State v. Slagle

"Where a defendant pleads guilty or no contest to committing crimes 'on or between' a range of dates as alleged in the charging instrument, the state can prove that the defendant committed the offense on any of the dates alleged because the defendant, 'by failing to limit or qualify his pleas, assent[s] to the broadest construction of his pleas.'" Hibbard v. Board of Parole, 144 Or App 82, 87-88 925 P2d 910 (1996), vac'd on other grounds, 327 Or 594, 965 P2d 1022 (1998).

Defendant appealed a conviction for 10 counts of first-degree encouraging child sexual abuse.  Defendant assigned error to the trial court finding that there were multiple victims of his crimes, and that the trial court failed to merge the verdicts into a single conviction.  Defendant argued that the affidavit should be stricken because it effectively amended his guilty plea by referring to 10 separate victims instead of a "single 'generic victim'" since the charging instrument did not specify that there were multiple victims.  The state argued that ORS 161.067(2) prohibits merger when the underlying offense involves two or more victims and that the district attorney's information broadly alleges that defendant possessed 10 visual recordings of a child without specifying whether the recording depicted multiple children.  "Where a defendant pleads guilty or no contest to committing crimes 'on or between' a range of dates as alleged in the charging instrument, the state can prove that the defendant committed the offense on any of the dates alleged because the defendant, 'by failing to limit or qualify his pleas, assent[s] to the broadest construction of his pleas.'" Hibbard v. Board of Parole, 144 Or App 82, 87-88 925 P2d 910 (1996), vac'd on other grounds, 327 Or 594, 965 P2d 1022 (1998).  The Court held that the trial court did not err because defendant's arguments are grounded on incorrect assumptions about there being only one victim.  Affirmed.