Court Opinion

ID: 9781889
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-30 17:35:15.222698+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:34:41.095265
License: Public Domain

SERCOMBE, J.,
dissenting.
The issue in this case is whether defendant was charged with a violation that could have been committed only by killing a second elk, so as to justify his submitted jury instruction to that effect and preclude the instruction that was given. Defendant was charged with a violation of former *535OAR 635-065-0001(2) (Jan 1, 2005),1 a rule of the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife (ODFW) that incorporated by reference the “requirements for hunting game mammals set out in the document entitled ‘2005 Oregon Big Game Regulations.’ ” Those requirements, in turn, stated a “bag limit” of “[o]ne bull elk with visible antler” in the restrictions applicable to the “Elk Centerfire Firearm Seasons” for the “General Coast, 2nd Season.” The wildlife citation and complaint charged defendant with the rule violation for “exceeding the bag limit on Coast Bull elk.”
The majority concludes that a person may exceed that “bag limit” hunting regulation by possessing a dead animal that was killed by someone else. 223 Or App at 533. Because it determines that a person does not have to kill an animal to exceed the bag limit, or even be engaged in hunting in any way, the majority rejects defendant’s submitted jury instruction and sustains the instruction given to the jury. It reasons that OAR 635-065-0001(2) carries out ORS 498.002(1), which provides:
“Wildlife is the property of the state. No person shall angle for, take, hunt, trap or possess, or assist another in angling for, taking, hunting, trapping or possessing any wildlife in violation of the wildlife laws or of any rule promulgated pursuant thereto.”
“Take” is further defined to mean “to kill or obtain possession or control of any wildlife.” ORS 496.004(16). Given the breadth of ORS 498.002(1), the majority reads the “bag limit” regulation expansively to regulate the number of elk that can be “taken,” either by killing, possessing or controlling the *536animal, in any one season. Accordingly, it concludes that defendant could exceed the “bag limit” regulation for Coast Bull elk by killing a single elk and possessing the dead carcass of another elk. Thus, the majority sustains the jury instruction given by the trial court.
With respect, the majority’s conclusion rests on an immaterial predicate. The interpretation of the “bag limit” hunting regulation rests on its own text and context. ORS 498.002(1) has little to do with the content and meaning of the “bag limit” hunting regulation. That statute broadly defines all violations of wildlife laws and rules, not the particular meaning of an individual regulation. Properly viewed in its context, the “bag limit” regulation restricts the number of elk that can be killed during a regulated centerfire firearm hunt. Other, more particular parts of the 2005 Oregon Big Game Regulations (Regulations) limit possession of dead or live elk and other game mammals, as well as setting out “bag limits” for each described hunt. Reading the bag limit regulation to restrict all manner of wildlife takings, as the majority does, makes that regulation inconsistent with several other regulations affecting the possession of dead game mammals or the control of live game mammals. Because nothing in the text or context of the regulation supports the construction of the bag limit regulation as the super-regulation for all wildlife takings, because that construction makes the regulation inconsistent with several other regulations, and because the plain and ordinary meaning of “bag limit,” is a restriction on the number of animals that may be killed and kept during a particular hunt, I respectfully dissent.
The narrow question presented in this appeal is whether the trial court erred in failing to give defendant’s requested jury instruction that “to establish the crime of exceeding the bag limit on coast bull elk, the state must prove,” among other things, that defendant “knowingly killed more than one coastal bull elk in the second season for coastal bull elk.” Instead, the court instructed the jury that it should convict defendant if it found that he “knowingly took more than one Coast elk during one season,” separately instructing that “take” means “to kill or obtain possession or control of any wildlife.”
*537We review a trial court’s refusal to give a requested jury instruction for error as a matter of law. State v. Moore, 324 Or 396, 927 P2d 1073 (1996). A party is entitled to have the jury instructed on the law that supports his or her theory of the case where there is evidence to support that theory and the instruction correctly states the law. State v. Lowe, 130 Or App 370, 373, 881 P2d 837 (1994).
Defendant argued before the trial court that a “bag limit” regulates the number of live animals that are killed during a hunt. The trial court disagreed:
“[DEFENSE COUNSEL]: They charged him with Exceeding the Bag Limit.
“[THE COURT]: I understand that.
“[DEFENSE COUNSEL]: They didn’t charge him with Taking.
“[THE COURT]: I understand. And Exceeding the Bag Limit, effectively, accuses him of possessing two elk, not one.
“[DEFENSE COUNSEL]: No sir. Uh, that is not in, that is not in the Administrative Rules that bag limit is equal to taking. * * * These regulations are * * * clearly defined in terms of living animals, exceeding your quota by killing more than one animal. That’s what a bag limit is. Any hunter knows that. They will not say, uh, for an animal they found dead on the road or dead in their field that they bagged an animal. They will say they found an animal.
^ * * *
“[THE COURT]: What I’m saying is, ultimately, is that this is a possession charge, not a killing charge. Exceeding the Bag Limit means you possess — there’s a quota. One elk. If you possess two, you’re over the quota. You’ve exceeded the bag limit. How you came into possession of the two elk doesn’t matter. You can’t do it. That’s what this charge is.”
As noted above, defendant was charged with a violation of OAR 635-065-0001(2), making it illegal to fail to comply with “the requirements for hunting game mammals” set out in the Regulations. The particular hunting requirement at issue, a “bag limit” of “one bull elk with visible antler” was contained in the restrictions in the Regulations *538applicable to the “Elk Centerfire Firearm Seasons” for the “General Coast, 2nd Season.” In construing the meaning of this limitation, we interpret administrative rules much like statutes, using the familiar maxims stated in PGE v. Bureau of Labor and Industries, 317 Or 606, 610-12, 859 P2d 1143 (1993). See Marshall’s Towing v. Department of State Police, 339 Or 54, 62, 116 P3d 873 (2005). That is to say, we look to the text and context of the provision, using rules of construction that bear directly on textual interpretation, to determine its meaning. In this case, the context of the “bag limit” regulation would include other restrictions in the Regulations and other rules and statutes regulating wildlife takings.
I begin with the text of the regulation, bearing in mind that “[w]ords of common usage typically should be given their plain, natural, and ordinary meaning,” PGE, 317 Or at 611. The ordinary meaning of “bag limit” is a quota on the number of live animals taken during a hunting or fishing period. Webster’s Third New Int’l Dictionary 162 (unabridged ed 2002), defines “bag limit” as “the maximum number offish or game animals permitted by law to be taken by one person in a given period.” Webster’s also defines the word “bag,” which is instructive of how it is used in the term “bag limit.” As a noun, “bag” is defined, in part, as:
“4: something that is bagged: as * * * b: a quantity of game taken during a particular hunt or during a particular period usu. by one person <the ~ included an elephant, and a magnificent male tiger>; often : the amount of game permitted (as by law) to be taken by one hunter <he got his ~ early and was home before lunch> c: something likened to the bag taken by a hunter or fisherman esp. in being won, captured, seized or otherwise taken by personal effort[.]”
Id. As a verb it means, “3 a: to take (animals) as game: to kill or capture (game) <he bagged a fine 10-point buck>[.]” Id. Those definitions confirm that, as the word “bag” is used in the context of the term “bag limit,” it is meant to include those animals that the hunter has “bagged” that is, the live animals that have been successfully killed and captured by the hunter.
Other dictionaries confirm this understanding. For example, The Oxford English Dictionary 880 (second ed *5391989) provides the following specific use of the word bag: “9. Sporting. = Game-bag; hence, the contents of a game-bag, the quantity of fish or game however large (embracing e.g. elephants and buffaloes) killed at one time; the produce of a hunting, fishing, or shooting expedition.” The Random House Dictionary of the English Language 155 (unabridged second 1987) defines bag as “the amount of game taken, esp. by one hunter in one hunting trip or over a specified period” and to bag as “to kill or catch, as in hunting: I bagged my first deer when I was a teenager.” Similarly, E. Cobham Brewer and Ivor H. Evans, Brewer’s Dictionary of Phrase and Fable 68 (Centenary ed 1970), provides the following definition of “to bag,” “[t]o secure for oneself, to purloin; probably from sporting or poaching use, to put into one’s bag what one has shot or trapped.”
Those sources of meaning imply that a “bag limit” establishes a quota on the number of live “animals * * * taken” during a hunting or fishing period. Although the meaning of “taken” may be elastic, the ordinary understanding of “bag limit” is that it applies to live animals (as opposed to actions related to possession or trafficking in animal meat or parts). Moreover, a “bag limit” pertains to actions during a hunting or fishing trip or season.
Those same understandings of the meaning of “bag limit” arise from the context of the regulations here. Within the Regulations, “bag limits” are set only in reference to particular hunts, hunts defined by time, location, and animal species. The Regulations set out a number of “general hunting regulations” that apply to all hunts, limitations on “legal hunting methods” in a table and text, and then several provisions on purchasing licenses, applications and tags, emergency hunts, landowner preference hunting, and special rules for youth and disabled hunters.
The bulk of the regulations, however, list hunting restrictions in table and rule formats for different species of game mammals. Those restrictions are first categorized by animal species, type of hunt, and hunting weapon, e.g., “Pronghorn Antelope - Controlled,”2 “Cougar - General,” and *540“Buck Deer Centerfire Firearm Seasons,” and “General Elk Bow Seasons.”3 Beneath each category of hunt, the Regulations state written limitations on the general hunt, such as tag sale deadlines, and then set out a table listing hunt numbers (referencing a described area of land), the hunt names (the name of the hunting area), a “bag limit” for each hunt, the “open season” (the time of each hunt), and for controlled hunts, the number of issued and applied for tags from the previous season. Sometimes, the table describes a general season for an animal species by listing the hunt season, the open season, the required tag, the “bag limit,” and the “open area” (place that the restrictions apply). The “bag limits” throughout the Regulations describe the number and type of animal that can be hunted, e.g., “one doe or fawn pronghorn,” and “one buck with visible antler.”
The regulations applicable to defendant’s conduct were those for the “Elk Centerfire Firearm Seasons.” The season of the hunt was “General Coast 2nd Season;” the “open season” was November 19-25; the tag required was “Coast Elk 2nd Season;” the “bag limit” was “[o]ne bull elk with visible antler;” and the “open area” was “Alsea, Applegate, Melrose, Scappoose, Siuslaw, Scott Mt. and Willamette units.”
The text and context of the “bag limit” regulation as applied to defendant suggest that the restriction pertains to hunting activities within the restricted area. OAR 635-065-0001(2) incorporates only the “requirements for hunting game mammals” that are stated in the Regulations. The Regulations in general set out each “bag limit” in the context of a particular hunt or hunting season. Given that the Regulations always describe “bag limit” in connection with hunting, it is reasonable to conclude that violating the “bag limit” would occur by hunting too many animals.
A second relevant rule of construction obligates a court to construe rules to be consistent with one another, ORS 174.010 (“where there are several provisions or particulars such construction is, if possible, to be adopted as will *541give effect to all”). The majority’s construction of “bag limit” regulations as the equivalent of ORS 498.002(1) and a limitation on all “takings” of the particular species of animal, whether by killing, controlling, or possessing the animal, makes the bag limitation inconsistent with more particular regulations on possession of live or dead animals and redundant of other regulations. To begin with, the Regulations already contained a general proscription on illegal takings. One of the “General Hunting Regulations” provides:
“No Person Shall:
“Take or attempt to take any game mammals or any protected wildlife species of any size or sex or amount, by any method or weapon, during a time or in any area not prescribed in these rules.”
(Boldface omitted.)
If the “bag limit” hunting regulation limits all “takings” of whatever character, then that specific regulation of “takings” is redundant. More importantly, the possession of dead animals is specifically regulated. The “General Hunting Regulations” limit the possession of the meat or carcass of certain animals in the field without evidence of the animal’s sex. Another of the “General Hunting Regulations” provides:
“No person shall possess or transport any game mammal or part thereof, which has been illegally killed, found or killed for humane reasons, except shed antlers, unless they have notified and received permission from personnel of the Oregon State Police or [Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife] prior to transporting.”
Assuming that defendant found the second elk, that regulation is the one violated by defendant. But defendant was charged with violating a different regulation, the “bag limit” on coastal bull elk during the second elk centerfire firearm season. According to the majority, if defendant had notified the State Police and received permission to keep and dress the animal, he would still have violated the “bag limit” hunting regulation because he would have “taken” a second animal by possession. 223 Or App at 534. Reading the “bag limit” hunting regulation as a regulation of hunting live animals, and not as a limit on possession of a found dead animal, *542eliminates any inconsistency between the regulations and should be the construction of the “bag limit” hunting regulation that is preferred.
Similarly, two or more live elk may be “taken,” in the sense of possessed, by license from ODFW. OAR 635-049-0015(1) provides that cervids may be held “as authorized by a cervid license issued by the Department.”4 OAR 635-049-0135 provides the general requirements for holding cervids; OAR 635-049-0175 describes the license issuance procedure. Had a person possessed two or more live elk as authorized by license, according to the majority, that person still would have “taken” a second animal by possession in violation of any applicable “bag limit” regulation. Construing the “bag limit” hunting regulation as limited to hunting violations removes that inconsistency between the regulations.
For those reasons, I read the “bag limit” hunting regulation to apply to defendant’s treatment of live animals during the regulated hunt. Because there was some question about whether defendant had killed the second elk, or merely encountered it in the field, defendant was entitled to a jury instruction defining the question to be whether defendant killed one or two elk. The trial court erred, in my view, in defining a violation of exceeding the “bag limit” hunting regulation differently and instructing the jury that a bag limit violation could occur merely by possessing more than one dead animal.

 Former OAR 635-065-0001 (Jam 1, 2005) provided:
“(1) The purpose of these rules is to establish license and tag requirements, limits, areas, methods and other restrictions for hunting game mammals pursuant to ORS Chapter 496.
“(2) OAR chapter 635, division 065 incorporates, by reference, the requirements for hunting game mammals set out in the document entitled ‘2005 Oregon Big Game Regulations,’ into Oregon Administrative Rules. Therefore, persons must consult the ‘2005 Oregon Big Game Regulations’ in addition to OAR chapter 635, to determine all applicable requirements for game mammals.”
All references to OAR 635-065-0001 refer to the 2005 rule in effect at the time of defendant’s conduct.

 A “controlled hunt” is a hunt where the number of hunters is limited and tags are awarded through a public drawing.

 A “center-fire” firearm, as distinguished from a “rimfire” firearm, uses cartridges that are “fired by the striking of a hammer or firing pin upon a cap or primer at the center of the base” of the cartridge. Webster’s at 362.

 Under OAR 635-049-0005(1), “ ‘[c]ervids’ are animals of the family Cervidae (deer, elk, moose, reindeer, and caribou).” The cervid license regulations were adopted in 2008. The use of “bag limit” in the 2008 Oregon Big Game Regulations is similar to its use in the 2005 Regulations.