State v. Stoneburner

── State v. Stoneburner ── Court: Court of Appeals of Arizona Date: June 01, 2026 Category: General NOTICE: NOT FOR OFFICIAL PUBLICATION. UNDER ARIZONA RULE OF THE SUPREME COURT 111(c), THIS DECISION IS NOT PRECEDENTIAL AND MAY BE CITED ONLY AS AUTHORIZED BY RULE. IN THE ARIZONA COURT OF APPEALS DIVISION ONE STATE OF ARIZONA, Appellee, v. OLIVER LAYNE STONEBURNER, Appellant. No. 1 CA-CR 25-0174 FILED 06-01-2026 Appeal from the Superior Court in Yavapai County No. S1300CR202400159 The Honorable Krista M. Carman, Judge AFFIRMED COUNSEL Arizona Attorney General’s Office, Phoenix By Evan Ridley Counsel for Appellee Janelle A. McEachern Attorney at Law, Chandler By Janelle A. McEachern Counsel for Appellant  STATE v. STONEBURNER Decision of the Court MEMORANDUM DECISION Presiding Judge David B. Gass delivered the decision of the court, in which Judge Anni Hill Foster and Judge D. Andrew Gaona joined. G A S S, Judge: ¶1 Oliver Stoneburner appeals his conviction and sentence for sexual conduct with a minor under the age of 15. The court affirms. FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY ¶2 The court views the facts in the light most favorable to sustaining the jury’s verdict and resolves all reasonable inferences against Stoneburner. See State v. Fontes, 195 Ariz. 229, 230 ¶ 2 (App. 1998). ¶3 The victim and Stoneburner met at an arcade in the summer of 2022. Victim was only 13 at that time. ¶4 More than a year later (in January 2024), the victim and Stoneburner started direct messaging on Instagram. On Instagram, Stoneburner acknowledged the victim’s age when he messaged her: “Ur 14.” He was concerned that he should be careful because of her young age and elaborated by saying: “If u was like 16 going on 17 id prolly be like fuck it.” The victim and Stoneburner then moved their conversation to Snapchat, a multimedia instant messaging app where past messages are only available for 24 hours. ¶5 Four days later, the victim and Stoneburner met at a park before walking to Stoneburner’s residence. There, Stoneburner and the victim had vaginal sex. The victim then left Stoneburner’s residence and went home. The victim—accompanied by her older cousin—went to the police station 2 days later to file a complaint. The victim gave the police the underwear she wore the night she was at Stoneburner’s residence. DNA testing of the underwear revealed the presence of semen and confirmed Stoneburner was 5.5 octillion1 times more likely to have contributed the semen than a random, unrelated person. The next night, Stoneburner went to the police station after learning the victim filed a complaint. The police read Stoneburner his Miranda rights, and Stoneburner admitted having 1 1 octillion = 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 2  STATE v. STONEBURNER Decision of the Court sexual intercourse with the victim. See Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436 (1966). At the time, Stoneburner was 19 years old, and the victim was only 14 years old. ¶6 A grand jury indicted Stoneburner on 1 count of sexual conduct with a minor under the age of 15 years, a class 2 felony. At trial, the victim testified consistent with the above description of events. At the close of the State’s case-in-chief, Stoneburner moved for judgment of acquittal under Rule 20. The superior court denied the motion, finding sufficient evidence to proceed to the jury. Stoneburner chose not to testify. ¶7 The jury convicted Stoneburner of 1 count of sexual conduct with a minor under the a