State v. Brown

124                     June 4, 2025                No. 502

   This is a nonprecedential memorandum opinion
    pursuant to ORAP 10.30 and may not be cited
         except as provided in ORAP 10.30(1).

         IN THE COURT OF APPEALS OF THE
                 STATE OF OREGON

                    STATE OF OREGON,
                     Plaintiff-Respondent,
                               v.
                MICHAEL ALLEN BROWN,
                    Defendant-Appellant.
               Clackamas County Circuit Court
                    21CR36501; A179515

   Ann M. Lininger, Judge.
   Submitted February 26, 2024.
   Ernest G. Lannet, Chief Defender, Criminal Appellate
Section, and Emily P. Seltzer, Deputy Public Defender, Office
of Public Defense Services, filed the brief for appellant.
   Ellen F. Rosenblum, Attorney General, Benjamin Gutman,
Solicitor General, and E. Nani Apo, Assistant Attorney
General, filed the brief for respondent.
  Before Ortega, Presiding Judge, Powers, Judge, and
Hellman, Judge.
   POWERS, J.
   Affirmed.
Nonprecedential Memo Op: 

 (2025)           125

        POWERS, J.
         In this criminal action, the trial court found defendant guilty of aggravated theft in the first degree, among
other crimes, after a bench trial arising out of a fraudulent bottle-deposit scheme. In a single assignment of error,
defendant challenges the sufficiency of the evidence supporting the first-degree aggravated theft conviction and
does not challenge any of his other convictions. Specifically,
defendant contends that the trial court erred by denying his
motion for judgment of acquittal because, in his view, the
state presented insufficient evidence that he actively participated in the bottle-deposit scheme. After reviewing the
parties’ arguments and the record, we affirm.
         As an initial matter, because the parties are familiar with the underlying procedural and historical facts, we
do not provide a detailed recitation for this nonprecedential memorandum opinion. In reviewing a challenge to the
sufficiency of the evidence, we examine the evidence in the
light most favorable to the state to determine whether a
rational trier of fact, accepting reasonable inferences and
reasonable credibility choices, could have found the essential elements of the crime beyond a reasonable doubt. State
v. Cunningham, 

, 

 (1994), cert den,

 (1995).
         On appeal, defendant contends that the state failed
to prove that he committed theft of property worth over
$10,000 because the evidence that he was near, or in “mere
proximity” to, evidence of the bottle-deposit fraud scheme
was insufficient and that, even if the state’s evidence could
establish that he possessed the cash that was in the house,
there was insufficient evidence that he obtained it through
the fraudulent scheme and not by lawful means. The state
remonstrates that the direct and circumstantial evidence of
the source of the cash and defendant’s possession of the cash
was sufficient for the court to deny defendant’s motion for
judgment of acquittal. We conclude that the trial court did
not err.
        We begin by noting that defendant does not challenge the trial court’s finding that Taylor, who also lived
126                                         State v. Brown

in the house with defendant, was running an extensive
theft scheme that used a stolen Oregon Bottle Drop kiosk
to print fraudulent receipts that were later exchanged for
cash at various stores. The evidence detectives found in
defendant’s home included a dismantled kiosk in the living
room, a printer with the specialized Oregon Bottle Drop
paper, notebooks containing information about the scheme,
approximately 200 fraudulent Bottle Drop receipts, and
envelopes of cash totaling almost $98,000 throughout the
home. Specifically, detectives found over $46,000 in cash
in the bedroom that defendant shared with Taylor, with a
large portion of it in a bag on defendant’s side of the bed.
         In short, given the evidence that the detectives
found in the home, combined with other evidence—including defendant’s statements, his sister’s testimony, evidence
found in his car, and evidence of his financial circumstances—we conclude that the trial court did not err by
denying defendant’s motion for judgment of acquittal. That
is, there is direct and circumstantial evidence from which
a rational factfinder could conclude that defendant’s knowledge of—and participation in—the fraudulent scheme gave
rise to a reasonable inference that he committed theft of
property worth over $10,000. See State v. Hall, 

, 

 (1998) (explaining that, in analyzing the
sufficiency of the evidence, an appellate court “make[s] no
distinction between direct and circumstantial evidence as
to the degree of proof required”).
        Affirmed.