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THE PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. ANDRE MERRITT, Defendant and Appellant.
A jury convicted defendant Andre Merritt of two counts of robbery and found true allegations that he personally used a firearm during both robberies. However, the trial court failed to give the standard jury instruction on the elements of robbery. The failure to instruct on the elements of a charged crime is serious constitutional error that impacts a defendant’s fundamental right to a jury trial. We must decide whether the error can ever be found harmless.
In People v. Cummings (1993) 4 Cal.4th 1233 (Cummings), this court held similar error to be reversible per se. However, developments since then, including the high court decision in Neder v. United States (1999) 527 U.S. 1 (Neder), have made that holding obsolete. Obviously, the more elements that the instructions omit, the more likely it is that the error is prejudicial. But we see no need to hold categorically that error in failing to instruct on elements of the offense can never be found harmless. Instead, harmless error analysis applies if the error at issue does not “ ‘vitiat[e] all the jury’s findings.’ ” (Id. at p. 11.) No such vitiation occurred here. Although this jury did not receive the standard robbery instructions, it was instructed on the mental state required for the crime, on the need to find defendant’s identity as the perpetrator, and on the elements of the firearm use allegation. In such circumstances, the error is not reversible per se but is reversible unless harmless beyond a reasonable doubt.
At trial, defendant conceded that the perpetrator, whoever he was, was guilty of robbery, i.e., that all of the elements of robbery were present. His defense was solely that he was not the perpetrator. The crimes were recorded, making the concession virtually compelled. Because of this concession and other circumstances, the error, serious though it was, was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt.
On December 19, 2012, around 5:00 p.m., Kristen Wickum was working at the front counter of Storage Direct, in Victorville. A man approached the front counter, pulled out a gun, and demanded money. Frightened, Wickum gave the man around $338. The man broke the office telephone, and then left. He was wearing a “hoody,” but Wickum could see his face. Wickum identified defendant as the perpetrator from a photographic lineup, although she could not identify him at trial. A video camera recorded the events. The recording was played for the jury.
Around 6:20 p.m. the same day, Christian Lopez was working at La Mexicana, a convenience store in Victorville. A man pointed a gun at Lopez and demanded money. Fearful that the man would shoot him, Lopez gave him around $700. The man kicked Lopez in the back as he left the store. Lopez identified defendant in court as the perpetrator and had previously identified him from a photographic lineup. An audio and video camera recorded the events. The recording was played for the jury.
Defendant presented an alibi defense. Defendant’s mother testified that the night of December 18, 2012, she picked him up from the local jail and took him home, where he and others celebrated his release from jail. The group smoked marijuana and played video games. The party lasted “at least two or three days.” Defendant’s mother testified that defendant never left the house from 5:00 p.m. to around 6:00 p.m., December 19, 2012. He was at home “on the computer.” She said he did not leave the house for about four days after being released from jail. Defendant’s brother testified that he specifically remembered defendant being home from around 4:30 p.m. to 6:30 p.m. the afternoon of December 19, 2012.
A San Bernardino County Sheriff’s detective testified in rebuttal that he was present when defendant was interviewed. Defendant said he was at home “earlier in the day” on December 19, 2012, but then he walked to a friend’s residence, where he spent the night of December 19.
The jury convicted defendant of both counts of robbery and found the firearm use allegations true. The court sentenced him accordingly. On appeal, he argued that the judgment must be reversed because the trial court failed to instruct the jury on the elements of robbery. The Attorney General conceded the error but argued it was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt. Relying on Cummings, supra, 4 Cal.4th 1233, the Court of Appeal found the error reversible per se and reversed the judgment.
We granted the Attorney General’s petition for review.
We must decide whether error in failing to instruct on the elements of robbery is amenable to harmless error analysis and, if so, whether the error was harmless in this case.
A. Is the Error Amenable to Harmless Error Analysis?
In Cummings, supra, 4 Cal.4th 1233, the codefendant, Gay, was convicted of multiple counts of robbery, attempted robbery, and conspiracy to commit robbery. As in this case, the court instructed the jury on the mental state required for robbery but otherwise failed to instruct on the elements of the crime. The failure to so instruct was obviously error. (Id. at pp. 1311-1312.) We considered the effect of the error.
More recently, this court considered whether instructional error that omitted two elements from the jury charge (in that case, two elements of a special circumstance allegation) was also amenable to harmless error review. (Mil, supra, 53 Cal.4th 400.) We concluded it was, although we found the error prejudicial in that case.
We distinguished, but did not overrule, Cummings, concluding that removing two elements from the jury’s consideration was different from “the omission of ‘substantially all of the elements of an offense,’ as occurred in Cummings, supra, 4 Cal.4th at page 1315.” (Mil, supra, 53 Cal.4th at p. 415.) Now that the same error that occurred in Cummings has occurred in this case, the time has come to decide whether Cummings should still be followed today.
We believe the rule established in Cummings, supra, 4 Cal.4th 1233, is as artificial as the rule the defendant urged in Mil, supra, 53 Cal.4th 400. What Neder said about the omission of a single element, and Mil about the omission of two elements, applies equally to the omission of more than two elements. As will be seen in the next part, where we consider the question of prejudice, the error here does not “ ‘defy’ ” harmless error analysis (Neder, supra, 527 U.S. at p. 7), but is readily susceptible to such analysis. Certainly, the more elements that are omitted, the less likely it is that the error is harmless, but so long as the error does not vitiate all of the jury’s findings, it is amenable to harmless error analysis.
The error here vitiated some of the jury’s findings, but not all of them. It did not vitiate the finding that defendant acted with the mental state required for robbery. It did not vitiate the finding that he personally used a firearm during the commission of the offenses. Perhaps crucially, it did not vitiate the finding on the only contested issue at trial: defendant’s identity as the perpetrator.
In urging this court to follow Cummings, defendant argues that because “Neder repeatedly emphasized the issue there was the omission of ‘an’ element or a ‘single’ element,” it does not control this case. It is true Neder repeatedly uses the singular in describing the missing element, but that is because only one element was missing. As explained, however, its reasoning applies to the omission of multiple elements as long as the omissions do not vitiate all of the jury’s findings.
We agree with the dissent that an instructional error or omission that amounts to the total deprivation of a jury trial would be structural error, that is, reversible per se. (Dis. opn., post, at p. 5.) That is not remotely what occurred here. Both attorneys described the elements of robbery to the jury, and did so accurately and completely. (See discussion, post, at p. 15.) The error did not vitiate three of the jury’s findings: (1) that defendant acted with the mental state required for robbery, (2) that he used a firearm, and (3) that he was the perpetrator. Defendant received a full and fair jury trial, with complete and correct instructions, on the question of identity, the only contested issue at trial. There was no total deprivation of a jury trial.
In response to the dissent’s rhetoric, we see nothing in this opinion that will encourage trial courts simply to tell the jury to convict the defendant of something if it finds he or she did something, anything, wrong, or to permit appellate courts to affirm convictions based on such instructions. (Dis. opn., post, at pp. 9-11.) Again, that is not remotely what occurred here. (See Neder, supra, 527 U.S. at p. 17, fn. 2 [the court’s response to the dissent’s similarly exaggerated claims].) We are also not engaging in appellate factfinding any more than did the court in Neder. Instead, we are assessing what effect the error had on the verdict.
The out-of-state cases the dissent cites are either consistent with this opinion or are distinguishable. State v. Bunch (N.C. 2010) 689 S.E.2d 866 is consistent with this opinion. That case found harmless the failure to instruct on multiple elements of the offense. As the dissent notes (dis. opn., post, at p. 6), the Bunch court did not additionally hold that the failure to instruct on all of the elements could be found harmless. That question was not before the court. In People v. Duncan (Mich. 2000) 610 N.W.2d 551, the jury convicted the defendant of two counts of murder and two counts of what the appellate court called “felony-firearm.” (Id. at p. 552.) But the trial court never instructed the jury on any of the elements of felony firearm. As far as the opinion indicates, it does not appear that the parties discussed with the jury that crime separately from the main murder charge or that the defense made any concession. The jury was only given the “title of the crime.” (Id. at p. 555.) The Michigan Supreme Court found the error reversible per se. Among the reasons it gave is that it is “possible that the failure to provide any of the elements of the charge may have suggested to the jury that the two charges were tie-barred, i.e., if the jury found defendant guilty of murder, they were then to find defendant guilty of felony-firearm.” (Ibid.) Here, by contrast, there was no tying of a secondary crime to a main crime, and, as discussed, the jury was not entirely ignorant of the elements of the charged crime. Finally, in Harrell v. State (Miss. 2014) 134 So.3d 266, the Mississippi Supreme Court rejected Neder, supra, 527 U.S. 1, entirely and, as a matter of independent state grounds, “h[e]ld that it is always and in every case reversible error for the courts of Mississippi to deny an accused the right to have a jury decide guilt as to each and every element.” (Harrell, at p. 275.) We have not rejected Neder.
For these reasons, we conclude that the rule of People v. Cummings, supra, 4 Cal.4th 1233, 1311-1315, has no continuing validity. The error of this case, like the errors in Neder, supra, 527 U.S. 1, and Mil, supra, 53 Cal.4th 400, is amenable to harmless error analysis. In the next part, we undertake that analysis.
B. Is the Error Prejudicial in This Case?
We must determine whether it is clear beyond a reasonable doubt that a rational jury would have rendered the same verdict absent the error. (Neder, supra, 527 U.S. at p. 18.) The circumstances here compel the conclusion the error was harmless.
The jury was not entirely ignorant of the elements of robbery. Although the court did not instruct on the elements (except the mental state), attorneys for both parties accurately described the elements of robbery in front of the jury. The court instructed the jury to follow its instructions rather than the attorneys’ comments on the law, but only to the extent those comments conflicted with the court’s instructions. Because the court gave no instruction on most of the elements of robbery, the attorneys’ comments did not conflict with any instruction. Accordingly, the jury might well have considered these comments in its deliberations. (See People v. Jennings (2010) 50 Cal.4th 616, 678 [the prosecutor’s discussion of the missing element a factor to consider in determining prejudice].) We do not suggest this circumstance cured the error. It is the court’s duty to instruct the jury, not the parties’. But it is a factor to consider in determining prejudice.
The evidence presented to the jury virtually forced this concession. Both crimes were captured on tape that was played to the jury. The recordings were such that defendant could argue he was not the person in the recording, but they did not allow him to argue credibly that no robbery occurred. The recording of the Storage Direct incident, which had no audio, shows the perpetrator wielding a gun and the victim handing over money before lying down on the floor. It also shows the perpetrator breaking the office telephone. The recording of the La Mexicana incident, which included audio, shows the perpetrator wielding a gun, yelling at the victim to lie down, demanding that the victim hand over money, and threatening to shoot the victim. The victim asks the perpetrator not to hurt him. The perpetrator kicks the victim in the back before leaving the store.
Finally, the evidence that both robberies occurred was overwhelming and uncontroverted. Both victims provided unchallenged testimony that they were robbed, and the jury could view the incidents on videotape. “[A] court, in typical appellate-court fashion, asks whether the record contains evidence that could rationally lead to a contrary finding with respect to the omitted element.” (Neder, supra, 527 U.S. at p. 19.) Here, the record contains no such evidence with respect to the omitted elements of robbery.
For all of these reasons, we find the error harmless beyond a reasonable doubt. Because all of these circumstances exist in this case, and combined they show the error to be harmless, we express no opinion on what other circumstances in other cases might or might not permit a finding of harmless error.
We stress that this kind of error should never occur. One of the trial court’s most basic duties is to instruct the jury on the elements of the crime. We assume the error here was solely due to inadvertence. No doubt the court intended to give the necessary instruction but somehow neglected to do so, and no one noticed. But a reviewing court should not have to go through this exercise. Certainly, a jury trial is a difficult undertaking. There is much to think about and much to do, often under considerable pressure. But the instructions are an important part of the process and care should be taken to ensure that they are correct and actually given. We also believe the prosecution bears responsibility for ensuring the jury is properly instructed. It is in its best interest to make sure the record does not contain obvious and serious error.
We reverse the judgment of the Court of Appeal and remand the matter for further proceedings consistent with this opinion, including resolving any remaining issues.
The court characterizes the main question before us as whether the trial court’s failure to instruct the jury on the elements of robbery “is amenable to harmless error analysis.” (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 13.) Although I agree that some form of harmless error review is appropriate, I believe such review is more circumscribed in this context than today’s opinion suggests.
Today’s opinion concludes that the logic of Neder and Mil “applies equally to the omission of more than two elements” of an offense and thus undermines People v. Cummings (1993) 4 Cal.4th 1233, which held that an instructional error that withdraws from the jury “substantially all of the elements of an offense” is not subject to harmless error analysis. (Id. at p. 1315.) But this case does not require us to reconsider Cummings. Although that case also involved the omission of an instruction on robbery, the case before us differs in one important respect: Here, unlike in Cummings, defense counsel expressly conceded that a robbery had taken place. In closing argument, defense counsel correctly stated for the jury each of the elements of robbery, repeating what the prosecutor had said. Defense counsel then said there was “ ‘no question these people were robbed, okay. Our only contention is with element number one that it was not the defendant. Not the defendant.’ ” (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 4.) The defendant in Cummings “did not dispute that the offenses shown by the evidence were robbery” (Cummings, at p. 1312), but a decision not to contest one or more elements of an offense is not tantamount to a concession and does not relieve the prosecution of its burden of proof (Estelle v. McGuire (1991) 502 U.S. 62, 69).
In light of defense counsel’s correct articulation of the elements of robbery, followed by an express concession that a robbery had occurred, this is a case where “a defendant himself has taken the [conceded] issue ․ away from the jury,” leaving the jury with only the question of identity. (Connecticut v. Johnson (1983) 460 U.S. 73, 87 (plur. opn.); see People v. Flood (1998) 18 Cal.4th 470, 504 [“One situation in which instructional error removing an element of the crime from the jury’s consideration has been deemed harmless is where the defendant concedes or admits that element.”].) It is on the basis of defense counsel’s concession (and there is no allegation here of ineffective assistance of counsel) that I find the instructional error harmless beyond a reasonable doubt.
The court today notes, among its reasons for finding the error harmless, that “the evidence that both robberies occurred was overwhelming and uncontroverted.” (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 16.) This is unnecessary to the holding and, in my view, unwarranted. It is true that Neder and Mil authorize reviewing courts, in applying harmless error analysis, to consider whether the evidence on the omitted element or elements was “overwhelming” and “uncontested.” (Neder, supra, 527 U.S. at p. 17; see Mil, supra, 53 Cal.4th at p. 414.) However, there is no escaping the fact that when a reviewing court considers the strength of the evidence in order to fill a gap in the jury’s findings, the court is wading into the factfinding role reserved for the jury. (See Neder, supra, 527 U.S. at p. 18; id. at p. 27 (conc. opn. of Stevens, J.); id. at pp. 34–39 (dis. opn of Scalia, J.); see also People v. Jackson (2014) 58 Cal.4th 724, 790 (conc. & dis. opn. of Liu, J.) [“The risk of an appellate court usurping the jury’s role becomes especially great when harmless error analysis focuses not on whether error might have affected the jury’s decisionmaking, but on whether there was overwhelming evidence to support the result.”].) The high court in Neder acknowledged that the failure to instruct the jury on an element of the offense “infringe[s] upon the jury’s factfinding role” but concluded that “an appropriate balance” must be struck “between ‘society’s interest in punishing the guilty [and] the method by which decisions of guilt are to be made.’ ” (Id. at p. 18.) Although appellate factfinding is permitted to cure a failure to instruct on one or two elements, at some point the severity of the error must tip the balance the other way. A reviewing court goes too far in exercising the jury’s function when it undertakes its own evaluation of the evidence in determining whether a wholesale failure to instruct the jury on the elements of an offense is harmless.
For the reasons above, I concur in the judgment.
DISSENTING OPINION BY CUÉLLAR, J.
Ask almost any lawyer or well-informed citizen and she will tell you that criminal adjudication in the United States is supposed to work something like this: Legislators define crimes, judges explain to juries the definitions of crimes a defendant is accused of committing, and jurors decide whether, beyond a reasonable doubt, the defendant engaged in the criminal acts charged. (See Pen. Code, § 6; United States v. Hudson & Goodwin (1812) 11 U.S. (7 Cranch) 32, 34; see also In re Winship (1970) 397 U.S. 358, 361 [“The requirement that guilt of a criminal charge be established by proof beyond a reasonable doubt dates at least from our early years as a Nation.”].) In this familiar and longstanding framework Americans find far more than just a guide to courtroom dramas and police procedural shows. Instead this framework preserves a link between criminal justice and democracy –– specifically, between criminal statutes enacted by the public’s democratic representatives and the integrity of an adjudicatory process assigning a specific role to judges and another to community members serving as jurors.
That process broke down completely in this case. Legislators had indeed defined the crime of robbery, but the jurors who convicted Andre Merritt of that crime were at no point given this definition by the judge. Merritt was charged with two robberies, and defense counsel argued at trial that someone other than Merritt had committed the crimes. The judge then told jurors that they had to find whether Merritt committed “the crime of robbery.” Though at certain points the lawyers offered arguments about what constitutes robbery, the judge never told the jurors what the law required. And so without the benefit of instruction on the concept of “robbery” — or indeed, even a literal recitation of the statutory elements — jurors were left to decide whether the defendant committed whatever they each felt robbery was. The jury then found Merritt guilty, and the judge sentenced him to over 19 years in prison for these crimes.
The jury that made Merritt a criminal found guilt based on little more than the title of a crime — “robbery,” a word the judge used several times but never once defined. So Merritt’s trial lacked the connection to democratic accountability of a jury applying a crime definition specified by their elected representatives. The jurors were sent to deliberate about whether Merritt committed robbery without any judicial instruction on how California defines that particular crime. When a jury’s deliberation is in no way structured by the facts that the Legislature singled out as necessary for a conviction, jurors might as well have been asked nothing more than, “do you think the defendant is guilty of anything?” This problem of unstructured, unmoored jury deliberation is prejudicial in a way that cannot be measured.
The majority’s contention is that “[w]hat Neder said about the omission of a single element, and Mil about the omission of two elements, applies equally to the omission of more than two elements.” (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 11.) This formulation understates the error in this case, which was a failure to give not just a few but all the elements. Failure to give two elements is not meaningfully distinct from failure to give one. But failure to give any definition of a crime is a different matter altogether. In cases where a court gives a partial definition, the jury’s deliberation is still structured by what the law requires for a conviction. In those cases, courts can ask whether the partial definition provided enough guidance that the jury’s verdict can be salvaged. But the error in Merritt’s case — total failure to tell the jury any of how the Penal Code defines the crime they must find — “vitiates all the jury’s findings.” (Sullivan, supra, 508 U.S. at p. 281.) In a case like this, we should give no weight to the jury’s finding that the defendant committed the crime, since this finding had no basis in any instruction provided by the court explaining the crime’s definition in the Penal Code.
In ruling on such deprivations of constitutional rights courts routinely distinguish between partial deprivations, which are sometimes treated as harmless, and total deprivations of the same right, which are treated as never harmless. For example, the complete deprivation of the Sixth Amendment right to counsel is never harmless, but the absence of a lawyer for part of trial can be harmless. (See People v. Lightsey (2012) 54 Cal.4th 668, 699-702.) Along the same lines, even if the “complete denial of summation amounts to structural error,” this does not mean “the restriction of summation also amounts to structural error.” (Glebe v. Frost (2014) 574 U.S. __, __ [135 S.Ct. 429, 431].) Likewise, we recently held that while “partial denial of the right to a previous trial transcript is subject to harmless error review, ․ the total denial of the same right would be structural error.” (People v. Reese (March 9, 2017, S230259) ___ Cal.5th. ___ [p. 12].) As Reese explained, this is because “errors can shift between being structural or subject to harmless error review depending on the extent of the violation.” (Id. at p. 10.) At Merritt’s trial, the violation was as total as possible: the jury was given no definition whatsoever of the charged crime. While Neder’s harmless error analysis can be extended to other cases with a partial definition (one or two missing elements), extending it to total deprivations strays into a whole different category. In cases with no definition, the jury made no findings that can be leveraged into a lawful verdict.
We are not the first court to consider whether Neder makes failure to define a crime harmless. Every state high court to consider this question has rejected the view the majority announces today. The Michigan Supreme Court ruled after Neder that a “trial court’s failure to instruct regarding any of the elements” of a crime sends “the jury to its deliberative duties deprived of its essential tool” and leaves “the jury to guess what the prosecuting attorney might be required to prove.” (People v. Duncan (Mich. 2000) 610 N.W.2d 551, 554.) The majority suggests that trial counsel’s arguments might explain the Duncan holding. Yet no opinion in Duncan mentioned counsel’s arguments ––perhaps because no judge considered those arguments relevant to the question at issue. What the Michigan Supreme Court actually said in its holding is contrary to the rule the majority announces today. (See Duncan, 610 N.W.2d at p. 552 [“We issue this opinion to reiterate a bright line rule: It is structural error requiring automatic reversal to allow a jury to deliberate a criminal charge where there is a complete failure to instruct the jury regarding any of the elements necessary to determine if the prosecution has proven the charge beyond a reasonable doubt.”]; id. at p. 556 [“a jury’s conviction must be set aside where the court omitted instructions on all the elements of an offense”].) And though two justices dissented in that case, they went out of their way to agree with the majority on the question we decide today. (See id. at p. 561, fn. 5 (dis. opn. of Corrigan, J.).) The Mississippi Supreme Court has also held on state law grounds that failure to give any definition of a crime is never harmless. (See Harrell v. State (Miss. 2014) 134 So.3d 266, 273.) And though the North Carolina Supreme Court has held that failure to give two elements of an offense may be harmless (just as we did in Mil), that court has not ruled that the same is true for failure to give any definition whatsoever. (See State v. Bunch (N.C. 2010) 689 S.E.2d 866.) In the 18 years since Neder, we are the first state high court to hold that a trial judge’s total failure to define a crime can be harmless. No federal court of appeals has so held either.
The majority points to another aspect of the record that it says confirms Merritt’s guilt, aside from the video footage and other evidence: defense counsel’s references to the elements of robbery, followed by his argument that “these people were robbed, okay.” (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 4, 13.) There are at least three problems with using a lawyer’s arguments to find guilt in this way. First, “the arguments of counsel are no substitute for instructions from the court.” (People v. Harris (2008) 43 Cal.4th 1269, 1320.) We have so held for a reason — only a judge can tell jurors an authoritative account of the law, and the integrity of the process is at risk if core obligations of a neutral adjudicator are turned over to advocates bound to the interests of their client. Second, counsel’s arguments here were not a “concession.” (Maj. opn., ante, at pp. 2, 14.) Though the plurality in Connecticut v. Johnson (1983) 460 U.S. 73 (Johnson) stated that an instructional error “may be harmless if the defendant conceded” the element, the two cases that the opinion cited for this point involved pleas of insanity or self-defense. (Id. at p. 87.) When defendants plead either of those defenses, they are confessing illegal acts, based on their own knowledge of their own acts. The only way to accept an insanity or self-defense plea is to accept that the defendant committed the charged acts. Merritt did not admit to any acts. Rather, his lawyer simply shared his secondhand assessment of the evidence. And all the lawyer said was that this evidence seemed to show someone else committing a robbery.
The majority quotes People v. Flood (1998) 18 Cal.4th 470 (Flood), which also stated that “removing an element of the crime from the jury’s consideration” can be harmless “where the defendant concedes or admits the element.” (Id. at p. 504.) A close reading of Flood undermines the majority’s view. For one, the opinion warned that “failing to submit the entire case to the jury” is “an error that clearly would be a ‘structural’ rather than a ‘trial’ error.” (Id. at p. 503.) The majority seems to hold the opposite. Moreover, the defense lawyer in the Flood case asked the judge to direct a finding on the element at issue. (Id. at p. 492.) The defendant then claimed on appeal that this directed finding violated his right to jury trial. Asking the judge to direct a finding on an element is no doubt a concession of that element. In a case like that, we can safely say that the “defendant himself has taken the issue ․ away from the jury.” (Johnson, supra, 460 U.S. at p. 87.) But Merritt did not ask for any directed finding. Nor did he confess to the charged acts, as with a self-defense or insanity defense.
The third problem with putting so much stock in defense counsel’s so-called “concession” is even more fundamental. Merritt, the majority observes, “knew what the elements of robbery were, and he had an opportunity to present any evidence he wished on the subject.” (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 14.) But the burden of proof in a criminal trial lies solely with the People. (See Sullivan, supra, 508 U.S. at p. 277; Flood, supra, 18 Cal.4th at p. 481.) Merritt elected to join the small fraction of criminal defendants who invoke their right to a jury trial, rather than waiving that right for a plea deal. Defendants who invoke their right to a jury trial can be acquitted (including by a directed verdict) even if they present no evidence whatsoever. (See Johnson, supra, 460 U.S. at p. 87, fn.16 [“a defendant in a criminal trial is justified, of course, in defending solely in reliance on the presumption of his innocence and the State’s burden of proof”].) When Merritt chose to go to trial, what he invoked was his right to a jury finding every element of the charged crime, not just the elements his lawyer chose to contest. (See Estelle v. McGuire (1991) 502 U.S. 62, 69 [“the prosecution’s burden to prove every element of the crime is not relieved by a defendant’s tactical decision not to contest an essential element of the offense”].) Defense counsel’s argument that someone committed a robbery was not a “concession” about the definition of robbery.
The majority writes that “[t]he error here vitiated some of the jury’s findings, but not all of them,” since jurors concluded that Merritt (rather than someone else) was a perpetrator of some act or another. (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 12.) But the question remains: a perpetrator of what, precisely? In every single trial that results in a guilty verdict, the jury will have found that the defendant committed some act or another. (See People v. Hogue (1991) 228 Cal.App.3d 1500, 1505.) What the majority calls a “crucial [ ]” distinction — that the jury determined “defendant’s identity as the perpetrator” (maj. opn., ante, at p. 12) — will be true for every single case in which this issue will need to be analyzed. But what the Sixth Amendment requires jurors to decide beyond a reasonable doubt is whether the accused committed the charged crime, not whether he or she happened to commit some act. The majority suggests that a finding that the defendant committed an undefined act — a finding that every single jury will make if they convict — is enough to open the door to judges analyzing the evidence in order to decide whether the defendant committed a crime. As a result, no matter how badly the jury was misled, an appellate court will now be able to use the majority’s justification for reweighing the evidence. Even if the beginning and end of the judge’s instruction to the jury is “decide beyond a reasonable doubt if the defendant is guilty of something, anything,” our ruling today requires judges to uphold the conviction if they agree that a video conclusively established guilt.
Along those lines, harmless error analysis in cases like this could be limited to an examination of the jury findings that were not tainted by the error. The question would be whether the jury’s findings logically establish the missing elements, not whether videos and live testimony allow an appellate court to guess that the jury could have found those elements. This limited and proportional form of harmless error analysis would ensure that truly harmless errors do not require retrial, while maintaining respect for a fundamental right. If whether or not an error is structural pivots on the fact that the jury made certain valid findings (and this is how the majority treats the jury’s findings on identity and intent), it seems disproportionate for this very narrow fact to trigger a roving journey through the prosecution’s evidence that ends in judges watching video footage and voting to decide guilt. If this narrow fact is the reason to analyze whether the error was harmless, the remedial analysis should be limited to that one fact alone.
Nothing in the majority opinion limits the nature of the harmless error analysis in light of the severity or character of the error. To the contrary, the majority rules that judges can weigh the evidence on their own even where jurors convict the defendant of a completely undefined crime. The majority takes care to “express no opinion on what other circumstances in other cases might or might not permit a finding of harmless error” as well as to “stress that this kind of error should never occur.” (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 15.) While I expect those warnings will serve to chasten both trial and appellate judges applying today’s opinion, the majority opens a dangerous door by holding — in defiance of both our precedent and the precedent of any other state high court or federal appeals court — that errors of this kind are negligible once enough appellate judges are convinced that the evidence shows a crime.
The expansive scope of the majority’s harmless error inquiry may make the result in today’s case easier to accept, but the takeaway for future cases is troubling. Going forward, so long as a jury finds beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant did something (even if that something is not a crime), appellate judges can take it from there and decide guilt on their own, no matter what delusions about the law served as the foundation for the jury’s verdict. This prospect is especially troubling for cases like this one featuring video evidence, which can have the effect of making a defendant’s guilt seem especially open and shut. After today’s ruling, so long as video from an officer’s body camera or an interrogation looks clear enough, it will not matter if a judge directed the jury to find guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. Even in such extreme cases, today’s opinion requires appellate judges to step into the jury’s shoes and vote on whether the video proved a crime.
No matter how fair California’s judges are, we remain “officers of the Government.” (Neder, supra, 527 U.S. at p. 32 (dis. opn. of Scalia, J.).) Which means we are “proper objects of that healthy suspicion of the power of government which possessed the Framers and is embodied in the Constitution.” (Ibid.) When we let judges examine evidence in order to answer questions that no juror was asked, we are “operating upon the spinal column of American democracy.” (Id. at p. 30.) At least Neder’s surgery was restricted to circumstances where a jury was told a definition of the crime. In those cases, the trial’s democratic backbone remains intact, since jurors still heard part of the legislature’s definition, and “the error affected only a tiny part of the verdict.” (Flood, supra, 18 Cal.4th at p. 521 (conc. opn. of Chin, J.).) This democratic backbone is what makes those verdicts salvageable, despite the small imperfection. But the majority holds that the very principles that purport to assure accountability in any criminal proceeding — the clear recitation of a crime’s statutory definition and the requirement that this definition be proved to a factfinder beyond a reasonable doubt — can be cast aside like a ballpoint pen bereft of ink.
No judge ever told the jurors in this case the definition of the charged crime — a definition specified by their democratic representatives. The majority’s holding goes well beyond what Neder requires, and it overrules Cummings’s crucial safeguards protecting the integrity of a process that decides whether someone is innocent or a criminal. I respectfully dissent.
WE CONCUR: CANTIL-SAKAUYE, C. J. WERDEGAR, J. CORRIGAN, J. KRUGER, J.

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Can. 840 The sacraments of the New Testament were instituted by Christ the Lord and entrusted to the Church.
As actions of Christ and the Church, they are signs and means which express and strengthen the faith, render worship to God, and effect the sanctification of humanity and thus contribute in the greatest way to establish, strengthen, and manifest ecclesiastical communion. Accordingly, in the celebration of the sacraments the sacred ministers and the other members of the Christian faithful must use the greatest veneration and necessary diligence.
Can. 842 §1. A person who has not received baptism cannot be admitted validly to the other sacraments.
§2. The sacraments of baptism, confirmation, and the Most Holy Eucharist are interrelated in such a way that they are required for full Christian initiation.
§2. Pastors of souls and other members of the Christian faithful, according to their respective ecclesiastical function, have the duty to take care that those who seek the sacraments are prepared to receive them by proper evangelization and catechetical instruction, attentive to the norms issued by competent authority.
Can. 844 §1. Catholic ministers administer the sacraments licitly to Catholic members of the Christian faithful alone, who likewise receive them licitly from Catholic ministers alone, without prejudice to the prescripts of §§2, 3, and 4 of this canon, and ⇒ can. 861, §2.
Catholic ministers in whose Churches these sacraments are valid.
Can. 845 §1. Since the sacraments of baptism, confirmation, and orders imprint a character, they cannot be repeated.
were actually or validly conferred, they are to be conferred conditionally.
Can. 847 §1. In administering the sacraments in which holy oils must be used, the minister must use oils pressed from olives or other plants and, without prejudice to the prescript of ⇒ can. 999, n. 2, consecrated or blessed recently by a bishop; he is not to use old oils unless it is necessary.
§2. The pastor is to obtain the holy oils from his own bishop and is to preserve them diligently with proper care.
Can. 848 The minister is to seek nothing for the administration of the sacraments beyond the offerings defined by competent authority, always taking care that the needy are not deprived of the assistance of the sacraments because of poverty.

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This is the ruleset that Im following when handling the annoying danish tradition of sending “Gække”-letters. “Gæk” means to tease or to make a fool of and the sending of these letters at easter is a tradition that goes back to 1770. The first “Gække”-letter had the name of the sender but the point of this game is to replace the name of the sender with punctuation tokens.
Then the receiver of the “Gække”-letter had until easter Sunday to guess who was the sender. There’s no official rule set so Im setting one up here which Im going to refer to.
§1.1 The letter needs to contain a rime of at least to lines and at least 20 words.
§1.2 Along with the letter the flower “Snowdrop” (Vintergæk) needs to be somehow attached or put in the envelope.
§1.3 The letter needs to be at least A5 size so the receiver can read it and so it will not easily get lost among other papers. Theres no upper limit to the size.
§1.4 The paper needs to be cut somehow so it has holes with nice patterns. Like a heart.
§1.5 Any color of paper can be used. It needs to be clean though!
§1.6 It needs to handwritten.
§1.7 It is okay to scan the letter and send it through an anonymous mail server with a fudged from-address. A picture of the Snowdrop needs to be attached to the mail. If the mail ends up in a spam filter it is considered void.
§1.8 The letter needs to be in the native language of where it is delivered or in english.
§1.9 Small hints to who sent it should be present.
§1.10 The punctuation tokens should replace first name. Pet names and maiden names can not be used. If middle and/or last names are used a clear spacing should be present so it is clear that more names has been replaced!
§1.11 The punctuation tokens can be other symbols if the rimes clearly states that this is the case. Like “My name is written in airborne cats…”.
§1.12 The receiver needs to have the letter at least 7 days before easter Sunday. 14 days before easter Sunday is good practice and the most polite time frame to give the receiver.
§2.1 If the receiver guesses that a person is a sender and it is not the correct a chocolate egg needs to be given to the person which was falsely accused of sending the letter.
§2.2 The receiver has as many guesses that he/she wants.
§2.3 The receiver can insinuate without directly guessing to collect more data on who sent the letter.
§2.4 If the receiver guesses at the correct sender then the sender needs to give a chocolate egg to the receiver and the competition ends.
§3.1 The sender of the letter can claim the chocolate egg easter Sunday or Monday. If the sender forgets to claim the egg in this time frame, the claim can be declared void by the receiver.
§3.2 The egg needs to be of chocolate. Both white and dark chocolate is accepted.
§3.3 It should not have expired. The winner of the “gække”-letter competition can at all time insist the other part to eat some of the chocolate egg. This ensures some quality of the egg.
§3.4 The egg needs to weigh at least 20 g but can of course be heavier. The egg is weighed without wrapping!
§3.5 The egg needs to be delivered within 7 days of the claim.
§3.6 If someone else owes the looser of the competition an egg, this claim can not be swapped to solve the winner’s claim.
§3.7 It is considered bad manners if pictures of the chocolate egg is posted on social medias along with bragging comments, without the looser’s consent.
§4.1 If the receiver of a “gække”-letter already had received 10 other letters the 11th can be declared void.
§4.2 A sender can only send 1 letter to a receiver per Easter.
§4.3 The sender and receiver can not be the same person.
Posted in TraditionBookmark the permalink.

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CATLAND, Plaintiff, v. YAMHILL COUNTY ASSESSOR, Defendant.
TC-MD 100353B.In the Oregon Tax Court. Magistrate Division, Property Tax.
JILL A. TANNER, Presiding Magistrate.
Plaintiff appeals the denial by Defendant of its application for a property tax exemption for the 2004-05 through 2010-11 ” beyond” tax years. A telephone trial was held with Magistrate Jeffrey S. Mattson on November 2, 2010. A. John Ochsner (Ochsner), property owner, appeared and testified on behalf of Plaintiff. Brian A. Linke appeared and testified on behalf of Defendant. The record closed on December 13, 2010.
The subject property has two exterior areas surrounded by eight foot high chain-linked fencing, with another four feet of fencing connected on the top rail, creating a “T” configuration.
After Defendant denied Plaintiff’s first application on March 16, 2010, Plaintiff timely appealed to this court on April 1, 2010. See ORS 305.280.
Taken together, ORS 307.112 and 307.162 provide that an exemption claim for any given tax year beginning July 1 must be filed on or before April 1. A claim for exemption may be filed on or before December 31 of the tax year if a late filing fee is paid.
Plaintiff filed its application on January 26, 2010, seeking exemptions for tax years 2004 through 2011. For the 2010-11 tax year, Plaintiff’s application was filed timely because the filing date was before the April 1, 2010, deadline.
that request result in a favorable outcome for Plaintiff. Because Plaintiff did not exist as a corporation until 2010, it may not apply for exemptions for any prior tax years.
Plaintiff’s claims regarding tax years 2004-05 through 2009-10 are dismissed. The only remaining tax year at issue is 2010-11.
When examining exemption statutes, the guiding principle is that “[t]axation is the rule and exemption from taxation is the exception.” Dove Lewis Mem. Emer. Vet. Clinic v. Dept. of Rev. (Dove Lewis), 301 Or 423, 426, 723 P2d 320 (1986) (citation omitted). In its analysis, the court is guided by the rule that property tax exemption statutes are strictly but reasonably construed. SW Oregon Pub. Def. Services v. Dept. of Rev. (SW Oregon), 312 Or 82, 88-89, 817 P2d 1292 (1991). “Strict but reasonable construction does not require the court to give the narrowest possible meaning to an exemption statute. Rather, it requires an exemption statute be construed reasonably, giving due consideration to the ordinary meaning of the words of the statute and the legislative intent.” North Harbour Corp. v. Dept. of Rev., 16 OTR 91, 95 (2002) (citation omitted). In exemption cases, the plaintiffs bear the burden of proof and must establish their case by a preponderance of the evidence. See ORS 305.427. A “[p]reponderance of the evidence means the greater weight of evidence, the more convincing evidence.” Feves v. Dept. of Revenue, 4 OTR 302, 312 (1971).
(We Care Oregon), TC-MD No 091226B, WL 4655319 at *4 (Nov 18, 2010); OAR 150-307.130-(A)(1)(b). Second, Plaintiff must separately account for funds and donations used for charitable purposes. We Care Oregon, WL 4655319 at *4; OAR 150-307.130-(A)(1)(c).
If Plaintiff fails to meet any element of the three-part test, Plaintiff does not qualify for property tax exemption.
organization’s articles of incorporation and bylaws. See Dove Lewis, 301 Or at 427 (citations omitted). Plaintiff’s bylaws state that it is organized for the “charitable, scientific and educational purpose of Animal Welfare Wildlife Conservation.” Although Plaintiff’s bylaws are vague, Plaintiff’s articles and bylaws are sufficient to satisfy the first element.
The second prong of the SW Oregon test requires that the organization perform in a manner that furthers its purported charitable objective. SW Oregon, 312 Or at 89. To determine whether an organization is performing in a manner that furthers its charitable purpose, courts look at the individual activities of the organization. We Care Oregon, WL 4655319 at *5, citin Goodwill Indus. of the Columbia Willamette, Inc. v. Benton County Assessor, TC-MD No 060676D, WL 1168679 at *4 (Apr 18, 2007) Hazelden Springbrook, Inc. v. Yamhill County Assessor, TC-MD No 031037D, WL 1237628 at *4 (May 11, 2004). Further, the activities must “be for the direct good or benefit of the public or community at large. Public benefits must be the primary purpose rather than a by-product. An organization that is established primarily for the benefit of its members, is not a qualifying charity.” OAR 150-307.130-(A)(3)(b).
must be doing good to others rather than being organized for the convenience of those who use its services.” Id.
(citation omitted; internal quotation marks omitted).
Although Plaintiff’s bylaws state that it is formed for a charitable purpose and its activities include “providing food, water, shelter, and sanctuary to homeless animals and wildlife.” Plaintiff is not currently accepting any stray or feral cats from the public, nor is it advertising or promoting its purported educational or scientific activities to the community at large.
personal pleasures of keeping pet cats and studying electrical engineering. Further, by not accepting cats or conducting advertising of any kind, Plaintiff is effectually secluding itself from the public. Plaintiff is not involved in activity that is primarily charitable, nor does it directly benefit the public or community and large. Plaintiff fails the second-part of the SW Oregon test.
Having failed the second of the three-part test, Plaintiff does not qualify as a charitable organization and does not meet the statutory requirements of ORS 307.130.
Plaintiff also claims that it is exempt as a scientific institution. “[A] * * * scientific organization cannot qualify for the exemption unless a significant portion of its activities have a charitable objective.” Rogue Gem v. Josephine County Assessor, 17 OTR 446, 451 (2003), citing Theatre West of Lincoln City, Ltd. v. Dept. of Rev., 319 Or 114, 117, 873 P2d 1083 (1994) (internal quotation marks omitted).
overall, not to any specific part or operation. We Care Oregon, WL 4655319 at *7, citing Mercy Medical Center, Inc. v. Dept. of Rev., 12 OTR 305, 307 (1992). “An element of gift and giving must be present in the organization’s activities, relating to those it serves.” OAR 150-307.130(3)(d). The element of giving must be viewed from the perspective of the recipient of the charitable giving. See SW Oregon, 312 Or at 91.
Plaintiff insists that it relieves a government burden and that its activities involve a gift or giving. Plaintiff argues that local governments spend “hundreds of millions of dollars every year controlling stray animals, from neighborhood cats defecating in sandboxes to feral cats living in urban areas.” In addition, Plaintiff alleges that cats are not a part of the natural eco-system of the United States, and their presence causes unnecessary suffering to wild animals. Plaintiff has not proffered evidence showing that it has accepted new cats from the public since its creation. The evidence offered by Plaintiff indicates that its activities since its inception are simple: to house and feed 30 cats on the subject property and to supply water to wildlife. That activity does not qualify; the government has no “obligation” to gather feral animals and hold them indefinitely in caged areas. Plaintiff’s own evidence describes how the widespread “trap-test-vaccinate-alter-and-release” program can be used “without endangering populations of birds and other wild animals.” (Ptf’s Ex 7.) Plaintiff has not met its burden of proof in showing that it relieves a government burden. Failure to do so, however, is not fatal to a claim of exemption.
charity involves “giving to the poor and needy.”U.S. Atheists, WL 34148929 at *3, quoting Corp. of LDS, 14 OTR at 249. This court has also held that, in order to qualify as a charitable institution, an organization must be for the “good or benefit of human beings.” Care for Kids, Inc. v. Yamhill County Assessor (Care For Kids), TC-MD No 991297D at 7 (July 10, 2000).
In Care for Kids, the organization seeking exemption stated its purpose as the “`providing of care of children away from their homes’ with the ancillary benefit of `enabling individuals to be gainfully employed.'” Id. Not only did the organization give a gift of education to the children, it directly gave to the public by providing childcare that would result in the opportunity for parents to remain employed.
Plaintiff argues that its gift or giving is the “food and medical treatment provided to the stray and feral feline residents of CatLand.” (Ptf’s Ltr at 7, Dec 10, 2010.) Plaintiff models itself after the Oregon Humane Society, a reputable charitable institution. The court disagrees that Plaintiff resembles the Humane Society, as this matter is in stark contrast to Care for Kids and Humane Societies nationwide. While the Humane Society provides gifts directly to the animals it protects, it also has the ancillary gift of allowing people to adopt pets at reduced prices, providing spay/neutering services, and providing services to members of the public that are no longer able to care for their pets. Similarly, the organization in Care for Kids provided gifts to the children, it also gave parents childcare so they could remain employed. Plaintiff gives gifts only to the cats on the subject property, not to the public as well. The public is not an additional recipient. Plaintiff has not proven that it provides a public benefit.
Because Plaintiff has not proven that it is a charitable organization or that a significant portion of its activities have a charitable purpose, it does not qualify as a scientific institution either.
IT IS THE DECISION OF THIS COURT that Plaintiffs appeal is denied.
Dated this ___ day of February 2011.
If you want to appeal Decision, file a Complaint in theRegular Division of the Oregon Tax Court, by mailing to:1163 State Street, Salem, OR 97301-2563; or by hand delivery to:Fourth Floor, 1241 State Street, Salem, OR.
Your Complaint must be submitted within 60 days after the dateof the Decision or Decision becomes final and cannot bechanged.
This document was signed by Presiding Magistrate Jill A.Tanner on February 24, 2011. The Court filed and entered thisdocument on February 24, 2011.
 Unless otherwise noted, all references to the Oregon Revised Statutes (ORS) and to the Oregon Administrative Rules (OAR) are to 2009.

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Adaptive fault tolerance mechanisms for opportunistic environments: a mobile agent approach. Vinicius Pinheiro, Fabio Kon, Alfredo Goldman. Concurrency and Computation: Practice and Experience. Vol 23, Issue 17, pp. 2078-2091. John Wiley and Sons, 2011.
Parallel Algorithms for Maximal Cliques in Circle Graphs and Unrestricted Depth Search. E. N. Cáceres, S. W. Song, and J. L. Szwarcfiter. RAIRO - Theoretical Informatics and Applications, Vol. 44, No. 3, pp. 293-311, 2010.
Approximating in Discrete Resource Sharing Scheduling Problem. M. Bougeret ; P-F. Dutot ; A. Goldman ; Y. Ngoko ; D. Trystram. International Journal of Foundations of Computer Science. Accepted for publication, 2010.
Reliable Management of Checkpointing and Application Data in Opportunistic Grids. Raphael Y. de Camargo, Fernando Castor, Fabio Kon. Journal of the Brazilian Computer Society, Vol. 16, Issue 3, pp. 177-190. Springer, London, 2010.
Performance Results of Running Parallel Applications on the InteGrade. E. N. Cáceres, H. Mongelli, L. Loureiro, C. Nishibe and S. W. Song. Concurrency and Computation: Practice and Experience, John Wiley and Sons, Vol. 22, No. 3, 2010, pp. 375-393.
MPI Support on Opportunistic Grids based on the InteGrade Middleware. M. C. Cardoso and F. M. Costa. Concurrency and Computation: Practice & Experience, Vol. 22, Issue 3, pp. 343–357. John Willey and Sons, 2009.
Improving reliability of cooperative concurrent systems with exception flow analysis. CASTOR, Fernando ; ROMANOVSKY, Alexander ; Rubira, Cecília Mary F. The Journal of Systems and Software, v. 82, p. 874-890. 2009.
Controlling processing usage at user level: a way to make resource sharing more flexible. Valeria Reis and Renato Cerqueira. Concurrency and Computation: Practice & Experience, Vol. 22, No 3, pp. 278-294. John Willey and Sons, 2010.
On the modularization and reuse of exception handling with aspects. CASTOR, Fernando ; Cacho, Nélio ; Figueiredo, Eduardo ; GARCIA, Alessandro ; Rubira, Cecília M. F. ; de Amorim, Jefferson Silva ; da Silva, Hítalo Oliveira. Software, Practice & Experience (Print), v. 39, p. 1377-1417. 2009.
A Coarse-Grained Parallel Algorithm for the All-Substrings Longest Common Subsequence Problem. C. E. R. Alves, E. N. Cáceres, and S. W. Song. Algorithmica, Volume 45, Number 3, pp. 301-335, July, 2006.
Statistical Approaches to Predicting and Diagnosing Performance Problems in Component-based Distributed Systems: An Experimental Evaluation. Sand Correa and Renato Cerqueira. SASO 2010 - Fourth IEEE International Conference on Self-Adaptive and Self-Organizing Systems. Budapest, Hungary. September 27-October 1, 2010.
Experimental Results of a Coarse-Grained Parallel Algorithm for Spanning Tree and Connected Components. E. N. Cáceres, H. Mongelli, C. Nishibe, and S. W. Song. International Conference on High Performance Computing and Simulation (HPCS 2010), pp. 631-637. Caen, France. June 28 to July 2, 2010.
Um Detector de Defeitos Cumulativo Baseado em uma Abordagem Difusa. SOUZA, J. E. ; CASTOR, Fernando. Anais do 28o Simpósio Brasileiro de Redes de Computadores e Sistemas Distribuídos. 2010, Gramado, Brazil.
Scheduling on multi-core clusters. Emílio Francesquini and Alfredo Goldman. ASTEC 2009, Workshop on Algorithms and Techniques for Scheduling on Clusters and Grids. Les Plantiers, France. June, 02 - 05 2009.
Combining Multiple Heuristics on Discrete Resources. Marin Bougeret, Pierre-François Dutot, Alfredo Goldman, Yannick Ngoko, and Denis Trystram. In APDCM, 11th Workshop on Advances in Parallel and Distributed Computational Models, Roma, Italy, May 2009. IEEE.
A Parallel Chain Matrix Product Algorithm on the InteGrade Grid. E. N. Cáceres, H. Mongelli, L. Loureiro, C. Nishibe, S. W. Song. 10th International Conference on High Performance Computing, Grid and e-Science in Asia Pacific Region (HPC Asia 2009). March 2-5, 2009. Kaohsiung, Taiwan, v.1 pp. 304-311.
An Alternative Implementation for the FPT k-Vertex Cover Parallel Algorithm. H. Mongelli, D. S. Aguena, E. N. Cáceres, S. W. Song. 10th International Conference on High Performance Computing, Grid and e-Science in Asia Pacific Region (HPC Asia 2009). March 2-5, 2009. Kaohsiung, Taiwan, v.1 pp. 148-155.
Efficient Maintenance of Distributed Data in Highly Dynamic Opportunistic Grids. Raphael Y. Camargo, Fernando Castor Filho and Fabio Kon. 24th ACM Symposium on Applied Computing (SAC 2009), Track on Dependable and Adaptive Distributed Systems (DADS), pp. 1067-1071. Honolulu, HI, USA, March 2009.
Compartilhamento do Acesso a Grades Computacionais em Redes Ad Hoc. GOMES, Diego Souza ; SILVA, F. J. S. ; VIDAL, Alexandre César Tavares ; FRANCO, Danilo Lauande. I Simpósio Brasileiro de Computação Ubíqua e Pervasiva. 2009, Bento Gonçalves, RS, Brazil.
A Context-aware Collaborative Presentation System for Handhelds. M. Malcher, M. Endler. Fifth Brazilian Symposium of Collaborative Systems - V Simpósio Brasileiro de Sistemas Colaborativos (SBSC 2008), Vila Velha (ES), Brazil, October 2008.
A Differential Coding Algorithm for Wireless Sensor Networks. J. Aquino, E. Nakamura, A. Loureiro, M. Endler. Proc. of IEEE International Symposium on Personal, Indoor and Mobile Radio Communications (PIMRC 2008, Services, Applications & Business Track, Cannes, France, Sept. 2008.
Supporing the Development of Context-aware Agent-based systems for Mobile Networks. J.Viterbo Filho, M.A.G. Malcher, M. Endler. Proc. of the 23rd ACM Symposium on Applied Computing (SAC 2008) - Mobile Agents and Systems (MAS) Track (Poster session), Vol. 3, pp. 1872-1873, ISBN 1-59593-753-7, Fortaleza, March 2008.
OGST: An Opportunistic Grid Simulation Tool. CUNHA FILHO, Gilberto ; SILVA, F. J. S. The Latin American Grid (LAGrid). 2008, Campo Grande, Brazil.
Performance Results of Running Parallel Applications on the InteGrade. CÁCERES, E. N., MONGELLI, H., NISHIBE, C., LOUREIRO, L. V. R., SONG, S. W. International Latin American Grid Workshop LAGrid 2008, 2008, Campo Grande. Proceedings of the 2nd. International Latin American Grid Workshop LAGrid 2008. Petrópolis: Laboratório Nacional de Computação Científica, 2008. v.1. p.25 - 30.
Uma Arquitetura para Otimização de Desempenho em Grades Computacionais Oportunistas In: Workshop de Computação Grid e Aplicações (WCGA). GOMES, Raphael de Aquino, COSTA, F. M., GEORGES, F. J. Anais do VI Workshop de Computação Grid e Aplicações (WCGA2008). pp.149-150. 2008, Rio de Janeiro.
Reserva de Processamento: uma abordagem no nivel do usuário. Valeria Reis and Renato Cerqueira. V Workshop de Sistemas Operacionais (WSO'2008) pp. 99-110, Belém, Brazil, SBC, 2008.
Experimenting Middleware-Level Monitoring Facilities to Observe Component-based Applications. Eduardo Fonseca de Andrea, Sand Correa, and Renato Cerqueira. SBCARS 2008 - II Simpósio Brasileiro de Componentes, Arquiteturas e Reutilização de Software. pp. 96-106, Porto Alegre, Brazil, SBC/EDIPUCRS, 2008.
A Self-diagnosis Approach for Performance Problem Localization in Component-based Applications. Sand Correa, Eduardo Fonseca de Andrea, and Renato Cerqueira. 11th IEEE/IFIP Network Operations and Management Symposium (NOMS 2008). pp. 931-934, Salvador, Brazil, 2008.
Adaptação de Conteúdo Sensível a Contexto para Dispositivos Móveis em Sistemas H.K. Rubinsztejn, M. Endler. Publish/Subscribe, Proc. of the XXV Brazilian Symposium on Computer Networks (SBRC 2007), Belém, May 2007.
Reduzindo a Implosão de Respostas em Protocolos de Descoberta de Serviços para Redes sem fio Ad hoc de Saltos Múltiplos. L.S. Lima, A.T.A. Gomes, A. Ziviani, M. Endler, B.F. Bastos. Proc. of the XXV Brazilian Symposium on Computer Networks (SBRC 2007), Belém, May 2007.
Um serviço flexível para a configuração e manutenção da política de privacidade de usuários de aplicações LBS. V. Sacramento, M. Endler, C.S. de Souza. Proc. of the XXV Brazilian Symposium on Computer Networks (SBRC 2007), Belém, May 2007.
A Mechanism for Replicated Data Consistency in Mobile Computing Environments. J.M. Monteiro, A. Brayner, S. Lifschiz, M. Endler. Proc. of the 22nd Annual ACM Symposium on Applied Computing (SAC 2007), Seoul, Korea. March 2007.
A Flexible Fault-Tolerance Mechanism for the Integrade Grid Middleware. SOUSA, Stanley Araujo de ; SILVA, F. J. S. ; LOPES, Rafael Fernandes. The Third International Conference on Networking and Services (ICNS 2007). 2007, Athens, Greece.
The Adapta Framework for Building Self-Adaptive Distributed Applications. SALLEM, Márcio Augusto Sekeff ; SILVA, F. J. S. The Third International Conference on Autonomic and Autonomous Systems (ICAS 2007). 2007, Athens, Greece.
Efficient Representation of Row-Sorted 1-Variant Matrices for Parallel String Applications. C. E. R. Alves, E. N. Cáceres, and S. W. Song. Proceedings 7th International Conference on Algorithms and Architectures for Parallel Processing, pp. 60-71, Lecture Notes in Computer Science, Springer Verlag, Volume 4494, 2007.
BSP/CGM Algorithms for the Transitive Closure Problem. E. N. Cáceres and C. Argemon. Proceedings of the High Performance Computing and Simulation Conference (HPCS 2007), 2007.
A Model for Transparent Grid Interoperability. STONE, Daniel C., MIRANDA, Márcio Nunes de, COSTA, F. M.. In: CCGrid2007 - 7th International Symposium on Cluster Computing and The Grid (poster), 2007, Rio de Janeiro.
Integrating Heterogeneous Grid Computing Environments. GARCIA, Alessandra, MIRANDA, Márcio Nunes de, COSTA, F. M.. In: In: CCGrid2007 - 7th International Symposium on Cluster Computing and The Grid (poster), 2007, Rio de Janeiro.
Supporting Context-Aware Applications: Scenarios, Models and Architecture. Ricardo Couto A. da Rocha and Markus Endler. Proceedings of the 24th Brazilian Symposium on Computer Networks (SBRC), Curitiba, May 2006.
A BSP/CGM Algorithm for Finding All Maximal Contiguous Subsequences of a Sequence of Numbers. C. E. R. Alves and E. N. Cáceres and S. W. Song. Proceedings Euro-Par 2006, pp.831-840, Lecture Notes in Computer Science, Springer Verlag, Volume 4128, 2006.
Reliable Systolic Computing through Redanduncy. K. Okuda, S. W. Song and M. T. Yamamoto. 11th Asia-Pacific Computer Systems Architecture Conference(ACSAC 2006), pp. 423-429, Lecture Notes in Computer Science, Springer Verlag, Volume 4186, 2006.
ContextGrid - Uma infra-estrutura de suporte a contexto para integração de dispositivos móveis a grades computacionais. SILVA JÚNIOR, Alaor José da, MIRANDA, Marcion Nunes de, COSTA, F. M. IV de Computação em Grade e Aplicações (WCGA 2006). 2006, Curitiba-PR.
Repositório seguro de aplicações baseado em GSS (artigo curto). Josede Ribamar Braga Pinheiro Júnior, Alexandre Cesar Tavares Vidal, and Fabio Kon.In Simpósio Brasileiro de Segurança da Informação e de Sistemas Computacionais, Florianópolis, September 2005. SBC.
Simulação de Neurônios Biologicamente Realistas em GPUs. Raphael Y. de Camargo. Décimo Simpósio em Sistemas Computacionais (WSCAD-SSC 2009). São Paulo, Brazil, Outubro 2009.
A Middleware Service for Coordinated Adaptation of Communication Services in Groups of Devices. J. Janeiro, M. Endler, T. Springer. Middleware Support for Pervasive Computing Workshop (PerWare 2009), at the IEEE Conference on Pervasive Computing and Communications (PerCom 2009), Galvestone, Texas, March 2009.
An Interceptor Model to Provide Dynamic Adaptation in the InteGrade Grid Middleware. Neto, Jesus J. O., COSTA, F. M.. In: Workshop on Grid Computing and Applications, 2009, Recife. Anais do VII Workshop on Grid Computing and Applications (WCGA2009). Recife: SBC, 2009. p.77 - 88.
Um Serviço Escalável e Robusto para Gerenciamento de Membros em Grades Computacionais de Grande Escala. Fernando Castor Filho, Rodrigo Maia, Augusta Figueiredo, Francisco Soares-Neto, Raphael Y. de Camargo and Fabio Kon. Proceedings of the 7th Workshop on Grid Computing and Applications (WCGA 2009). 2009, Recife, Brazil.
Towards an Adaptive Middleware for Opportunistic Environment: A Mobile Agent Approach. V. Pinheiro ; A. Goldman ; F. Kon. 7th International Workshop on Middleware for Grids, Clouds and e-Science - MGC 2009, Urbana-Champaign. ACM/IFIP/USENIX 10th International Middleware Conference Workshop Proceedings, v. 1. 2009.
A Flexible Architecture for Mobile Real-Time Collaboration Services. T. Springer, D. Schuster, J. Janeiro, M. Endler, A.A. Loureiro (extended abstract), Poster Session, International Middleware Conference 2008, Leuven (Belgium), December 2008.
A Tool for Isolating Performance in General-Purpose Operating Systems. Valeria Q. Reis and Renato Cerqueira. In 6th International Workshop on Middleware for Grid Computing - MGC 2008, Leuven, Belgium, December 2008. ACM/IFIP/USENIX.
Performance Results of Running Parallel Applications on the InteGrade. Edson N. Cáceres, Henrique Mongelli, Leonardo Loureiro, Christiane Nishibe, Siang W. Song. 2nd. International Latin American Grid Workshop LAGrid 2008. In 20th International Symposisum on Computer Architecture and High Performance Computing (SBAC-PAD), Campo Grande, Brazil, October 29 - November 1, 2008, pp. 25-30.
A Middleware Architecture for Context-Aware and Location-Based Mobile Applications. J. Viterbo F., V. Sacramento, R.C.A. da Rocha, M.A.G. Malcher, G. Baptista, M. Endler, Proc. of the 32th International Software Engineering Workshop (SEW-32), Porto Sani, Greece, October 2008.
Implantação Automatizada de Grades Computacionais Oportunistas. Fabrício Nascimento, Alfredo Goldman e Raphael Camargo. In IV Simpósio do Instituto de Matemática e Estatística, São Paulo, Brazil, Setembro 2008.
Armazenamento Distribuído de Dados e Checkpointing de Aplicações Paralelas em Grades Oportunistas. Raphael Y. de Camargo and Fabio Kon. Concurso de Teses e Dissertações do Simpósio Brasileiro de Computação, 2008 Belém, Brazil, July 2008.
Uma Arquitetura para Otimização de Desempenho em Grades Computacionais Oportunistas. GOMES, Raphael de Aquino, COSTA, F. M., GEORGES, F. J.. In: In: Workshop de Computação Grid e Aplicações (WCGA), 2008, Rio de Janeiro. Anais do VI Workshop de Computação Grid e Aplicações (WCGA2008), pp.149-150, 2008.
MPI Support on Opportunistic Grids based on the InteGrade Middleware. Marcelo C., COSTA, F. M.. In: : Latin American Grid 2nd International Workshop (LAGRID2008), 2008, Campo Grande - MS. Proceedings of the Latin American Grid 2nd International Workshop (LAGRID2008), 2008.
A Group Membership Service for Large-Scale Grids. CASTOR FILHO, Fernando ; Fabio Kon ; CAMARGO, Raphael Yokoingawa ; MARQUES, Augusta. 6th Workshop on Middleware for Grid Computing (Leuven, Belgium), Proceedings of the Middleware'2008 Workshop on Middleware for Grid Computing (NY, USA - ACM Press). 2008.
Discovering Services with Restricted Location Scope in Ubiquitous Environments. J. Viterbo Filho, M. Endler, V. Sacramento. Proc. of the 4th International Workshop on Middleware for Pervasive and Ad-Hoc Computing (MPAC 2007), co-located with ACM/IFIP/USENIX Middleware 2007. Newport Beach, CA, November 2007.
Enhancing Grid Usage through Semantic Metadata, Alexandre César Tavares Vidal, Sergio Takeo Kofuji Fourth International Workshop on Emerging Technologies for Next-generation GRID (ETNGRID 2007). Paris, France June 2007. (Slides).
Semantics-Based Grid Resource Management. VIDAL, Alexandre César Tavares ; Sérgio T. Kofugi ; SILVA, F. J. S. ; KON, Fabio. 5th International Workshop on Middleware for Grid Computing - MGC 2007. Proceedings of ACM/IFIP/USENIX 8th International Middleware Conference 2007. 2007, Newport Beach, Orange County.
AutoGrid: Towards an Autonomic Grid Middleware. SALLEM, Márcio Augusto Sekeff ; SOUSA, Stanley Araújo de ; SILVA, F. J. S Fourth International Workshop on Emerging Technologies for Next-generation GRID (ETNGRID 2007). Proceedings of the 16th IEEE International Workshops on Enabling Technologies: Infrastructures for Collaborative Enterprises (WETICE-2007). 2007, Paris, France.
Integrando Dispositivos Móveis ao Middleware Integrade. Diego Gomes, Francisco Silva e Silva, M. Endler. 1st Worskhop on Pervasive and Ubiquitous Computing (WPUC), part of 19th Intern. Symposium on Computer Architecture and High Performance Computing (SBARC-PAD 2007). Gramado, RS, 2007.
Avaliação do Impacto da Implementação de uma Infra-estrutura de Suporte a Contexto na Integração de Dispositivos Móveis a Grades Computacionais. SILVA JÚNIOR, Alaor José da, MIRANDA, Márcio Nunes de, COSTA, F. M.. In: SBRC2007 - V Workshop de Computação em Grade e Aplicações, 2007, Belém-PA. Anais do V Workshop de Computação em Grade e Aplicações (WCGA 2007). 2007. p.61 - 72.
Uma API Pub/Sub para Aplicações Móveis Sensíveis ao Contexto. G. Baptista, M. Endler, V. Sacramento, H. Rubinsztejn. 1st Worskhop on Pervasive and Ubiquitous Computing (WPUC), part of 19th Intern. Symposium on Computer Architecture and High Performance Computing (SBARC-PAD 2007). Gramado, RS, 2007.
Trust in large-scale computational grids: An SPKI/SDSI extension for representing opinion. Jose de Ribamar Braga Pinheiro Júnior, Alexandre Cesar Tavares Vidal, Fabio Kon, and Marcelo Finger. In 4th International Workshop on Middleware for Grid Computing - MGC 2006, Melbourne, Australia, November 2006. ACM/IFIP/USENIX.
Integração de Ambientes Heterogêneos de Grades Computacionais. Alessandra Caetano Garcia do Nascimento, Márcio Nunes Miranda. In WCGA 2006: Anais do IV Workshop de Computação em Grid e Aplicações. Simpósio Brasileiro de Redes de Computadores (SBRC 2006). Sociedade Brasileira de Computação. Curitiba, Maio, 2006.
The Implementation of the BSP Parallel Computing Model on the InteGrade Grid Middleware. Andrei Goldchleger, Alfredo Goldman, Ulysses Hayashida, and Fabio Kon. In 3rd ACM/IFIP/USENIX International Workshop on Middleware for Grid Computing, Grenoble, France, November 28-29, 2005.
A Study of Mobile Agents Liveness Properties on MobiGrid. Rodrigo M. Barbosa, Alfredo Goldman, and Fabio Kon. In 2nd International Workshop on Mobility Aware Technologies and Applications, Montreal, Canada. October 17-19, 2005.
InteGrade: Object-Oriented Grid Middleware Leveraging Idle Computing Power of Desktop Machines. Andrei Goldchleger, Fabio Kon, Alfredo Goldman, and Marcelo Finger. ACM/IFIP/USENIX International Workshop on Middleware for Grid Computing. Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, June 2003. (Extended Abstract) (PPT Slides). [.bib] An extended version appeated at Concurrency and Computation: Practice & Experience, see above in the Journal section.
Efficient Parallel Application Execution on Opportunistic Desktop Grids. Francisco Silva, Fabio Kon, Daniel Batista, Alfredo Goldman, Fabio Costa and Raphael Camargo Grid Computing - Technology and Applications, Widespread Coverage and New Horizons, Soha Maad (Ed.), ISBN: 978-953-51-0604-3, InTech, 2012.
Some communication issues on scalable parallel computing. C. E. R. Alves, E. N. Cáceres, F. Dehne, and S. W. Song. Chapter XVII. In: Handbook of Research on Scalable Computing Techniques. Kuan-Ching Li, Ching-Hsien Hsu, Laurence T. Yang, Jack Dongarra, Hans Zima (editors). IGI Global 2009. ISBN: 978-1-60566-661-7. To appear.
Service Discovery Approaches to Mobile Peer-to-Peer Computing, A.T.A. Gomes, A. Ziviani, L.S. Lima, M. Endler. Chapter in Mobile Peer-to-Peer Computing for Next Generation Distributed Environments: Advancing Conceptual and Algorithmic Applications, Publisher IGI Global (USA), 2009.
Computação Autônoma: Conceitos, Infra-estruturas e Soluções em Sistemas Distribuídos. Sand Correa and Renato Cerqueira. In: Artur Ziviani; Paulo André da Silva Gonçalves (editores). Livro texto dos minicursos - XXVII Simpósio Brasileiro de Redes de Computadores e Sistemas Distribuídos. pp. 152-199. Porto Alegre, RS: Sociedade Brasileira de Computação, 2009.
Minicurso: Grades Computacionais: Conceitos Fundamentais e Casos Concretos. Fabio Kon, Alfredo Goldman. Jornada de Atualização em Informática (JAI'2008) do Congresso da Sociedade Brasileira de Computação. pp. Belém, PA. 2008. (Slides).
Minicurso: Algoritmos paralelos eficientes para alguns problemas em processamento de cadeias de caracteres. S. W. Song. Jornada de Atualização em Informática (JAI'2007) do Congresso da Sociedade Brasileira de Computação. pp. 13-55, Editora PUC Rio, 2007. Slides 1, 2 e 3.
The Grid Architectural Pattern: Leveraging Distributed Processing Capabilities. Raphael Y. de Camargo, Andrei Goldchleger, Marcio Carneiro, and Fabio Kon. In Pattern Languages of Program Design 5 (PloPD5), Dragos Manolescu; James Noble; Markus Völter. (Editors). Addison Wesley Publishing Company, 2006, pages 337-356. (draft).
InteGrade: a tool for executing parallel applications on a Grid for opportunistic computing. José Braga Pinheiro Jr., Raphael Y. de Camargo, Andrei Goldchleger, and Fabio Kon. In Proceedings of the 23th Brazilian Symposium on Computer Networks (SBRC Tools Track). Fortaleza-CE, Brazil, May 2005.
Segurança em Grades Computacionais. José Braga Pinheiro Jr. e Fabio Kon. Minicurso apresentado no 20o Simpósio Brasileiro de Segurança da Informação e de Sistemas Computacionais. pp. 65-111. SBC. Florianópolis, 2005.
Implantação de Componentes de Software Distribuídos Multi-Linguagem e Multi-Plataforma. Amadeu Andrade Barbosa Júnior. Advisor: Renato Cerqueira. Master Thesis, Department of Informatics, PUC-Rio. August 2009.
Monitorando o Ambiente de Execução de Componentes de Software Distribuídos. Eduardo Fonseca De Andrea. Advisor: Renato Cerqueira. Master Thesis, Department of Informatics, PUC-Rio. April 2009.
Uma Arquitetura de Serviços de Acesso a Dados Estruturados em Aplicações Científicas. Rodrigo Carneiro Henrique. Advisor: Renato Cerqueira. Master Thesis, Department of Informatics, PUC-Rio. April, 2009.
Uma Avaliação do Uso de Linguagens Dinâmicas no Desenvolvimento de Middleware: Um Estudo de Caso da Implementação de um ORB na Linguagem Lua. Renato Figueiró Maia. Advisor: Renato Cerqueira. Ph.D. Thesis, Department of Informatics, PUC-Rio. April 2009.
Context Management for Distributed and Dynamic Context-Aware Computing. Ricardo Couto Antunes da Rocha. Ph.D. Thesis - Department of Informatics - Pontificial Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro, February 2009. Advisor: Markus Endler.
Grades Computacionais Oportunistas: Alternativas para Melhorar o Desempenho das Aplicações. Raphael de Aquino Gomes. Dissertação - Instituto de Informática - Universidade Federal de Goiás, 2009.
Xenia: um sistema de segurança para grades computacionais baseado em cadeias de confiança. José de Ribamar Braga Pinheiro Júnior. Doctoral Thesis - Department of Computer Science - University of São Paulo, Apr. 2008.
Análise de Padrões de Uso em Grades Computacionais. Danilo Conde. Master Thesis - Department of Computer Science - University of São Paulo, Jan 2008.
MPICH-IG: Uma Infra-estrutura de Execução de Aplicações Paralelas do Tipo MPI em Grades Computacionais Oportunistas. Marcelo de Castro Cardoso. Dissertação - Instituto de Informática - Universidade Federal de Goiás, 2008.
Uso de um Modelo de Interceptadores para Prover Adaptação Dinâmica no InteGrade. Jesus José de Oliveira Neto. Dissertação - Instituto de Informática - Universidade Federal de Goiás, 2008.
Uma Infra-estrutura para a Execução Distribuída de Componentes de Software. Carlos Eduardo Lara Augusto. Advisor: Renato Cerqueira. Master Thesis, Department of Informatics, PUC-Rio. 2008.
Armazenamento Distribuído de Dados e Checkpointing de Aplicações Paralelas em Grades Oportunistas. Raphael Yokoingawa de Camargo. Doctoral Thesis - Department of Computer Science - University of São Paulo, May 2007.
MobiGrid: arcabouço para agentes móveis em ambientes de grades computacionais. Rodrigo Barbosa. Master Thesis - Department of Computer Science - University of São Paulo, March 2007.
O problema da troca de mensagens de diferentes tamanhos em redes multi-aglomerados. Fábio Massaaki Katayama. Master Thesis - Department of Computer Science - University of São Paulo, November 2006.
Um Arcabouço para Composição, Teste e Simulação de Protocolos de Handover Suave. Vera Nagamuta. Doctoral Thesis - Department of Computer Science - University of São Paulo, April 2006. Advisors: Siang Wun Song and Markus Endler.
ContextGrid: Uma infra-estrutura de suporte a contexto para integração de dispositivos móveis a grades computacionais. Alaor José da Silva Júnior. Master Thesis (Computer Science) - Universidade Federal de Goiás. 2006.
Protocolos par-a-par para Interligação de Aglomerados em Grades Computacionais. Valdmir Moreira Rocha. Master Thesis - Department of Computer Science - University of São Paulo, in Portuguese, December 2005.
Desenvolvimento de Algoritmos Paralelos para Aglomerados com a Técnica de Paralelização de Laços. Ulisses Kendi Hayashida. Master Thesis - Department of Computer Science - University of São Paulo, January 2005. Advisor: Siang Wun Song.
List Ranking: Um Estudo Experimental. Guilherme Pereira Vanni. Master Thesis - Department of Computer Science - University of São Paulo, October 2004. Advisor: Siang Wun Song.
Um Algoritmo de Aproximação Paralelo para Transversal Mínima com Aplicação em Análise da Expressão Gênica. Danielle Passos de Ruchkys. Master Thesis - Department of Computer Science - University of São Paulo, December 2002. Advisor: Siang Wun Song.
Algoritmos paralelos de granularidade grossa para problemas de alinhamento de cadeias. Carlos Eduardo Rodrigues Alves. Doctoral Thesis - Department of Computer Science - University of São Paulo, December 2002. Advisor: Siang Wun Song.

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Jeffrey has been practicing with Garfinkle Biderman since his call to the Bar in 1991. His practice focuses on commercial disputes with an emphasis on contracts, real property, construction liens, commercial leases, bankruptcy and insolvency, and employment matters.
Title v. Canadian Asset Based Lending Enterprise (Cable) Inc.
Noormohamed v. ANP Holdings Ltd.
Schenker of Canada Ltd. v. Royal King Upholstery Inc.
Nanji v. 944936 Ontario Inc.
Douglas v. Magick Woods Ltd.
Morguard Real Estate Investment Trust v. Pita Pazzaz Inc.
Vanreal Properties Ltd. v. Erisan Inc.

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The Office of City Clerk is one of the oldest and most respected positions in municipal government. Its varied responsibilities are set forth in detail within the Mississippi Code of 1972, Annotated (MCA).
A more detailed explanation of each duty can be found in the following chapters. STATUTORILY The Clerk of each municipality is designated by statute, and serves as: 1. Auditor, MCA § 21-15-21. 2. Bookkeeper, MCA § 21-35-11, § 21-39-5. 3. Custodian of the official seal, MCA § 21-15-17. 4. Clerk of the police court, MCA § 21-23-11. 5. Registrar of voters, MCA § 23-15-35. The clerk of the municipality shall be the registrar of voters and shall be authorized to register applicants as county electors. As to registration of municipal electors based on receipt of a copy of the application for registration by the county registrar, see MCA § 23-15-39(3). 6. Ex officio treasurer (in municipalities not having depositories), MCA § 21-3-5 and § 21-39-19. In addition to serving in the positions listed above, each municipal clerk is statutorily required to: 1. Certify building, plumbing, electrical, sanitary, and like codes (together with the mayor), which have been adopted and cited in an ordinance by the governing body of the municipality and file same as a part of the permanent records of the clerk’s office; MCA § 21-19-25. 2. Keep the “municipal Minutes” in which he shall record the proceedings and all orders, ordinances and judgments of the governing authorities, and shall record the proceedings and all orders, ordinances and judgments of the governing authorities, and shall keep the same fully indexed alphabetically, so that all entries on the minutes can be easily found (“All official actions of the governing authorities of a municipality shall be evidenced only by official entries duly recorded on such minute book”); MCA § 21-15-17. 3 3. Keep a “Docket of Claims,” in municipalities of 2,000 or more, or in others so ordering, MCA § 21-39-7. 4. Keep the “Municipal Docket” upon which he shall enter each subject, other than claims and accounts, to be acted upon by the governing authorities at the next meeting (“After each meeting he shall make up such docket for the next regular meeting and he shall examine the statutes of the state and the ordinances of the municipality to ascertain the subjects required or proper to be acted upon at the following meeting and shall docket all such matters”), MCA § 21-15-19. 5. Make monthly financial reports to the governing body at its regular meeting; MCA § 21-35-13. 6. Keep the ordinance book; MCA § 21-13-12 and § 21-15-17. 7. Copy the assessment rolls; MCA § 21-33-41. 8. Certify and publish the levy for municipal taxes; MCA § 21-33-47. 9. Certify certain tax levy information to the Department of Revenue; MCA § 21-33-47. 10. Issue warrants; MCA § 21-39-13. 11. Certify copies of ordinances whenever proof of their existence is needed in judicial proceedings; MCA § 21-13-17. By law, the municipal clerk has most of the financial administration duties. If the clerk is elected, he should be given qualified support personnel; if the clerk is appointed, he should be qualified in financial administration. The clerk must have knowledge of accounting and municipal legal requirements.
How can I find out about elections in this area?