Title: State v. Woodman
Citation: N/A
Docket Number: S51920
State: Oregon
Issuer: Oregon Supreme Court
Date: June 22, 2006

FILED: June 22, 2006
IN THE SUPREME COURT OF THE STATE OF OREGON
STATE OF OREGON,
v.
JEREMY LEONARD WOODMAN,
Petitioner on Review.
(C01061305; CA A120532; SC S51920)

En Banc


On review from the Court of Appeals.*


Argued and submitted June 23, 2005.


Robin A. Jones, Senior Deputy Public Defender, Salem, argued
the cause and filed the brief for petitioner on review.  With her
on the brief were Peter A. Ozanne, Executive Director, Office of
Public Defense Services, and Peter Gartlan, Chief Defender.


David J. Amesbury, Assistant Attorney General, Salem, argued
the cause and filed the brief for respondent on review.  With him
on the brief were Hardy Myers, Attorney General, and Mary H.
Williams, Solicitor General.

BALMER, J.



The decision of the Court of Appeals is affirmed.  The
judgment of the circuit court is reversed, and the case is
remanded to the circuit court for further proceedings.

*Appeal from Linn County Circuit Court, Rick J. McCormick, Judge.
195 Or App 385, 97 P3d 1263 (2004).

BALMER, J.

This criminal case presents two issues:  (1) whether
the trial court erred in ordering a new trial based on juror
affidavits, and (2) whether the trial court's jury instructions
as to the mental state required to convict defendant of murder
were erroneous.  

A jury convicted defendant of murder.  Defendant moved
for a new trial and submitted affidavits from two jurors to
demonstrate that the jurors were confused about the law when they
convicted defendant.  The trial court granted a new trial based
on the juror affidavits.  The state appealed that decision, and
defendant cross-appealed, asserting that there had been an error
in the trial court's jury instructions.  The Court of Appeals
concluded that the trial court had erred in granting a new trial
and that it had not erred in its jury instructions.  Accordingly,
it reversed the judgment and ordered the trial court to reinstate
the jury verdict.  State v. Woodman, 195 Or App 385, 97 P3d 1263 (2004).  

We allowed review and, for the reasons that follow,
affirm the decision of the Court of Appeals.

FACTS

The facts relating to the murder were disputed at
trial.  Because the jury found defendant guilty, we state the
facts in a manner consistent with that verdict, noting that the
jury could have found defendant guilty based on this version of
the facts or on other evidence that we discuss below, including
statements by defendant.  Defendant was physically and
emotionally abused as a child.  An adult (Hauck, the victim in
this case) offered defendant respite from that abuse, but then
sexually abused him.  Several years later, as an adult, defendant
struggled with methamphetamine addiction and returned to Hauck's
home for a short time.  During his stay with Hauck, defendant
discovered videotapes of Hauck engaging in sexual acts with a
number of young boys, including defendant as a boy.  Defendant
threatened to reveal the existence of the videotapes unless Hauck
gave him a large sum of money, but Hauck refused and threatened
to kill defendant if he exposed Hauck's sexual abuse. 



After that confrontation, defendant left Hauck's home.
Shortly thereafter, Hauck contacted defendant and told him to
retrieve his belongings.  Defendant was afraid of Hauck and asked
a friend, Yancey, to accompany him.  When they arrived at Hauck's
home, defendant instructed Yancey to wait in Hauck's garage while
he retrieved his belongings.  A short time later, defendant
entered the garage and informed Yancey that he was going to "lie
down" with Hauck.  Defendant asked Yancey to wait in the living
room for him.  Yancey did so, and, after approximately an hour,
Yancey heard defendant and Hauck arguing in the bedroom.  Yancey
also heard "a loud thud and a bang" before he heard defendant
scream for help.  Fearful for defendant's safety, Yancey took a
crowbar from Hauck's garage and entered the bedroom where
defendant and Hauck were arguing. 

 Yancey saw defendant sitting
on the floor, looking as if he had been "roughed up."



Until Yancey entered the bedroom, Hauck apparently had
been unaware of Yancey's presence in his home.  Hauck demanded to
know who Yancey was and then attacked him.  Yancey yelled for
defendant to help him, but defendant, apparently dazed from his
injuries, remained sitting on the floor.  Eventually, while
Yancey and Hauck were fighting, defendant went to the kitchen and
brought back a knife.  He slid the knife across the floor to
Yancey.  Hauck reached the knife first and threatened Yancey with
it, but Yancey was able to kick the knife out of Hauck's hand. 
Hauck and Yancey then struggled for the knife, and, at some point
during that struggle, Yancey grabbed the knife and stabbed Hauck
in the back and neck. 



Hauck fell to the floor and did not move again.  At
that point, defendant left the room and returned with a heavy
pipe.  While Hauck was lying on the ground, defendant struck
Hauck with the pipe several times on the head.  Hauck died of
wounds to his head, neck, and chest.  Defendant and Yancey fled
the scene in Hauck's vehicle.  Defendant later used Hauck's
credit cards and pawned some of Hauck's jewelry. (1)



The police arrested both defendant and Yancey in
connection with Hauck's death.  Defendant initially told the
police that he had acted alone, but the physical evidence in the
case suggested that at least two people had been involved.  The
physical evidence was inconclusive as to whether Hauck had died
from knife wounds or from blunt force trauma.  The state
ultimately charged both Yancey and defendant with aggravated
murder for Hauck's death.

PROCEEDINGS BELOW

Defendant and Yancey were tried jointly before a jury. 
At trial, the state argued that both defendant and Yancey were
guilty of aggravated murder for personally and intentionally
killing Hauck during the course of a robbery.  The state argued
in the alternative that defendant and Yancey were guilty of the
lesser-included offense of intentional murder.  Yancey, but not
defendant, testified at trial.


The jury acquitted Yancey, but it found defendant
guilty of the lesser-included offense of intentional murder. 
After the judgment was entered, two jurors contacted defendant's
lawyer to relate concerns regarding the jury deliberations in the
case.  Defendant's lawyer asked the court for permission to
contact other jurors, but the court denied that request. 
Defendant's lawyer then prepared affidavits stating the concerns
that the two jurors had expressed, and those jurors signed them. 
Based on those affidavits, defendant's lawyer moved for a new
trial under ORCP 64 B. (2)

The trial court considered defendant's motion for a new
trial, which was based on the affidavits and testimony 

from the
two jurors.  Both jurors indicated that 10 out of the 12 jurors
had believed that Yancey had acted in self-defense and had
acquitted him on that ground.  Both jurors also reported that the
jury had failed to understand that they could not convict
defendant of intentional murder under an aiding-and-abetting
theory if they also found that Yancey was not guilty of murder
based on self-defense. (3)

Following the hearing, the trial court issued an order
granting defendant a new trial.  In that order, the trial court
described the basis of its ruling:

According to the trial court, the "irregularity in the
proceedings" under ORCP 64 B(1) was juror confusion.  The trial
court found that the verdict also was "against law" under ORCP 64
B(5) on the ground that defendant could not be guilty of
intentional murder under an aiding-and-abetting theory because
the jury had found that the only person whom defendant could have
aided and abetted, Yancey, was not guilty of murder (on a theory
that Yancey had acted in self-defense). (4)



The state appealed, arguing that the trial court
impermissibly had relied on the jurors' affidavits and testimony
in deciding to grant defendant a new trial.  Defendant cross-appealed, arguing that the trial court had erred by refusing a
jury instruction that defendant had requested on the definition
of intent.

The Court of Appeals agreed with the state that the
trial court had erred in granting defendant a new trial.  The
Court of Appeals also rejected defendant's argument on cross-appeal that the trial court had erred by refusing to give
defendant's requested jury instruction.  In light of those
conclusions, the Court of Appeals vacated the trial court's order
and remanded with instructions for the trial court to reinstate
the judgment on the jury's verdict.  Woodman, 195 Or App at 395. 
We allowed defendant's petition for review.

ANALYSIS



Defendant argues that the Court of Appeals erred by
vacating the trial court's order for a new trial.  Specifically,
defendant argues that (1) the trial court correctly had
considered the jurors' affidavits in making its ORCP 64 B
rulings; (2) even if the trial court had erred by considering the
jurors' affidavits, other sufficient evidence existed to support
the trial court's ORCP 64 B rulings; and (3) the trial court had
erred by refusing to give defendant's requested jury instruction
on the meaning of intent.

As a preliminary matter, we reject defendant's second
argument -- that, even without the jurors' affidavits and
testimony about the reasoning underlying the verdict, other
sufficient evidence existed to support the trial court's ORCP 64
B ruling.  The jury verdict finding defendant guilty of murder
and the jury verdict finding Yancey not guilty were both general
verdicts, and, as described above, the evidence at trial could
have supported those verdicts under several different theories.
Thus, the only evidence before the trial court when it ruled on
defendant's motion for a new trial that even tended to show that
the jury had acquitted Yancey under a self-defense theory and had
convicted defendant under an aiding-and-abetting theory was the
jurors' affidavits and testimony.  For that reason, the critical
issue respecting this aspect of the case is whether the trial
court properly considered those affidavits and testimony in
making its ORCP 64 B rulings.

As we explain below, we agree with the Court of
Appeals' ultimate conclusion that the trial court's consideration
of the juror affidavits was improper.  However, we affirm the
Court of Appeals' ORCP 64 B(1) ruling on somewhat different
grounds and take this opportunity to clarify the use of juror
affidavits in motions for a new trial under ORCP 64 B(1) and ORCP
64 B(5).

ORCP 64 B, which we have quoted in full above, allows a
judgment to be set aside if one of the circumstances identified
in the rule "materially affect[ed] the substantial rights of [a]
party."  Here, the trial court granted a new trial under the
following two subsections of ORCP 64 B:

"* * * * *


"(5) Insufficiency of the evidence to justify the
verdict or other decision, or that it is against law."



In addressing the trial court's ORCP 64 B(1) ruling,
the Court of Appeals held that, "[r]egardless of the role that
juror affidavits and testimony played in the trial court's
decision * * *," juror confusion does not constitute an
"[i]rregularity in the proceedings" that justifies impeaching a
jury verdict.  Woodman, 195 Or App at 391.  In support of that
conclusion, the Court of Appeals cited Whisnant v. Holland, 206
Or 392, 292 P2d 1087 (1956), and Ore. Cas. R. R. Co. v. Ore. S.
Nav. Co., 3 Or 178 (Mult Co Cir Ct 1869), along with several of
its own decisions.

Although, as noted, we agree with the Court of Appeals
that the trial court should not have granted defendant's motion
for a new trial under ORCP 64 B(1), we disagree with the Court of
Appeals' statement, quoted above, that Whisnant and Ore. Cas.
R. R. Co. stand for the proposition that juror confusion never
may constitute an "[i]rregularity in the proceedings" within the
meaning of ORCP 64 B(1).  That proposition might be correct, but
it does not find support in the cases cited, and it is not
necessary to adopt such a rule in this case.  Instead, as
explained below, those cases stand for the more basic proposition
-- which is dispositive here -- that juror affidavits are
inadmissible to establish the jury's mental processes in reaching
a verdict, including any confusion that the jurors may have
experienced during their deliberations.

In Whisnant, the jury asked the bailiff to transmit a
request to the trial court for further instructions on
negligence.  The bailiff apparently did not convey the jury's
request fully to the trial judge, and the trial court did not
instruct the jury further.  On review, the plaintiff argued that
she was entitled to a new trial because the jury instructions
were confusing and because the bailiff had neglected to inform
the trial court of the jury's request for clarification.  In
support of her argument, the plaintiff submitted juror affidavits
attesting to the jury's confusion.  

In addressing the plaintiff's assignment of error, this
court first explained that "[t]he rule is well-established in
this jurisdiction that affidavits of jurors may not be received
to impeach their verdict.  This includes attempted impeachment of
a verdict based upon a juror's misunderstanding of the
instructions of the trial court or his mistake as to the
evidence."  Whisnant, 206 Or at 396 (citations omitted).  After
explaining that it would not consider the juror affidavits for
that reason, this court then addressed the merits of the
plaintiff's argument by examining the jury instruction that the
trial court had submitted and by considering whether the
bailiff's failure to pass along the jury's request for
clarification had constituted prejudicial error.  This court then
made its legal ruling on the merits based solely on that part of
the record.  Id. at 397-98.

Whisnant thus stands for only the basic proposition
that juror affidavits cannot be used to prove juror confusion. 
That conclusion is consistent with prior case law.  "The
affidavit of the juror is inadmissible to impeach the verdict or
even to show a mistake in making up the verdict.  Nor can it be
received to show what passed in the jury room.  Nor on account of
an afterthought of the juror."  Ore. Cas. R. R. Co., 3 Or at 180
(citations omitted).  Whisnant also is consistent with subsequent
case law.  See, e.g., Ertsgaard v. Beard, 310 Or 486, 496, 800
P2d 759 (1990) (juror affidavits alleging jury misconduct during
deliberation must be ignored to extent that they relate to oral
exchanges between jurors to persuade others or to mental
processes jurors used in reaching verdict); D.C. Thompson and Co.
v. Hauge, 300 Or 651, 658-60, 717 P2d 1169 (1986) ("[W]e hold
that juror affidavits or testimony seeking to impeach a jury's
verdict based upon allegations that the jurors misunderstood the
effect of their verdict are inadmissible[.]"); Blanton v. Union
Pacific Railroad Co., 289 Or 617, 631, 616 P2d 477 (1980) ("juror
affidavits may not be used to impeach such a verdict"); State v.
Gardner, 230 Or 569, 571, 371 P2d 558 (1962) ("We have repeatedly
said that affidavits of jurors as to what occurred during their
deliberations will not be received to impeach their verdict.").

Here, the trial court erred in using the juror
affidavits and testimony to inquire into the jury's deliberations
and order a new trial based on "[i]rregularity in the
proceedings" under ORCP 64 B(1).  Without the juror affidavits,
defendant had no factual basis to argue that an irregularity had
occurred in the proceedings.

The Court of Appeals next examined the trial court's
ORCP 64 B(5) ruling that the jury's verdict was "against law." 
The trial court had instructed the jury that defendant could be
convicted of murder, either because he personally and
intentionally caused Hauck's death or because he aided and
abetted Yancey in intentionally causing Hauck's death.  As noted,
Yancey was acquitted, and defendant was convicted.  Based on the
juror affidavits, the trial court determined that the jury had
acquitted Yancey because it had accepted his claim of self-defense, but that the jury had convicted defendant because he had
aided and abetted Yancey in killing Hauck.  As the trial court
analyzed the legal issue, defendant could not be guilty of
intentional murder under an aiding-and-abetting theory when the
jury also had determined that his codefendant was not guilty of
murder because of self-defense.  The trial court concluded that
the verdict finding defendant guilty was "against law."

In reviewing that ruling, the Court of Appeals
explained that it was irrelevant whether the trial court's legal
analysis of the possibly inconsistent verdicts was correct. 
Rather, the dispositive issue was that the trial court's
understanding of the rationale for the jury's verdict was based
only on juror affidavits and testimony, and the affidavits and
testimony were inadmissible for that purpose.  Woodman, 195 Or
App at 391-92, 391 n 2.  Specifically, the Court of Appeals held
that a court may consider juror affidavits only if those
affidavits disclose "a criminal obstruction of justice such as
fraud, bribery, or forcible coercion."  Id. at 393.

We agree with the Court of Appeals that juror
affidavits are admissible only if they disclose misconduct such
as fraud, bribery, forcible coercion, or other obstruction of
justice.  This court has observed:

Carson v. Brauer, 234 Or 333, 345, 382 P2d 79 (1963); see also
Ertsgaard, 310 Or at 493-96 (discussing permissible and
impermissible use of juror affidavits and testimony). 

Applying those principles, we again conclude that the
trial court erred when it used juror affidavits to determine
whether the jury had correctly applied the law.  Defendant did
not allege that any juror had engaged in fraud, bribery,
coercion, or other obstruction of justice that would constitute
misconduct.  In those circumstances, the trial court lacked a
legal basis for using juror affidavits and testimony to grant a
new trial.

As we discussed above with respect to the trial court's
conclusion as to "irregularity" in the proceedings, without the
juror affidavits the trial court could not have concluded that
the jury's verdict was "against law" under ORCP 64 B(5).  Indeed,
the trial court specifically stated that, "without the input from
the jurors," sufficient evidence supported the verdict.  The
trial court correctly characterized the evidence in the record as
sufficient to support a lawful verdict based on the jury finding
that defendant was guilty of murder as a principal, rather than
as an aider or abettor of Yancey's actions.  Evidence in the
record supported a finding that defendant and not Yancey had
inflicted the fatal blows on Hauck.  Defendant told police that
he was solely responsible for killing Hauck, and the physical and
testimonial evidence permitted the jury to find that Hauck was
killed either by defendant wielding the metal pipe or by Yancey
stabbing him.  In the absence of any basis, other than the juror
affidavits, to support the trial court's conclusion that the
verdict was "against law," that conclusion was error.

As noted previously, defendant filed a cross-appeal
challenging the trial court's refusal to give his requested
instruction regarding the element of intent in the crime of
murder.  At trial, defendant asked the trial court to give the
following instruction relating to the element of intent:

"As used in the phrase 'intentionally caused the
death of [the victim],' a person acts intentionally or
with intent when the person acts with a conscious
objective either to cause a particular result, or to
engage in particular conduct."

The Court of Appeals first observed that "[a] refusal
to give a requested instruction is not error if the instruction
given by the court, although not in the form requested,
adequately covers the subject of the requested instruction." 
Woodman, 195 Or App at 395 (internal citation and quotation marks
omitted).  The court then stated that defendant's proffered
instruction was a correct statement of the law and may have been
"more succinct than the one given," but held that, because the
trial court's instruction "correctly stated the law," there was
no error.  Id.

On review, defendant contends that the trial court's
instruction was incorrect as a matter of law because, to be
guilty of intentional murder, a defendant must have acted with
the specific intent to cause the victim's death.  According to
defendant, the trial court erred by refusing to omit the phrase
"or to engage in particular conduct" from the instruction,
leaving the jury with the mistaken impression that it could find
that defendant had acted intentionally if he intended to "cause a
particular result" or if he "engage[d] in particular conduct,"
but did not intend a particular result from that conduct. 
Specifically, defendant argues that the instructions permitted
the jury to find defendant guilty of murder if it found that
defendant intentionally had "engage[d] in particular conduct" –-
sliding the knife to Yancey -– even if the jury believed that
defendant did not intend for Yancey to use the knife to kill
Hauck.  

Defendant claims that the jury instructions permitted
the jury to believe the version of the facts that he argued at
trial -– that Hauck had died from the knife wounds caused by
Yancey, but that defendant had not intended to kill Hauck, either
when he slid the knife to Yancey or at any other relevant time -–
and still convict him of murder.  Because those instructions
permitted the jury to convict him of murder without finding that
he intended to cause Hauck's death, defendant argues, they were
erroneous.  See State v. Pine, 336 Or 194, 209-10, 82 P3d 130
(2003) (conviction reversed because instructions permitted jury
to find defendant guilty even if it failed to find each element
of offense).    

In determining whether it was error to give a
particular instruction, we read the instructions as a whole to
determine whether they state the law accurately.  See State v.
Oatney, 335 Or 276, 290, 66 P3d 475 (2003), cert den, 540 US 1151
(2004) (so stating); State v. Barnes, 329 Or 327, 334, 986 P2d
1160 (1999) (same).  In Oregon, "[a] person commits criminal
homicide if, without justification or excuse, the person
intentionally, knowingly, recklessly or with criminal negligence
causes the death of another human being."  ORS 163.005(1).
"[C]riminal homicide constitutes murder * * * [w]hen it is
committed intentionally[.]"  ORS 163.115(1)(a).   The term
"'[i]ntentionally' * * * means that a person acts with a
conscious objective to cause the result or to engage in the
conduct so described," unless the context requires otherwise. 
ORS 161.085(7).

Defendant is correct that the phrase "or to engage in
particular conduct" in the intent instruction, if read in
isolation, might suggest that a person could be convicted of
murder if the person "engaged in conduct" that "cause[d] the
death of another human being," even if the person did not intend
that result.  Such a conviction, defendant argues, would be
improper, because murder requires that the defendant intend that
his conduct result in the death of the victim.  Therefore,
according to defendant, in the context of a murder charge, only
the first part of the ORS 161.085(7) definition of
"intentionally" –- that the person "act[ ] with a conscious
objective to cause the result" [i.e., the death of the victim] –-
is applicable, and only that part of the definition should be
included in the instruction.  It was error, in defendant's view,
to instruct the jury that it could find defendant guilty of
murder if it determined that he had "act[ed] with a conscious
objective * * * to engage in particular conduct."  


In our view, reading the instructions as a whole,
rather than examining the intent instruction standing alone, the
instructions accurately reflected the statutory requirements.  In
the context of the intentional murder charge, the jury would have
understood the words "particular conduct" in the phrase
"conscious objective to * * * engage in particular conduct" to
mean conduct intended to cause the death of another.  So
understood, the "engage in particular conduct" part of the
instruction conveyed the same meaning as the "cause a particular
result" part of the instruction because both parts required the
jury, to convict defendant of intentional murder, to find that
defendant acted "with a conscious objective" that his actions
would result in the death of Hauck.  Here, the trial court first
told the jury that "the State must prove beyond a reasonable
doubt * * * that [defendant] intentionally caused the death of
[Hauck]."  The court then stated that the phrase "intentionally
caused the death" of Hauck means that "the person acts with a
conscious objective either to cause a particular result, or to
engage in particular conduct."  Those instructions correctly told
the jury that the prohibited conduct to which the intent element
applied was "caus[ing] the death of [Hauck]."  Defendant's
reading of the instructions as permitting the jury to find him
guilty of murder based on a finding only that he had a conscious
objective to "engage in particular conduct," such as sliding the
knife to Yancey, and not a conscious objective to cause Hauck's
death, is not a reasonable one, when the instructions are read as
a whole.
 (5)  We conclude that the jury instruction about which
defendant complains was not erroneous.

The decision of the Court of Appeals is affirmed.  The
judgment of the circuit court is reversed, and the case is
remanded to the circuit court for further proceedings.

1. Testimony also supported an alternative version of the facts, one that suggested that, prior
to going to Hauck's home on the day of the murder, defendant already had made plans to kill
Hauck and take his property and that he then had followed through with those plans.  Moreover,
defendant told police at one point that he was the person who had killed Hauck by hitting him
with a crowbar and stabbing him with a knife before taking Hauck's car, jewelry, and credit
cards.

2. ORCP 64 B provides:

3. One of the jurors testified, however, that the jury also believed that defendant had
intended to cause Hauck's death and had introduced the knife into the fight between Hauck and
Yancey with that intent.

4. ORS 161.155 defines accessory liability:

5. In concluding that the trial court's instruction, considered as part of the instructions as a
whole, was not legally erroneous, we do not necessarily approve of that instruction.  Defendant
may be correct that the instruction would have been clearer if the trial court had omitted the
phrase "or to engage in particular conduct."