Perez v. Cain, 444 P.3d 506

In 2005, at age 14 petitioner participated in a home invasion that resulted in two deaths; he stipulated to waiver into adult court and pleaded guilty to aggravated murder.
The juvenile court accepted the stipulated waiver after relying on a Marion County waiver study that applied the Kent criteria and found the youth "of sufficient sophistication and maturity."
Petitioner’s convictions became final in 2007; he filed a post-conviction petition in 2009 asserting ineffective assistance claims but did not challenge the juvenile court’s legal standard for waiver.
The Oregon Supreme Court decided State v. J.C.N.-V. in 2016, holding ORS 419C.349(3) requires a finding that the youth possess adult-like intellectual, social, and emotional capabilities to understand the significance and wrongfulness of conduct.
Petitioner then filed a successive, untimely post-conviction petition asserting that, under J.C.N.-V., the juvenile court applied the wrong waiver standard; the post-conviction court dismissed it as untimely and successive under ORS 138.510(3) and ORS 138.550(3).
The Court of Appeals affirmed, concluding petitioner could reasonably have raised the legal-standard claim earlier given the waiver study’s reliance on Kent criteria and contemporaneous litigation of J.C.N.-V.

Issue	Petitioner’s Argument	Superintendent’s Argument	Held
Whether petitioner’s J.C.N.-V.-based claim "could not reasonably have been raised" earlier so as to trigger the statutory escape clauses	J. C. N.-V. announced a new legal standard unforeseeable before 2016; therefore claim could not reasonably have been raised earlier	J. C. N.-V. did not change law in a novel or surprising way; its reasoning (text, context, legislative history) was reasonably foreseeable and could have been raised in the original petition	Held: Claim could reasonably have been raised earlier; escape clauses do not apply; dismissal affirmed

State v. J. C. N.-V., 359 Or. 559, 380 P.3d 248 (2016) (interpreting ORS 419C.349(3) to require finding of adult-like intellectual, social, and emotional capabilities)
Verduzco v. State of Oregon, 357 Or. 553, 355 P.3d 902 (2015) (statutory escape clauses require a fact-specific reasonableness inquiry on whether a claim could have been raised earlier)
Chavez v. State of Oregon, 364 Or. 654, 438 P.3d 381 (2019) (distinguishing Verduzco where a Padilla-type claim could not reasonably have been raised earlier)
Kent v. United States, 383 U.S. 541 (1966) (appended waiver criteria that influenced Oregon waiver statute)
Hardin v. Popoff, 279 Or. App. 290, 379 P.3d 593 (2016) (argued by superintendent that J.C.N.-V. was not a novel change in law)
Long v. Armenakis, 166 Or. App. 94, 999 P.2d 461 (2000) (formulation of whether a legal question was reasonably predictable)
Padilla v. Kentucky, 559 U.S. 356 (2010) (Sixth Amendment precedent used in Verduzco/Chavez comparisons)
Chapman v. Mayfield, 358 Or. 196, 361 P.3d 566 (2015) (summary judgment standard referenced)