Title: Oregon v. Rogers

State: oregon

Issuer: Oregon Supreme Court

Document:

No. 44	
November 12, 2021	
695
IN THE SUPREME COURT OF THE
STATE OF OREGON
STATE OF OREGON,
Plaintiff-Respondent,
v.
DAYTON LEROY ROGERS,
Defendant-Appellant.
(CC CR8800355, CR8800356, CR8800357, 
CR8800358, CR8800359, CR8800360)
(SC S063700)
On automatic and direct review of the sentence of death 
imposed by the Clackamas County Circuit Court.
Thomas Rastetter, Judge.
Argued and submitted March 5, 2021.
Ryan T. O’Connor, O’Connor Weber LLC, Portland, and 
Richard L. Wolf, Richard Wolf PC, Portland, argued the 
cause and filed the briefs for appellant.
Dayton Leroy Rogers filed the supplemental brief pro se.
David B. Thompson, Assistant Attorney General, Salem, 
argued the cause and filed the brief for respondent. Also 
on the brief were Ellen F. Rosenblum, Attorney General, 
Benjamin Gutman, Solicitor General, and Colm Moore, 
Assistant Attorney General.
Karen A. Steele, Salem, and Frank E. Stoller, Dundee, 
filed the brief for amicus curiae Marco Montez.
Karen A. Steele, Salem, filed the brief for amici curiae 
Randy Lee Guzek and Robert Paul Langley, Jr.
Bert Dupré and Kenneth A. Kreuscher, Portland, and 
Mark A. Larrañaga, Seattle, filed the brief for amicus curiae 
Michael Martin McDonnell.
696	
State v. Rogers
Before Walters, Chief Justice, and Nakamoto, Flynn, 
Duncan, Nelson, and Garrett, Justices, and Durham, Senior 
Judge, Justice pro tempore.*
NELSON, J.
The sentence of death is vacated, and the case is remanded 
to the circuit court for resentencing.
______________
	
*  Balmer, J., did not participate in the consideration or decision of this case.
Cite as 368 Or 695 (2021)	
697
	
NELSON, J.
	
In 1989, defendant was found guilty of multiple 
counts of aggravated murder in six consolidated cases and 
sentenced to death. In his initial appeal, we affirmed his 
convictions but reversed his death sentences and remanded 
for resentencing. State v. Rogers, 313 Or 356, 836 P2d 1308 
(1992) (Rogers I). We have reversed sentences of death in 
this case and remanded for resentencing on two subsequent 
occasions, most recently in 2012. See State v. Rogers, 330 Or 
282, 4 P3d 1261 (2000) (Rogers II); State v. Rogers, 352 Or 
510, 288 P3d 544 (2012) (Rogers III). In his fourth penalty-
phase trial, in 2015, defendant again received a sentence 
of death in each of the consolidated cases. This is an auto­
matic and direct review of those sentences. ORS 138.052(1). 
For the reasons set out below, we reverse defendant’s sen­
tences of death and remand this case to the trial court for 
resentencing.
	
We described much of the relevant factual and pro­
cedural background in one of the prior appeals:
	
“Over a period of time in 1987, police discovered the 
bodies of seven women in the Molalla Forest. The State 
Medical Examiner determined that each of the women had 
been stabbed or cut with a sharp object. When the bod­
ies were discovered, defendant was in police custody as 
a suspect in the killing of another woman, Smith. Smith 
had died from multiple stab wounds. Smith and the seven 
women buried in the Molalla Forest were prostitutes. The 
facts surrounding the Molalla Forest killings shared other 
similarities with those surrounding the Smith killing. 
During the investigation of the Molalla Forest killings, 
defendant was convicted of aggravated murder for killing 
Smith, but he was not sentenced to death.
	
“In May 1989, defendant was found guilty of 13 counts of 
aggravated murder arising out of six of the Molalla Forest 
killings.”
Rogers II, 330 Or at 284 (footnote omitted). We explained the 
breakdown of those charges as follows:
“Defendant was charged in a separate indictment for each 
victim. In each indictment, he was charged with one count 
of aggravated murder in the course of torturing the victim, 
698	
State v. Rogers
ORS 163.095(1)(e) [(1987)], and aggravated felony murder in 
the course of kidnapping, ORS 163.095(2)(d) [(1987)]; ORS 
163.115(1)(b)(E) and (F) [(1987)]. In one indictment, defen­
dant was charged with a third count of aggravated murder 
for murder in the course of sexual abuse. ORS 163.095(2)(d) 
[(1987)]; ORS 163.115(1)(b)(H) [(1987)].”
Rogers II, 330 Or at 284 n  2. As noted, those convictions 
were affirmed by this court in Rogers I. This appeal con­
cerns the death sentences that were imposed in defendant’s 
fourth penalty-phase trial in 2015.
	
On appeal to this court, defendant filed an open­
ing brief challenging his death sentences on numerous 
grounds.1 While briefing in this case was ongoing, the legis­
lature enacted Senate Bill (SB) 1013 (2019), which made sig­
nificant changes to Oregon’s death penalty statutes. After 
SB 1013 took effect, defendant filed a supplemental opening 
brief raising additional assignments of error relating to the 
effect of SB 1013 on this case. In part, defendant’s supple­
mental brief incorporated by reference arguments about the 
effect of SB 1013 that were made in State v. Bartol, 368 Or 
598, ___ P3d ___ (2021). In its answering brief, the state 
incorporated by reference the arguments that it had made 
in its supplemental briefs in Bartol.
	
In Bartol, this court addressed a constitutional 
challenge by a defendant to his death sentence in light of SB 
1013. There, we explained that,
“[p]rior to the enactment of SB 1013 in 2019, Oregon had 
two categories of murder: ‘murder’ and ‘aggravated mur­
der.’ ‘Murder’ was defined to include certain forms of crim­
inal homicide, ORS 163.115(1) (2013), amended by Or Laws 
2019, ch 635, § 4, and ‘aggravated murder’ was defined as 
‘ 
“murder” * 
* 
* committed under, or accompanied by,’ any 
one of 12 enumerated aggravating circumstances, ORS 
163.095 (2013), amended by Or Laws 2019, ch  635, §  1. 
Thus, prior to SB 1013, murder committed under or accom­
panied by any one of 12 aggravating circumstances could 
result in a death sentence. ORS 163.105(1)(a) (2013); Or 
Const, Art I, § 40.
	
1  Portions of defendant’s brief appear to renew prior challenges to his convic­
tions. We reject any challenge to the guilt phase without further discussion. 
Cite as 368 Or 695 (2021)	
699
	
“SB 1013 changed that. It created a new category of mur­
der, ‘murder in the first degree’; reclassified all the forms 
of murder that previously had been ‘aggravated murder’ as 
‘murder in the first degree’; and provided a maximum sen­
tence of life imprisonment without the possibility of parole 
for ‘murder in the first degree.’ Or Laws 2019, ch 635, §§ 1, 
3(1), (2). Thus, SB 1013 eliminated the death penalty for all 
the forms of murder that had previously been eligible for it, 
including the form that defendant had committed—murder 
committed when confined to a penal or correctional facility 
or otherwise in custody.”
368 Or at 601. Although SB 1013 retained the death penalty 
for narrower classes of conduct, none of the narrowed defini­
tions applied in Bartol. Id. at 625.
	
SB 1013 had the same effect in this case. Defendant’s 
convictions rest on three theories of aggravated murder. The 
first is that each murder “occurred in the course of or as a 
result of intentional maiming or torture of the victim.” ORS 
163.095(1)(e) (1987). The second and third theories were 
that defendant “personally and intentionally committed” 
the murders in the course of committing or attempting to 
commit kidnapping or first-degree sexual abuse. See ORS 
163.095(2)(d) (1987); ORS 163.115(1)(b)(E), (F), (H) (1987). SB 
1013 reclassified all of those theories of aggravated murder 
as first-degree murder. See Or Laws 2019, ch 635, §§ 1, 3; 
ORS 163.107(1)(e), (j). The conduct that defendant was found 
guilty of committing is no longer classified as aggravated 
murder, and it is no longer punishable by death. See ORS 
163.107(2)(b) (providing that the maximum penalty for first-
degree murder is life imprisonment without the possibility 
of parole).
	
As we explained in Bartol, that circumstance gives 
rise to a violation of the requirement, found in Article I, sec­
tion 16, of the Oregon Constitution, that “all penalties shall 
be proportioned to the offense.”2 “The basic proportionality 
	
2  In Bartol, the state argued that the defendant’s Article I, section 16, chal­
lenge was barred by Article I, section 40, which provides that, “[n]otwithstanding 
sections 15 and 16 of this Article, the penalty for aggravated murder as defined by 
law shall be death upon unanimous affirmative jury findings as provided by law 
and otherwise shall be life imprisonment with minimum sentence as provided 
by law.” We explained in Bartol that “the only challenges to the death penalty 
that Article I, section 40, bars are those that are entirely incompatible with the 
700	
State v. Rogers
concept that the gravity of an offense should correspond to 
the severity of the punishment gives rise to special rules for 
the death penalty.” Bartol, 368 Or at 621. That is because 
death is “ 
‘an unusually severe punishment, unusual in its 
pain, in its finality, and in its enormity.’ 
” Id. at 622 (quoting 
Furman v. Georgia, 408 US 238, 287, 92 S Ct 2726, 33 L Ed
2d 346 (1972) (Brennan, J., concurring)). As a result, the 
proportionality requirement of Article I, section 16, entails 
that “the death penalty must be reserved for the ‘worst of 
crimes,’ and that there must be a ‘fundamental, moral dis­
tinction’ between crimes that are punishable by death and 
those that are not.” Bartol, 368 Or at 623 (quoting Kennedy 
v. Louisiana, 554 US 407, 438, 446-47, 128 S Ct 2641, 171
L Ed 2d 525 (2008) (internal citations omitted)).
	
In Bartol, we held that,
“[a]lthough the legislature did not make SB 1013 retroac­
tive as to sentences imposed before its effective date, the 
enactment of the bill itself reflects a judgment that conduct 
that was previously classified as ‘aggravated murder’ does 
not fall within the narrow category of conduct that can be 
punished by death, as opposed to lesser sentences, includ­
ing life imprisonment.”
368 Or at 625. We reached that conclusion because SB 1013 
applies only to sentencings that occur after its effective date, 
regardless of when the crime was committed. Or Laws 2019, 
ch  635, §  30. As we explained in Bartol, “[t]hat provision 
shows that the legislature did not regard conduct commit­
ted before the effective date as more culpable than conduct 
committed after it.” 368 Or at 624.
	
That “creates a proportionality problem: It allows 
the execution of persons whose conduct the legislature has 
determined is not the worst of the worst and whose culpabil­
ity is no different from those who cannot be executed.” Id. at 
624 (emphases in original). For example,
“if two persons jointly engaged in conduct that was previ­
ously classified as ‘aggravated murder’ but is now classi­
fied as ‘murder in the first degree,’ and the first person was 
death penalty as a punishment for aggravated murder as a general matter.” 368 
Or at 612. The proportionality argument at issue here is not such a challenge. 

Id. at 613.
Cite as 368 Or 695 (2021)	
701
sentenced before SB 1013’s effective date but the second 
person was sentenced after that date, the first person could 
be sentenced to death, but the second person could not.”
Id. The result is that “whether a person who committed con­
duct that was previously classified as ‘aggravated murder’ 
but is now classified as ‘murder in the first degree’ can be 
sentenced to death depends on the person’s sentencing date, 
not on the relative gravity of the conduct.” Id.
	
That different treatment—of persons whose con­
duct the legislature has now determined does not differ in 
a way that justifies death—violates Article I, section 16. As 
we explained in Bartol, leaving the defendant’s death sen­
tence in place would “violate two special proportionality 
requirements that, under Article I, section 16, apply to the 
death penalty” in that
“[m]aintaining his death sentence would allow the execu­
tion of a person for conduct that the legislature has deter­
mined no longer justifies that unique and ultimate pun­
ishment, and it would allow the execution of a person for 
conduct that the legislature has determined is no more cul­
pable than conduct that should not result in death.”
Id. We therefore vacated the defendant’s death sentence and 
remanded the case for resentencing. Id. at 624-25.
	
The death sentences that were imposed in this 
case violate Article I, section 16, for the same reason. As 
in Bartol, we reverse the sentence of death and remand for 
resentencing. ORS 138.052(2)(a). That disposition, combined 
with the fact that defendant cannot be sentenced to death 
on remand, means that we do not need to address any of 
defendant’s other challenges to his sentence.
	
The sentence of death is vacated, and the case is 
remanded to the circuit court for resentencing.