State v. Boauod, 459 P.3d 903

Defendant was charged with harassment after an encounter on a MAX train in which the victim, M, said defendant rubbed her thigh; defendant gave inconsistent testimony about whether he touched her.
Police interviewed defendant shortly after the incident on an officer body camera; the recording shows defendant in a holding cell (behind bars) and captures both audio and demonstrative gestures difficult to parse from audio alone.
Defendant moved in limine to exclude the video image and admit only the audio, arguing the bars would unfairly prejudice the jury; the state argued the video was the best evidence of intent and would show gestures and demeanor.
Trial court denied the motion, finding the video’s demonstrative gestures, demeanor, and need to avoid accent-based misunderstanding had high probative value and that curative instructions would limit prejudice.
The jury convicted; on appeal defendant challenged (1) the OEC 403 ruling admitting the video and (2) the court’s failure to sua sponte order a mistrial or corrective instruction after the prosecutor argued that defendant lied and M told the truth during rebuttal.

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Admissibility under OEC 403 of the video (image vs audio-only)	Video highly probative: shows gestures, demeanor, and clarifies speech; audio-only would risk misunderstanding due to accent	Video image of defendant behind bars is unfairly prejudicial and the court should admit only audio	Court did not abuse discretion; probative value of video gestures and demeanor outweighed the prejudice of the holding-cell image
Failure to sua sponte declare mistrial or give corrective instruction for prosecutor's credibility comments (plain error)	Prosecutor permissibly argued inferences from the evidence and urged the jury to infer lying from the record	Prosecutor's assertions that defendant lied deprived defendant of a fair trial and required sua sponte corrective action	Not plain error; it was not beyond dispute that comments were so prejudicial as to deny a fair trial

State v. Mayfield, 302 Or 631 (establishes the multi-step OEC 403 balancing framework and option to admit part of proffered evidence)
State v. Anderson, 363 Or 392 (probative value depends on relevance and materiality to the case)
State v. Shaw, 338 Or 586 (review standard for discretionary evidentiary rulings under OEC 403)
State v. Gibson, 299 Or App 582 (trial court decision must fall within range of legally permissible choices)
State v. McCurry, 300 Or App 666 (similar closing-argument facts; not beyond dispute that prosecutor’s comments required sua sponte mistrial)
State v. Montez, 324 Or 343 (trial court must declare mistrial sua sponte only if comments so prejudicial they deny a fair trial)
State v. Sperou, 365 Or 121 (prosecutor may argue inferences from record but must not express personal opinion on witness credibility)