Title: State v. Schwab
Citation: N/A
Docket Number: S058555
State: Oregon
Issuer: Oregon Supreme Court
Date: September 16, 2010

FILED: September 16, 2010
IN THE SUPREME COURT OF THE STATE OF OREGON
STATE OF OREGON,
Respondent on Review,
v.
CYNTHIA LYNN SCHWAB,
Petitioner on Review.
(CC 07C50644; CA
A139336; SC S058555)
En Banc
On petition for review filed on June 16, 2010;*
considered and under advisement on August 18, 2010.
Jedediah Peterson, Deputy Public Defender,
Salem, filed the petition for petitioner on review.  With him on the petition
was Peter Gartlan, Chief Defender, Office of Public Defense Services.
No appearance contra.
PER CURIAM
The petition for review is denied.
Kistler, J., concurred and filed an opinion, in
which Gillette, J., joined.
*Appeal from Marion County Circuit Court, Mary Mertens James, Judge. 234 Or App 43, 227 P3d 1182 (2010).
PER CURIAM
The petition for review is denied.
KISTLER, J., concurring.
The court today
denies the petition for review in this case.  I concur in that disposition but
write separately to note an unpreserved problem with an instruction that, in
some counties, is being given with increasing frequency.
In this case,
defendant possessed 2.48 ounces of marijuana.  Some of the marijuana was
packaged in a way that, as an officer later testified, suggested defendant
possessed the marijuana with the intent to transfer or sell it.  The state
charged defendant with delivery, and the trial court instructed the jury:
"Under Oregon law,
possession with intent to deliver constitutes delivery, even where no actual
transfer is shown.  An attempted transfer occurs when a person intentionally
engages in conduct which constitutes a substantial step and includes, but [is]
not limited to, possession of a large amount of a controlled substance, not for
personal use, but consistent, instead, with trafficking in controlled
substances."
The second sentence of the trial court's
instruction told the jury that, if it found that defendant possessed "a
large amount of a controlled substance, not for personal use, but consistent,
instead, with trafficking in controlled substances," then an attempted
transfer had occurred.
In my view, that
part of the instruction improperly converted a permissible factual inference
into a mandatory finding.  To be sure, if a jury finds that a defendant
possessed a larger amount of a controlled substance than a person ordinarily
would possess for personal use, then the jury may but is not required to infer
that the defendant possessed the controlled substance with the intent to sell
or transfer it.(1) 
A judge, however, may not instruct a jury that it must draw that inference. 
The United States Supreme Court held over 30 years ago that such an instruction
would violate the Due Process Clause.  See Sandstrom v. Montana, 442 US
510, 513, 523-24, 99 S Ct 2450, 61 L Ed 2d 39 (1979) (holding that the instruction
that "[t]he law presumes that a person intends the ordinary consequences
of his voluntary acts" violates due process).
In this case,
defendant objected to the trial court's instruction on a different ground, and
the Court of Appeals correctly resolved the objection that defendant raised.  See
State v. Schwab, 234 Or App 43, 48-49, 227 P3d 1182 (2010) (rejecting
defendant's argument that the trial court's instruction failed to require
indicia of trafficking other than possession of a large amount of a controlled
substance).  For that reason, I concur in the court's denial of defendant's
petition for review.  It is important to recognize, however, that the Court of
Appeals decision in this case and our denial of review are limited to the
objection that defendant raised.  Neither the Court of Appeals decision nor our
denial of review should be read as giving unqualified approval to the trial
court's instruction.
Gillette, J., joins in this opinion.
1. The
strength of the inference varies with the amount of the controlled substance
possessed.  When the amount of a controlled substance that a defendant
possesses is only slightly more than a person ordinarily would possess for
personal use, other evidence of the defendant's intent may be necessary to
permit a reasonable juror to infer that the defendant possessed the substance
with intent to deliver.  Conversely, when a person possesses a substantially
larger amount of a controlled substance than ordinarily would be possessed for
personal use, no other evidence may be necessary to permit a reasonable juror
to infer that the defendant possessed the substance with intent to deliver.