Opinion
A159775
01-04-2018
STATE of Oregon, Plaintiff-Respondent, v. Jonah Michael FULLERTON, Defendant-Appellant.
Ernest G. Lannet, Chief Defender, and Meredith Allen, Deputy Public Defender, Criminal Appellate Section, Office of Public Defense Services, filed the brief for appellant. Ellen F. Rosenblum, Attorney General, Benjamin Gutman, Solicitor General, and Patrick M. Ebbett, Assistant Attorney General, filed the brief for respondent.
Ernest G. Lannet, Chief Defender, and Meredith Allen, Deputy Public Defender, Criminal Appellate Section, Office of Public Defense Services, filed the brief for appellant.
Ellen F. Rosenblum, Attorney General, Benjamin Gutman, Solicitor General, and Patrick M. Ebbett, Assistant Attorney General, filed the brief for respondent.
Before Ortega, Presiding Judge, and Garrett, Judge, and Powers, Judge.
PER CURIAMDefendant appeals a judgment of conviction for two counts of first-degree sexual abuse, ORS 163.427. In his first assignment of error, he asserts that the trial court erred by requiring him to proceed to trial without counsel because he did not knowingly and voluntarily waive his right to counsel through "misconduct." In a second assignment, defendant contends that the trial court erroneously allowed the state to present expert testimony about the grooming behavior of a person who has a sexual interest in children. Finally, in a third assignment of error, defendant asserts that the trial court erred by not merging his guilty verdicts for the two counts of first-degree sexual abuse into a single conviction. We reject defendant's first and second assignments of error without written discussion. We write only to address the state's concession that the trial court erred by not merging the jury's guilty verdicts into a single conviction. We agree with the state that the trial court erred in that regard, see State v. Nelson , 282 Or.App. 427, 447, 386 P.3d 73 (2016), and accept the state's concession.
Defendant also submitted a pro se brief. We reject his pro se assignments of error without further discussion.
--------
Convictions on Counts 1 and 2 reversed and remanded for entry of a judgment of conviction for one count of first-degree sexual abuse; remanded for resentencing; otherwise affirmed.