Court Opinion

ID: 9530136
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 03:57:29.986648+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:28:00.406848
License: Public Domain

VAN HOOMISSEN, J.,
concurring.
I agree with the majority opinion’s analysis, conclusion, and disposition in this case.
I write separately to express my concern about an issue raised by petitioner in the Court of Appeals and again in his petition for review. That issue is whether the agency hearing violated due process because the agency’s counsel, an assistant attorney general, may have combined prosecutorial and adjudicative functions. The Court of Appeals failed to respond to that issue and this court, in allowing review, expressly declined to review it.
In the context of an APA contested case hearing, ORS 183.413 et seq, the dual role of the Attorney General as prosecutor and as legal advisor to the agency on evidentiary and procedural matters is troublesome to me. Assuming that such a dual assignment is permissible in the abstract,1 the issue remains whether, in this and other cases, the requisite degree of separation of functions is being maintained within the Department of Justice. That is a question this court should address at its first feasible opportunity when the issue has been properly preserved at a hearing and raised on appeal.

 ORS 183.450(6) provides that agencies may, at their discretion, be represented at hearings by the Attorney General.