Court Opinion

ID: 9544777
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 17:01:33.905801+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:13:37.792068
License: Public Domain

THORNTON, J.,
specially concurring.
I concur in the result but disagree with the rationale offered by the majority to support its conclusion. Simply stated, the central issue presented here is whether Oregon law permits the introduction into evidence of a purported copy of an official record bearing only the facsimile signature of the purported custodian of that record.
The state in its brief freely concedes the following: that "[t]he certification utilized in the present case is indistinguishable from the certification procedure approved by this court in [State v. Pingelton, 31 Or App 241, 570 P2d 666 (1977), rev den 281 Or 99 (1978)]”; that "[t]he certification utilized included a reproduction of the signature of the certifying officer”; and that "the original suspension records and the original certification were placed together on a photocopy machine in such a manner that the original document and the certification were reproduced on a single page.”
The state argues that we should affirm on the authority of Pingelton. Conversely, defendant contends that the state has "offered no certification or testimony that the photocopies offered in evidence were ever compared with the certified copies which they were copied from”; that the state has made no record for an exception to the Best Evidence Rule; and that therefore we should reverse the trial court and dismiss the case.
*118For reasons which sire more fully stated in my dissent in Pingelton, I am of the opinion that Pingelton was incorrectly decided and should be overruled.
ORS 43.470 provides as follows:
"(1) Whenever a copy of a writing is certified, to be used as evidence, the certificate shall state that a copy has been compared by the certifying officer with the original, and that it is a correct transcript of the whole or of a specified part.
"(2) Whenever a transcript of a public writing stored in machine language in a data processing device or computer is certified to be used as evidence, it shall be stated by the certifying officer that it is a correct transcript of specified data contained within the data processing device or computer.
"(3) The official seal, if there is any, of the certifying officer, shall also be affixed to the certificate or any other certificate, except when the certificate of a clerk of a court is used in the same court or before an officer thereof.”
Read literally, this statute requires that the copy be compared by its custodian with the original record for accuracy and completeness. The signature of the custodian attests to the fact that a comparison was made. The certification in question states that this was done. Use of a "floating certification” (reproduction of a form certification along with the document on a single page at the time of photocopying) calls the truth of that attestation into question.
It may well be that the procedure employed by the Motor Vehicles Division here is less burdensome than individual comparison but it is an expedient which our statutes and best evidence law have not heretofore sanctioned. Oregon has not adopted the "Uniform Facsimile Signature of Public Officials Act.” By statute the original of a document is required to be introduced unless an exception applies. ORS 41.610. Certified copies of public records constitute such an exception (ORS 41.640(l)(d), 43.330(6)), the purpose of which is to dispense with the necessity of calling the custodian as a witness to authenticate the copy. State v. Woodward, 1 Or App 338, 340-41, 462 P2d 685 (1969). Actual comparison and signature is the substitute the legislature has prescribed for presence in court and the opportunity to cross-examine. "Floating certification” *119makes it impossible to determine after the fact whether a comparison has been made and increases the possibility of falsification by persons with access to the certification form or any copy upon which that certification is reproduced.
Buttler and Warden, Judges, join in this specially concurring opinion.