The Court of Appeals Appears at Mac-Hi

by KAREN STEELE

For the first time in the history of Eastern Oregon, a legitimate Court of Appeals took place in McLoughlin’s Jack Williams Auditorium.  Three court judges, two public defenders, and one prosecutor entered Tuesday morning, along with a bailiff and police escort. What happened on stage was nothing like anything you’ve seen on TV.

One of the two important things to understand is that this is not the “heroic defense attorney vs evil prosecutor” cases that you see on cable programming. Secondly, this was a real Court of Appeals session. It was the real deal, not a fun reenactment just to entertain high schoolers.

Some background information: before the Court gathers, the kind of typical court action that you’re used to seeing has already happened. The defendant has already been declared ‘guilty’ by the judges and the jury. If said defendant feels that the verdict is unfair or biased (or verdicts, if they are being tried for multiple charges), an appeal is filed. Basically - imagine a four-year old whining “it’s not fair!” This is also called a complaint. If deemed to be a viable complaint by a panel, the appeal moves on to the Court of Appeals.

The three judges (Judges Rex Armstrong, Erika Hadlock, Jim Egan; seen at left, in order) gather, along with the defendant’s attorney (in these cases, Mark Brown and John Evans) and the state prosecutor (Prosecutor Shaw). The defender has 10 minutes to explain the background information to the judges and then explain the points that their client has complained on - the ruling is unfair, the charges are biased or unjust, this piece of evidence was ignored, etc. Then the prosecutor takes the stand for 15 minutes and explains why the appellate court gave this ruling. For the last five minutes, the defender counters the prosecutor’s points and justifies them for their client’s sake. At the 30-minute mark, a red light goes off and the defense leaves the stand.

Not super exciting, but still intriguing. After hearing over ten of these on a typical day, the judge returns home, and, sometime over the next month, writes up an opinion, where they explain if they feel that the previous ruling was accurate, or if it should be appealed (removed, taken back, recalled). If two or more of them decide that the complaint should be appealed, they meet up and write an official opinion and turn it in. And the cycle continued.

The published opinions from the Court of Appeals on October 27th can be found at this website: http://www.publications.ojd.state.or.us/Pages/OpinionsCOA2015.aspx.