not be impeached with respect to collateral matters, i.e., facts that have no
independent relevance to the issues in the case).
4. We emphasize that our ruling is based on a statutory source of law -- the Oregon
Evidence Code.  We do not consider or rely upon either the Oregon or the federal
constitution.
5. There are two reasons why the subject of redacting the derogatory statements may
never have come up.  First, as I have already described, no one suggested that some
statements could be distinguished from others, so that only four had to be removed. 
Redacting them all, however, likely would have removed so much of the substance and
context of the conversation as to render the recording inaccurate.  See State v. Harberts,
315 Or 408, 417-18, 848 P2d 1187 (1993) (redaction of inadmissible matters from
otherwise relevant evidence may be permitted if the meaning of what remains is not
significantly altered).  Second, the record suggests significant doubt whether such
redaction of the conversation at the sentence or phrase level was possible.  After the
prosecutor offered to make an altered recording containing only the portion of defendant's
statements about relinquishing custody of his kids, the prosecutor asked for clarification
of her task.  She asked what she was expected to do with, for example, defendant's
statement, "If you don't get me a new attorney, I'm going to sign over the kids."  She
explained that it was hard to break up the recording to delete part of a statement like that. 
The trial court acknowledged the difficulty and told the prosecutor she did not have to
sanitize it completely; the court was asking her only to extract the portion about signing
over the kids from the rest of the conversation.  Defense counsel took no issue with the
prosecutor's comments about the difficulty of redacting highly select portions of the
recording.
6. With the direct attacks on defendant's counsel removed, the other statements
become much more benign -- they appear to be mere requests for a lawyer, rather than
requests for a different lawyer.  For example, the recording would still contain:  (1)
defendant's threat to give custody of his kids to the state if his mother and girlfriend
"cannot get me a good lawyer;" (2) his statement that he just wants to find a lawyer and
doesn't care if it is "Mr. Magoo and on his first case;" and (3) his acknowledgment that
the investigator on the case was on his side, but the investigator was not a lawyer.  It is
the written transcript, however, that makes it possible, on careful examination, to find a
way to leave some statements in, while removing others.
7. Significantly, defendant did not on appeal give the Court of Appeals the benefit of
the same list of objectionable statements.  Indeed, out of the 13 pages of argument in
defendant's Court of Appeals brief, defendant's entire argument on redaction was a single
sentence in which defendant urged that his statements expressing his opinion about his
counsel's competence "could have been redacted without changing the import of
defendant's remarks about his children."  Defendant was nonspecific and did not identify
the four statements that he has enumerated in his briefing to this court.  Defendant
therefore failed to preserve the redaction issue in two ways:  by not making that argument
to the trial court and by not presenting that issue to the Court of Appeals.  
See State v. Wyatt, 331 Or 335, 341-47, 15 P3d 22 (2000) (court will not consider an issue not
preserved before the trial court); Tarwater v. Cupp, 304 Or 639, 644-45, 644 n 5, 748 P2d
125 (1988) (a petitioner in this court cannot shift or change position on review and argue
or raise an issue that was not before the Court of Appeals).
8. I am far less confident of that conclusion than the majority is.  It seems equally or
more probable that the jurors, who can observe the attorneys and their skills throughout
the trial, will make and trust their own judgments about the abilities of the defense
counsel and the prosecutor (and, for that matter, the trial court).  For present purposes,
however, I accept that the statements pose some danger of prejudice, albeit difficult to
quantify.