State v. Larson
Case # A156627
Full Text of Opinion: http://www.publications.ojd.state.or.us/docs/A156627.pdf
Defendant Larson was charged with Delivery of Marijuana in June 2006 in Washington County Circuit Court in Oregon. Around the same time, he was also arrested in Washington State and charged there with Manufacturing Marijuana. In November 2006, Larson pleaded guilty to delivery in the Oregon case and the possession count was dismissed. In March 2007, he entered a guilty plea in the Washington case.
Larson later got his Washington State conviction vacated (expunged). He soon after filed a motion in Oregon to have his Oregon conviction expunged pursuant to ORS 137.225. He asserted in part that the events that led to his Washington conviction occurred before June 2006, several months before he was convicted in Oregon, and thus were not part of the “circumstances and behavior” that the court could consider under ORS 137.225(3).
The trial court disagreed with Larson and considered the Washington conviction to deny his motion to set aside his Oregon conviction.
The Court of Appeals concludes that under ORS 137.225(3), a trial court may consider only the defendant’s “circumstances and behavior” after the conviction that he or she seeks to have set aside. The Court of Appeals admits that its earlier conclusion in State v. Coughlin, 258 Or. App. 882, 889, 311 P3d 988 (2013) – that a trial court may consider all of the defendant’s “circumstances and behavior” in the 10-year period leading up to that person’s ORS 137.225 motion – was wrong. Because Larson’s Washington conduct occurred prior to the Oregon conviction, the Washington conduct is not part of the circumstances and behavior that a trial court could consider. Accordingly, the trial court erred in considering the Washington conviction, and the case is reversed and remanded.