An appeal is a specific, technical legal procedure, and appellate rules limit the court to considering only a few kinds of errors. An appeal is not a place to argue that the witnesses lied, that your trial attorney didn’t listen to you, or the prosecutor was biased or vindictive. Every single successful appeal is about the specific, identifiable mistakes of the trial judge.
You need each of these three things to win.
First, the trial judge has to have made a legal mistake. Most possible mistakes fall into one of three types: a mistake of law, an incorrect exercise of discretion, or a mistake of fact.
A mistake of law is a good issue to raise on appeal. For example, whether a witness’s testimony is inadmissible hearsay is a pure question of law, and there is only one correct answer.
An incorrect exercise of discretion, by contrast, is appealable but very hard to win. Whether to reschedule trial is within the judge’s discretion, because the judge is expected to consider and balance many factors. It often has more than one correct answer. It’s a poor appeal issue.
Finally, issues of fact are simply not appealable. Facts are proved in court by the testimony of witnesses or other evidence. Where there is evidence from which a fact could be decided either way, an appellate court won’t disturb either decision. The theory is that the judge (or jury, when a jury is making the decision) is in the best position to observe witnesses and decide which are believable. Without evidence, there’s usually a legal rule that specifies who wins a fact dispute; those legal rules are sometimes called “presumptions.” (Whether there is enough evidence to support a specific factual conclusion is actually a question of law, rather than a question of fact, and it can be appealed.)
Second, if the judge made a legal mistake, then it can only be raised on appeal if it is “preserved.” The party who wants to appeal has to object to the trial court’s ruling and explain the basis for the objection. On occasion, even unpreserved errors can be raised as “plain error,” but plain errors are very hard to win.
Finally, the error must have “prejudiced” the party who wants to appeal; the error must have a tendency to affect the outcome. In federal court, but not in Oregon state court, some errors are so serious that prejudice need not be proved. Those errors are called “structural” errors. Oregon courts do not recognize structural errors, but an error that would be structural in federal court would probably be held to be prejudicial in state court.
If all three elements are met, the appellate court can order a new trial, or a new hearing relating to the trial such as a motion hearing or sentencing, or can vacate a conviction altogether. Without all three elements (a mistake by the judge, preservation, and prejudice), an appeal will not succeed.
If the judgment being appealed is from an Oregon circuit (trial) court, the appeal is usually to the Oregon Court of Appeals, and Oregon Court of Appeals decisions can be reviewed by the Oregon Supreme Court. Justice and municipal court proceedings and DMV proceedings are appealed to the state circuit court. Federal district (trial) court proceedings in Oregon are appealed to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. Oregon Supreme Court decisions, and federal appellate decisions, can be reviewed by the United States Supreme Court, but the court only handles a few cases each year.
If the illegality or injustice in your trial was not the subject of a specific error by the judge, then it cannot be appealed. It might be an issue that you can raise in another proceeding, such as post-conviction relief or federal habeas corpus.
