Terms Used In Oregon Statutes > Chapter 10 > General Provisions

• Adjournment sine die: The end of a legislative session "without day." These adjournments are used to indicate the final adjournment of an annual or the two-year session of legislature.
• Affidavit: A written statement of facts confirmed by the oath of the party making it, before a notary or officer having authority to administer oaths.
• Answer: The formal written statement by a defendant responding to a civil complaint and setting forth the grounds for defense.
• Any other state: includes any state and the District of Columbia. See Oregon Statutes 174.100
• Attachment: A procedure by which a person's property is seized to pay judgments levied by the court.
• Certified copy: means the document, in either paper or electronic format, issued by the State Registrar of the Center for Health Statistics and containing all or a part of the information contained on the original vital record, and which, when issued by the state registrar, has the full force and effect of the original vital record. See Oregon Statutes 432.005
• Child: means an individual, whether over or under the age of majority, who is or is alleged to be owed a duty of support by the individual's parent or who is or is alleged to be the beneficiary of a support order directed to the parent. See Oregon Statutes 110.503
• Child support order: means a support order for a child, including a child who has attained the age of majority under the law of the issuing state or foreign country. See Oregon Statutes 110.503
• City: includes any incorporated village or town. See Oregon Statutes 174.100
• Clerk of court: An officer appointed by the court to work with the chief judge in overseeing the court's administration, especially to assist in managing the flow of cases through the court and to maintain court records.
• Clerk of court: means the trial court administrator or any other nonjudicial officer or employee of the circuit court for a county authorized by the presiding judge for the judicial district. See Oregon Statutes 10.010
• Complaint: A written statement by the plaintiff stating the wrongs allegedly committed by the defendant.
• Continuance: Putting off of a hearing ot trial until a later time.
• Contract: A legal written agreement that becomes binding when signed.
• Convention: means the Convention on the International Recovery of Child Support and Other Forms of Family Maintenance, concluded at The Hague on November 23, 2007. See Oregon Statutes 110.503
• Conviction: A judgement of guilt against a criminal defendant.
• Damages: Money paid by defendants to successful plaintiffs in civil cases to compensate the plaintiffs for their injuries.
• Dead body: means a human body or such parts of such human body from the condition of which it reasonably may be concluded that death occurred. See Oregon Statutes 432.005
• Decedent: A deceased person.
• Deed: The legal instrument used to transfer title in real property from one person to another.
• Defendant: In a civil suit, the person complained against; in a criminal case, the person accused of the crime.
• Dependent: A person dependent for support upon another.
• Docket: A log containing brief entries of court proceedings.
• Equitable: Pertaining to civil suits in "equity" rather than in "law." In English legal history, the courts of "law" could order the payment of damages and could afford no other remedy. See damages. A separate court of "equity" could order someone to do something or to cease to do something. See, e.g., injunction. In American jurisprudence, the federal courts have both legal and equitable power, but the distinction is still an important one. For example, a trial by jury is normally available in "law" cases but not in "equity" cases. ^{Source: U.S. Courts}
• Evidence: Information presented in testimony or in documents that is used to persuade the fact finder (judge or jury) to decide the case for one side or the other.
• Foreign country: means a country, or a political subdivision of a country, other than the United States, that authorizes the issuance of support orders and:

  (a) That has been declared under the law of the United States to be a foreign reciprocating country;

  (b) That has established a reciprocal arrangement for child support with this state as provided in ORS § 110. See Oregon Statutes 110.503

• Gender identity: means an individual's gender-related identity, appearance, expression or behavior, regardless of whether the identity, appearance, expression or behavior differs from that associated with the gender assigned to the individual at birth. See Oregon Statutes 174.100
• Grand jury: agreement providing that a lender will delay exercising its rights (in the case of a mortgage,
• Guardian: A person legally empowered and charged with the duty of taking care of and managing the property of another person who because of age, intellect, or health, is incapable of managing his (her) own affairs.
• Interment: means the disposition of human remains by entombment or burial. See Oregon Statutes 432.005
• Issuing state: means the state in which a tribunal issues a support order or a judgment determining parentage of a child. See Oregon Statutes 110.503
• Issuing tribunal: means the tribunal of a state or foreign country that issues a support order or a judgment determining parentage of a child. See Oregon Statutes 110.503
• judicial department: means the Supreme Court, the Court of Appeals, the Oregon Tax Court, the circuit courts and all administrative divisions of those courts, whether denominated as boards, commissions, committees or departments or by any other designation. See Oregon Statutes 174.113
• Juror: means any juror or prospective juror. See Oregon Statutes 10.010
• Juror: A person who is on the jury.
• Jury: means a body of persons temporarily selected from persons who live in a particular county or district, and invested with power to present or indict in respect to a crime or to try a question of fact. See Oregon Statutes 10.010
• Law: includes decisional and statutory law and rules and regulations having the force of law. See Oregon Statutes 110.503
• Live birth: means the complete expulsion or extraction from its mother of a product of human conception, irrespective of the duration of pregnancy, that, after such expulsion or extraction, breathes or shows any other evidence of life such as beating of the heart, pulsation of the umbilical cord or definite movement of voluntary muscles, whether or not the umbilical cord has been cut or the placenta is attached. See Oregon Statutes 432.005
• local government: means all cities, counties and local service districts located in this state, and all administrative subdivisions of those cities, counties and local service districts. See Oregon Statutes 174.116
• Oath: A promise to tell the truth.
• Obligation: An order placed, contract awarded, service received, or similar transaction during a given period that will require payments during the same or a future period.
• Person: includes individuals, corporations, associations, firms, partnerships, limited liability companies and joint stock companies. See Oregon Statutes 174.100
• Personal property: All property that is not real property.
• Physician: means a person authorized to practice medicine, chiropractic or naturopathic medicine under the laws of this state or under the laws of Washington, Idaho or California, a physician assistant licensed under ORS § 677. See Oregon Statutes 432.005
• Power of attorney: A written instrument which authorizes one person to act as another's agent or attorney. The power of attorney may be for a definite, specific act, or it may be general in nature. The terms of the written power of attorney may specify when it will expire. If not, the power of attorney usually expires when the person granting it dies. ^{Source: OCC}
• Probable cause: A reasonable ground for belief that the offender violated a specific law.
• Probation: A sentencing alternative to imprisonment in which the court releases convicted defendants under supervision as long as certain conditions are observed.
• public body: means state government bodies, local government bodies and special government bodies. See Oregon Statutes 174.109
• public notice: means any legal publication which requires an affidavit of publication as required in ORS § 193. See Oregon Statutes 174.104
• Quorum: The number of legislators that must be present to do business.
• Real property: Land, and all immovable fixtures erected on, growing on, or affixed to the land.
• Record: means a report that has been registered by the state registrar. See Oregon Statutes 432.005
• Register: means to file in a tribunal of this state a support order or judgment determining parentage of a child issued in another state or a foreign country. See Oregon Statutes 110.503
• Remand: When an appellate court sends a case back to a lower court for further proceedings.
• Report: means a document, whether in paper or electronic format, containing information related to a vital event submitted by a person required to submit the information to the state registrar for the purpose of registering a vital event. See Oregon Statutes 432.005
• Settlement: Parties to a lawsuit resolve their difference without having a trial. Settlements often involve the payment of compensation by one party in satisfaction of the other party's claims.
• Sexual orientation: means an individual's actual or perceived heterosexuality, homosexuality or bisexuality. See Oregon Statutes 174.100
• State: includes a state or territory of the United States, the District of Columbia and New York City. See Oregon Statutes 432.005
• State: means a state of the United States, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, the United States Virgin Islands, any territory or insular possession under the jurisdiction of the United States or an Indian nation or tribe. See Oregon Statutes 110.503
• state government: means the executive department, the judicial department and the legislative department. See Oregon Statutes 174.111
• State Treasury: includes those financial assets the lawful custody of which are vested in the State Treasurer and the office of the State Treasurer relating to the custody of those financial assets. See Oregon Statutes 174.100
• Subpoena: A command to a witness to appear and give testimony.
• Summons: Another word for subpoena used by the criminal justice system.
• Support enforcement agency: means a public official, governmental entity or private agency authorized to:

  (a) Seek enforcement of support orders or laws relating to the duty of support;

  (b) Seek establishment or modification of child support;

  (c) Request determination of parentage of a child;

  (d) Attempt to locate obligors or their assets; or

  (e) Request determination of the controlling child support order. See Oregon Statutes 110.503

• Support order: means a judgment, decree, order, decision or directive, whether temporary, final or subject to modification, issued in a state or foreign country for the benefit of a child, a spouse or a former spouse, that provides for monetary support, health care, arrearages, retroactive support or reimbursement for financial assistance provided to an individual obligee in place of child support. See Oregon Statutes 110.503
• Testimony: Evidence presented orally by witnesses during trials or before grand juries.
• Transcript: A written, word-for-word record of what was said, either in a proceeding such as a trial or during some other conversation, as in a transcript of a hearing or oral deposition.
• Trial: A hearing that takes place when the defendant pleads "not guilty" and witnesses are required to come to court to give evidence.
• Trial jury: A group of citizens who hear the evidence presented by both sides at trial and determine the facts in dispute. Federal criminal juries consist of 12 persons. Federal civil juries consist of six persons.
• Tribunal: means a court, administrative agency or quasi-judicial entity authorized to establish, enforce or modify support orders or to determine parentage of a child. See Oregon Statutes 110.503
• United States: includes territories, outlying possessions and the District of Columbia. See Oregon Statutes 174.100
• Verification: means confirmation of the information on a vital record based on the facts contained in a report. See Oregon Statutes 432.005
• Violate: includes failure to comply. See Oregon Statutes 174.100
• Vital record: means a report of a live birth, death, fetal death, marriage, declaration of domestic partnership, dissolution of marriage or domestic partnership and related data that have been accepted for registration and incorporated into the official records of the Center for Health Statistics. See Oregon Statutes 432.005