Court Opinion

ID: 9797215
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 04:15:31.868066+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T08:53:17.043581
License: Public Domain

LANDAU, P. J.,
concurring.
I agree with the majority that this case is indistinguishable from State v. Ashbaugh, 225 Or App 16, 200 P3d 149 (2008), rev allowed, 346 Or 257 (2009), and that, in consequence, the case must be remanded for findings about whether defendant, in fact, subjectively believed that she was free to leave the scene. I write separately for two reasons.
First, as I stated in my concurring opinion in Ashbaugh, if it is necessary to remand for findings on whether defendant felt free to leave, it is not necessary for us to opine whether, if she did, such a subjective belief was objectively reasonable. It is the state’s burden to demonstrate such a belief, and, if the state cannot meet that burden, then the matter is at an end, rendering any opinion about the reasonableness of such a belief merely advisory.
Second, apart from that, I have come to have reservations about whether Ashbaugh was correctly decided. It strikes me that the decision cannot easily be harmonized with the Supreme Court’s decision in State v. Holmes, 311 Or 400, 410, 813 P2d 28 (1991), in which the court stated that “law enforcement officers remain free to approach persons on the street or in public places, seek their cooperation or assistance, request or impart information, or question them without being called upon to articulate a certain level of suspicion in justification.” (Emphasis added.) As I understand it, under our decision in Ashbaugh and in subsequent decisions, we have concluded that, while it may be permissible for law enforcement officers to ask a person for identification, it is not permissible for those officers to do anything with that *693very information without reasonable suspicion that the person giving it has engaged in criminal activity. That makes little sense to me.
I also have come to question whether remanding for findings as to a defendant’s subjective understanding in this and similar cases can be reconciled with basic principles of preservation of error. In this case, for example, defendant did not argue to the trial court or to us that it is error to determine whether she was stopped without first finding whether she subjectively believed that she could not leave and, if she did, that such a believe was objectively reasonable. She did not ask us for a remand for such a finding. But we are granting that relief nevertheless. I imagine trial courts will be more than a little frustrated to find us remanding for findings that defendants never requested from them in the first place.
In fairness to the majority, granting that relief is what Ashbaugh requires. And, in fairness to the majority in Ashbaugh, the tensions that I have described are due in no small part to what appears to be some inconsistency in Holmes itself. Perhaps the Supreme Court will sort that out when it reviews Ashbaugh. In the meantime, Ashbaugh is controlling. I therefore concur in the result.