Whether a trial court commits structural error for purposes of the Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution, when the trial court instructs a jury in a criminal case that the jury can return a nonunanimous guilty verdict

QUESTION PRESENTED The State of Oregon charged petitioner with three felony criminal offenses. The trial court instructed the jury that it could return a nonunanimous guilty verdict. After deliberations, the jury returned a verdict finding petitioner guilty on all three counts. The court read the verdict aloud, and the presiding juror informed the court that the decision was unanimous. In Ramos v. Louisiana, 590 U.S. __, 140 S. Ct. 1390, 206 L. Ed. 2d 583 (2020), this Court held that the Sixth Amendment jury-trial right, as incorporated against the states through the Fourteenth Amendment, required a unanimous verdict to convict a defendant of a serious offense. Following that decision, the Oregon Supreme Court held that a trial court’s instruction that a jury may return a nonunanimous guilty verdict violates the Sixth Amendment but that the error was harmless whenever the verdict was unanimous. The question presented is: Whether a trial court commits structural error for purposes of the Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution, when the trial court instructs a jury in a criminal case that the jury can return a nonunanimous guilty verdict.