Jacob Tanzer

This case is a mandamus action by French tire manufacturer Michelin France to require dismissal of a products liability suit filed against it in Oregon circuit court by Oregon corporation Lamb-Weston. The underlying claim alleged that a defective Michelin tire caused damage to a truck and lost profits, though the tire's purchase, installation, and explosion all occurred outside Oregon. The Oregon Supreme Court granted the writ and ordered dismissal, holding that the trial court lacked personal jurisdiction. The court first found no jurisdiction under any specific provision of Oregon's long-arm statute, ORCP 4, then concluded that the general due-process provision also did not permit jurisdiction because Michelin France lacked minimum contacts with Oregon related to the claim, as required by World-Wide Volkswagen.

proceduretorts & liability

This case was a marital dissolution proceeding involving the division of real property acquired partly as gifts to the husband, along with awards of spousal and child support after a 13-year marriage with four children. The Oregon Supreme Court held that property received by one spouse as a gift during marriage qualifies as a marital asset under ORS 107.105(1)(e) and is subject to equitable division, applying a rebuttable presumption of equal spousal contribution that accounts for homemaker efforts. The court upheld the trial court's roughly equal division of assets, awarding the wife the family home and 10 acres while giving the husband the remaining acreage, and affirmed spousal support of $300 monthly for 10 years plus child support, with remand only for child support recalculation. The reasoning centered on the statute's directive to consider homemaker contributions to marital assets and the length of the marriage in determining a just division, even where initial acquisition was by gift rather than joint effort.

family lawproperty

This case involves the equitable division of property in the dissolution of a 24-year marriage between parties in their early forties with grown children and no requests for spousal support. The disputed assets included the family home, a house purchased with savings after separation, a condominium, and farmland inherited by the wife shortly before the parties separated. The trial court awarded the family home to the husband and the inheritance and condominium to the wife while ordering the other house sold and proceeds split; the wife appealed seeking an even split of non-inherited assets. On de novo review, the Oregon Supreme Court held that inherited property is not subject to the statutory presumption of equal contribution applicable to marital assets, affirmed that the inheritance should remain with the wife, and modified the decree to award the second house entirely to the wife along with a $20,000 judgment lien on the family home to achieve a just and proper overall division considering the parties' incomes and the desirability of a clean break.

family lawproperty

The case involved taxpayers challenging a county assessor's valuation of a 14-acre undeveloped portion of a 26-acre parcel for ad valorem tax purposes after they purchased the entire property in an arm's-length transaction for $500,000. The Tax Court upheld the Department of Revenue's reduced assessed value of $154,860 for the tract, and on de novo review the Oregon Supreme Court affirmed that decision. Plaintiffs argued that subtracting the assessed value of the remaining 12 acres from the purchase price established a lower fair market value, but the court held that a recent sale price of the whole property is not necessarily determinative of the value of a part and found the evidence unpersuasive. The court instead credited the assessor's comparable sales analysis, which supported the higher valuation after adjustments for differences in the properties, and concluded that plaintiffs failed to meet their burden of proving the assessment incorrect under ORS 305.427.

taxesproperty

This case was a mandamus proceeding brought by a defendant who had entered a no-contest plea to first-degree sexual abuse; he challenged the trial court's denial of his motion to have counsel attend presentence investigation interviews conducted by a county diagnostic center. The Oregon Supreme Court held that the defendant was entitled to the presence of counsel at those interviews. The court reasoned that Article I, section 11 of the Oregon Constitution and the Sixth Amendment guarantee the right to counsel in all criminal prosecutions, that sentencing is a critical stage of such a prosecution at which a defendant must be heard, and that presentence interviews are an integral part of the sentencing process from which counsel therefore cannot be excluded.

criminal lawprocedure

This case involved former employees suing their employer for breach of contract after being discharged for alleged threats of violence, claiming the discharge violated the 'just cause' provision in the employee handbook. The trial court and Court of Appeals found for the employer, determining that just cause existed based on the employer's good faith investigation and reasonable belief in the facts, without needing to confirm if the threats actually occurred. The Supreme Court of Oregon affirmed, holding that the handbook's just cause clause did not transfer the employer's common law right to unilaterally decide factual matters to a court or other arbiter. The court reasoned that in the absence of explicit or implicit contractual terms shifting this authority, the employer retains the prerogative to make factual determinations regarding just cause.

labor & employment