Opinion ID: 1282788
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: complexity of capital murder issues

Text: To see how a proceeding like that in the present case can frustrate the certainty required for a death sentence, one must begin with a careful examination of the death penalty law. ORS 163.150 itself does not define aggravated murder, the crime for which the death penalty is authorized. It prescribes additional procedures and criteria for imposing the death penalty. But ORS 163.150 presupposes that the defendant has committed aggravated murder before the court proceeds to the sentencing proceeding. That supposition will often depend on debatable issues, as the following examples show. They are included here, not because they arise in this case, but because they illustrate why no unrepresented defendant can simply by pleading guilty to aggravated murder provide the predicate for a death sentence with the requisite degree of certainty. Aggravated murder is defined in ORS 163.095 as follows: As used in ORS 163.105 and this section, `aggravated murder' means murder as defined in ORS 163.115 which is committed under, or accompanied by, any of the following circumstances: (1)(a) The defendant committed the murder pursuant to an agreement that the defendant receive money or other thing of value for committing the murder. (b) The defendant solicited another to commit the murder and paid or agreed to pay the person money or other thing of value for committing the murder. (c) The defendant committed murder after having been convicted previously in any jurisdiction of any homicide, the elements of which constitute the crime of murder as defined in ORS 163.115 or manslaughter in the first degree as defined in ORS 163.118. (d) there was more than one murder victim in the same criminal episode as defined in ORS 131.505. (e) the homicide occurred in the course of or as a result of intentional maiming or torture of the victim. (2)(a) The victim was one of the following and the murder was related to the performance of the victim's official duties in the justice system: (A) A police officer as defined in ORS 181.610(6); (B) A correctional, parole or probation officer or other person charged with the duty of custody, control or supervision of convicted persons; (C) A member of the Oregon State Police; (D) A judicial officer as defined in ORS 1.210; (E) A juror or witness in a criminal proceeding; (F) An employe or officer of a court of justice; or (G) A member of the State Board of Parole. (b) The defendant was confined in a state, county or municipal penal or correctional facility or was otherwise in custody when the murder occurred. (c) The defendant committed murder by means of an explosive as defined in ORS 164.055(2)(a). (d) Notwithstanding ORS 163.115(1)(b), the defendant personally and intentionally committed the homicide under the circumstances set forth in 163.115(1)(b). (e) The murder was committed in an effort to conceal the commission of a crime, or to conceal the identity of the perpetrator of a crime. (f) The murder was committed after the defendant had escaped from a state, county or municipal penal or correctional facility and before the defendant had been returned to the custody of the facility. Whether a murder is an aggravated murder under this statute turns on questions of law as well as on facts, questions that demand professional knowledge of law and professional responsibility for making a proper record. What, for instance, will qualify as a thing of value for purposes of ORS 163.095(1)(a) and (b)? Cf. State v. Whitley, 295 Or. 455, 459, 666 P.2d 1340 (1983) (property must be a thing of value for burning it to be arson). Under subsection (1)(c), how closely must the elements of homicide in another jurisdiction, perhaps in another language, correspond to the elements of murder or manslaughter in Oregon? What is torture within the meaning of subsection (1)(e)? If a defendant had pleaded guilty under this subsection without counsel to raise that question, before this court circumscribed torture in State v. Cornell/Pinnell, 304 Or. 27, 32, 741 P.2d 501 (1987), there would be no assurance that the defendant facing a death sentence actually had committed aggravated murder. What kind of persons qualify under ORS 163.095(2)(a)(B) as being charged with the duty of custody, control or supervision of convicted persons? What does the subsection mean by a murder related to the victim's official duties? In paragraph (E), how far does a juror or witness in a criminal proceeding include potential jurors and witnesses in anticipated future proceedings, and must this status be known to the murderer? See State v. Maney, 297 Or. 620, 626, 688 P.2d 63 (1984). In paragraph (F), does an officer of a court of justice who is not an employe include, for instance, a prosecutor or other member of the bar? Cf. ORS 9.010(1) (any state bar member is an officer of the court). Does otherwise confined in custody in subsection (2)(b) mean for purposes of aggravated murder and a potential death sentence what it means for warning a person before police questioning, or is it any clearer? Cf. State v. Milligan, 304 Or. 659, 748 P.2d 130 (1988) (compelled blood samples taken without formal arrest); State v. Okeke, 304 Or. 367, 745 P.2d 418 (1987) (excluding evidence seized from person in involuntary confinement at detoxification center); State v. Magee, 304 Or. 261, 744 P.2d 250 (1987) (person held for questioning in police station). Does the perpetrator of a crime in subsection (2)(e) include every person potentially punishable for the crime or only the person who committed the decisive act? Cf. ORS 161.150 to 161.175 (Parties to crime). Some of these questions are difficult, others are easier, and some may never arise in an actual prosecution for aggravated murder. There is no need to answer them in the abstract here. What questions like these show is that neither a circuit court nor this court can assure that a death sentence is not applied beyond its authorized reach when a defendant pleads guilty and does not raise or let counsel raise the legal issues. In the present case, defendant was allowed to pursue a course that prevented the lawyers who were appointed to advise him from making an effective challenge to the state's proof of aggravated murder. Without a guilty plea, it is not at all certain whether a jury would have been convinced beyond a reasonable doubt that defendant was motivated to kill his lover because he resented her willingness to testify to his assaulting her child (which is the basis of this aggravated murder charge) rather than out of jealousy or some other psychic drive. He similarly prevented an effective challenge to the death sentence in the sentencing phase, to which I shall return.