State v. Eastep

Defendant, who was convicted after a jury trial of unauthorized use of a vehicle (UUV), ORS 164.135, assigns error to the trial court’s denial of his motion for judgment of acquittal (MJOA) and to the court’s rejection of his requested jury instruction that, to establish the offense of UUV, the state must prove that the vehicle in question was “a ‘single operable unit.’” For the reasons explained below, we conclude that the trial court did not err and we therefore affirm the judgment of conviction.1

In reviewing the trial court’s denial of defendant’s MJOA, we view the evidence in the light…