Court Opinion

ID: 9900463
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-11-18 22:13:21.577609+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:21:05.713756
License: Public Domain

560                   April 26, 2023              No. 218

         IN THE COURT OF APPEALS OF THE
                 STATE OF OREGON

                   ADAM STELTZ,
                  Plaintiff-Appellant,
                            v.
                      Brad CAIN,
                   Superintendent,
          Snake River Correctional Institution,
                Defendant-Respondent.
             Malheur County Circuit Court
                 20CV30653; A175037

  Erin K. Landis, Judge.
  Argued and submitted September 21, 2022.
  Harrison Latto argued the cause and filed the briefs for
appellant.
   Joanna L. Jenkins, Assistant Attorney General, argued
the cause for respondent. Also on the brief were Ellen F.
Rosenblum, Attorney General, and Benjamin Gutman,
Solicitor General.
  Before Shorr, Presiding Judge, and Mooney, Judge, and
Pagán, Judge.
  PAGÁN, J.
  Judgment dismissing writ of habeas corpus vacated and
remanded.
Cite as 325 Or App 560 (2023)                            561

        PAGÁN, J.
         In this appeal from a judgment dismissing a peti-
tion for writ of habeas corpus, plaintiff assigns error to the
habeas court’s denial of his motion to appoint counsel to
assist his petition. Although we agree with defendant that,
in general, a person seeking habeas corpus is not guaran-
teed assistance of counsel by statute or constitution, because
the record in this case does not demonstrate that the habeas
court exercised its discretion with respect to the motion to
appoint counsel, we vacate the judgment and remand for
further proceedings.
         To begin, we are not addressing the merits of plain-
tiff’s various claims for habeas relief. Although we briefly
describe those claims here, we do so only for context. The
relevant facts of this case are procedural.
        In August 2020, plaintiff sought habeas relief,
alleging what we understand to be defects in several crim-
inal cases underlying his current imprisonment, as well
as denial of medical treatment for kidney pain, bone pain,
and abnormal back conditions. Along with the petition for
habeas corpus, plaintiff also filed a “Motion for Appointment
of Counsel” pursuant to ORS 34.355 and ORS 34.365, sup-
ported by plaintiff’s trust account statement.
          The court ordered defendant to show cause why
the writ of habeas corpus should not issue. Defendant later
requested an extension to reply due to “attorney error.” The
extension was granted. In its response, defendant argued
that post-conviction relief, not habeas corpus, was the
exclusive remedy for addressing the alleged defects in the
underlying criminal cases. Moreover, defendant argued that
plaintiff’s claims for medical care “fail to state a claim for
relief,” because they did not allege that defendant was fail-
ing to treat serious medical needs.
         The habeas court specifically found that the major-
ity of the petition was “unintelligible,” the claims attacking
prior criminal proceedings were barred by ORS 138.540,
and that the claims for medical care did not allege what
treatments were being denied or allege deliberate indiffer-
ence to serious medical needs. Neither the order nor the
562                                                 Steltz v. Cain

general judgment dismissing the petition for habeas relief
addressed plaintiff’s motion for appointment of counsel.
         About two weeks later, plaintiff again filed a motion
for counsel “for help of fileing [sic] an amended complaint for
habeas. I asked for this at the time of fileing,” and included
a declaration in support, referencing a previous habeas
action. The habeas court did not address the second motion
for appointment of counsel.
        At issue in this appeal is the habeas court’s discre-
tion under statute to appoint an attorney. In relevant part,
ORS 34.355 provides:
       “If counsel is appointed by a court to represent, in an
   initial proceeding by habeas corpus or on appeal as pro-
   vided in ORS 34.710, a person who is imprisoned or other-
   wise restrained of liberty by virtue of a charge or conviction
   of crime and who is determined to be financially eligible
   for appointed counsel at state expense, the public defense
   services executive director shall determine compensation
   for counsel and costs and expenses of the person in the pro-
   ceeding or on appeal.”
         We have interpreted ORS 34.355 as providing “dis-
cretionary and implicit authority” for the court to appoint
counsel for indigent petitioners in habeas cases. Combs v.
Baldwin, 161 Or App 270, 276, 984 P2d 366 (1999). We rec-
ognized that authority as discretionary because neither the
Oregon Constitution nor the United States Constitution
guarantees counsel in habeas cases, which are at their core,
civil proceedings. Id. at 275.
         The consequence of the discretionary authority
provided to the habeas court is that we, as an appellate
court, will not disturb the lower court’s ruling on a motion
to appoint counsel if that decision is within the spectrum of
legally permissible rulings on the matter. See State v. Pilon,
321 Or App 460, 466, 516 P3d 1181 (2022). A trial court can
also abuse its discretion when a “decision is not supported by
reason and evidence or when a court fails to exercise its dis-
cretion or to consider all relevant circumstances in making
its decision.” State v. Farmer, 210 Or App 625, 640, 152 P3d
904, rev den, 342 Or 645 (2007); see also State v. Mayfield,
302 Or 631, 645, 733 P2d 438 (1987) (“The judge errs if the
Cite as 325 Or App 560 (2023)                               563

judge fails to exercise discretion, refuses to exercise discre-
tion or fails to make a record which reflects an exercise of
discretion.”).
         In this case, the record shows that plaintiff filed the
request for appointment of counsel contemporaneously with
his petition for habeas corpus relief. From that information,
all we can reliably infer is that the habeas court abused its
discretion by failing to or refusing to exercise its discretion
to appoint counsel for plaintiff or to deny the motion.
         Defendant contends that controlling law already
explains that a trial court is not required to consider or
respond to a motion for appointment of counsel in habeas
cases. See Bates v. Czerniak, 187 Or App 8, 12-13, 66 P3d 519,
rev den, 335 Or 422 (2003). We disagree. In Bates, we con-
cluded that it was not plain error for the trial court to fail to
respond to a motion for appointment of counsel in a habeas
petition. Id. However, for several reasons, Bates, although
nominally discussing ORS 34.355, was not addressing the
same question that we address today and is therefore not
dispositive of this case. In Bates, the specific question was
whether the trial court erred when it failed to sua sponte
convert the plaintiff’s habeas action to a post-conviction
relief (PCR) action. 187 Or App at 10. We concluded that
because the trial court was not required to treat the plain-
tiff’s habeas action as a PCR action, any error in failing to
do so was not plain. Id. at 12. As a consequence, because
there was no obligation to treat the petition as a PCR action,
there was no concomitant obligation to appoint counsel, as
required under the PCR statutes. Id. at 12. We then con-
sidered whether the plaintiff’s argument for appointment
of counsel under the PCR statutes could have alternatively
been considered as plain error in the habeas context and
concluded any error under the habeas statutes was not
plain. Id. at 13.
         We reject defendant’s contention that plaintiff did
not preserve his claim with respect to his motion to appoint
counsel. We were not asked in Bates to consider whether fil-
ing a motion for appointment of counsel was sufficient to
preserve the issue for appellate review, and thus analyzed
it only for plain error. But in the context of habeas corpus
564                                                           Steltz v. Cain

petitions, and the statutory time frames for the court and
defendant to respond, a plaintiff is generally afforded no
other opportunity to raise the issue. See ORS 34.370 (estab-
lishing time for rulings on habeas actions). And owing to
the speed with which a writ of habeas corpus triggers judi-
cial scrutiny, motion practice other than a motion to strike
under ORS 34.680 is inappropriate in habeas actions. Bedell
v. Schiedler, 307 Or 562, 566, 770 P2d 909 (1989). Although
plaintiff filed only the single motion for appointment of coun-
sel with the court prior to the judgment, he was presented
no other opportunity to raise the issue, nor did he have an
opportunity to object to any procedural defect. Cf. Peeples v.
Lampert, 345 Or 209, 224, 191 P3d 637 (2008) (the petitioner
did not request findings despite at least two opportunities
to do so, thus claimed procedural error was unpreserved);
Jaimez v. Rosales, 323 Or App 741, 743, 525 P3d 92 (2023)
(failure to request findings for matter of court discretion
foreclosed appellate review of alleged procedural defect).
And although the error plaintiff assigned in this case is pro-
cedural, as opposed to substantive, sometimes procedural
defects are excused from traditional preservation require-
ments.1 See, e.g., State v. McLaughlin, 307 Or App 368, 369,
476 P3d 987 (2020) (preservation not required when error
appeared for first time in the judgment); State v. Rhamy, 294
Or App 784, 785, 431 P3d 103 (2018) (same).
         In this case the habeas court was presented with
a motion to appoint counsel at the time plaintiff filed the
writ of habeas corpus. Plaintiff renewed that request after
the court entered judgment on the petition.2 Thus, the court
    1
      Our cases addressing abuse of discretion distinguish procedural errors
from substantive errors. For instance, a trial court could award attorney fees
that were substantively permissible, but without making special findings—a pro-
cedural error. Absent preservation of the procedural error, we would typically
not review a claimed procedural error. See, e.g., Jaimez, 323 Or App at 743. This
case does not lend itself to such distinction between procedural and substantive
errors, in part because ORS 34.355 does not provide a mechanism for a litigant
to request findings as does ORCP 68 C, and in part because the habeas court did
not create even the minimally adequate record required for substantive appellate
review.
    2
      At oral argument on appeal defendant suggested that the later motion to
appoint counsel was irrelevant, because plaintiff had no right to amend the peti-
tion. We express no opinion on whether plaintiff could have amended the peti-
tion or moved for reconsideration after the court issued judgment but note that
plaintiff could have amended the petition under ORCP 23 A before defendant’s
Cite as 325 Or App 560 (2023)                                               565

was presented with a motion that required an exercise of
discretion. To be sure, plaintiff was not entitled to have an
attorney appointed, but he was entitled to a ruling with suf-
ficient explanation on the record in response to his motion
to appoint counsel. See Mayfield, 302 Or at 645. Failure to
rule on the motion was an abuse of discretion by the habeas
court. Id. We therefore vacate the judgment and remand for
the habeas court to rule on the motion and make a record
of its exercise of discretion. See State v. Kacin, 237 Or App
66, 73, 240 P3d 1099 (2010) (trial court “must * * * supply
enough information to enable appellate courts to engage in
meaningful review of the court’s exercise of discretion”).
       Judgment dismissing writ of habeas corpus vacated
and remanded.

response, or after defendant’s response with consent of defendant or with leave of
the court before the court issued judgment. See Taylor v. Peters, 274 Or App 477,
480 n 5, 361 P3d 54 (2015), aff’d, 360 Or 460, 383 P3d 279 (2016) (noting that had
the defendant raised a certain argument below, the plaintiff “may have been able
to amend the petition under ORCP 23 to make the necessary allegations”).