Title: State v. Flores-Montecinos

State: maine

Issuer: Maine Supreme Court

Document:

MAINE SUPREME JUDICIAL COURT 
Reporter of Decisions 
Decision: 
2017 ME 120 
Docket: 
Pen-16-359 
Submitted 
On Briefs: May 25, 2017 
Decided: 
June 15, 2017 
 
Panel: 
SAUFLEY, C.J., and ALEXANDER, GORMAN, JABAR, HJELM, and HUMPHREY, JJ. 
 
 
STATE OF MAINE 
 
v. 
 
FRANCO A. FLORES-MONTECINOS 
 
 
PER CURIAM 
[¶1]  Franco A. Flores-Montecinos appeals from a judgment convicting 
him of theft by unauthorized taking or transfer (Class E), 17-A M.R.S. 
§ 353(1)(A) (2016), entered by the trial court (Penobscot County, A. Murray, 
J.) after a jury trial.  For the first time in this case, Flores-Montecinos 
challenges the constitutionality of 17-A M.R.S. § 361-A(2) (2016), which, in 
pertinent part, creates a permissible inference, see M.R. Evid. 303, that a 
defendant engaged in the conduct that constitutes the crime of theft by 
unauthorized taking or transfer if the State proves beyond a reasonable doubt 
that the defendant “concealed unpurchased property stored, offered or 
exposed for sale while the defendant was still on the premises of the place 
where it was stored, offered or exposed.”  We affirm. 
 
2 
[¶2]  Contrary to Flores-Montecinos’s argument, section 361-A(2) is 
sufficiently clear to give an ordinary person adequate notice of the type of 
conduct that gives rise to the permissible inference of the specified elements 
of theft.1  See State v. Reckards, 2015 ME 31, ¶¶ 4-5, 113 A.3d 589; see also 
State v. Preston, 2011 ME 98, ¶ 7, 26 A.3d 850 (stating that an unpreserved 
vagueness challenge to a statute is reviewed only for obvious error). 
[¶3]  Flores-Montecinos’s remaining contention that section 361-A(2) is 
subject to, and fails to survive, strict scrutiny is not persuasive.  See United 
States v. Jenkins, 909 F. Supp. 2d 758, 776 (E.D. Ky. 2012) (“[C]riminal statutes 
are not per se subject to strict scrutiny.”); see also Chapman v. United States, 
500 U.S. 453, 464-65 (1991) (reflecting the general principle that the 
constitutional protections inherent in criminal process are sufficient to 
protect a defendant’s liberty interest, and so, unless a criminal statute 
implicates some other fundamental right, only rational basis review is 
required).   
                                         
1  Although Flores-Montecinos attempts to make an argument that because of the alleged 
vagueness in 17-A M.R.S. § 361-A(2) (2016), his arrest, prosecution, or conviction may have been 
ethnically motivated, there is nothing in the record to support that contention.  We caution that in 
the future, if a party has concerns about improper conduct motivated by race, ethnicity, or some 
other protected status, that party should develop a proper record and raise those concerns during 
the trial court proceedings. 
 
3 
The entry is: 
Judgment affirmed. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Rory A. McNamara, Esq., Drake Law, LLC, Berwick, for appellant Franco A. 
Flores-Montecinos 
 
R. Christopher Almy, District Attorney, and Tracy Collins, Asst. Dist. Atty., 
Prosecutorial District V, Bangor, for appellee State of Maine 
 
 
Penobscot County Unified Criminal Docket docket number CR-2016-76 
FOR CLERK REFERENCE ONLY