State v. Paramoure

2026 UT App 74

THE UTAH COURT OF APPEALS

STATE OF UTAH,
Appellee,
v.
PHILIP CHRISTOPHER PARAMOURE,
Appellant.

Opinion
No. 20240381-CA
Filed May 7, 2026

Third District Court, Salt Lake Department
The Honorable Paul B. Parker
No. 221903231

Freyja Johnson, Emily Adams, and
Jessica Hyde Holzer, Attorneys for Appellant
Simarjit S. Gill and Brandon E. Simmons,
Attorneys for Appellee

JUDGE GREGORY K. ORME authored this Opinion, in which
JUDGES RYAN M. HARRIS and JOHN D. LUTHY concurred.

ORME, Judge:

¶1 The State charged Philip Christopher Paramoure with
child abuse. At trial, Paramoure argued that his actions were
justified as reasonable discipline of his son. The jury disagreed
and convicted him. On appeal, Paramoure challenges the trial
court’s initial and supplemental jury instructions regarding the
affirmative defense of reasonable discipline. Because we agree
that the supplemental instruction misstated the law, we reverse
his conviction.
State v. Paramoure

BACKGROUND 1

¶2 One night in February 2022, Paramoure arranged to pick
up his fourteen-year-old son (Son) for a weekend visit, but Son
messaged Paramoure asking if he could go to Paramoure’s house
the next morning instead. Son told Paramoure that one of his
friends was “talking about hurting himself” and that Son “might
need to go over there.” Paramoure was concerned because
another of Son’s friends had committed suicide a few months
prior. So Paramoure asked Son for the friend’s name and address.
Son accused Paramoure of “blowing it way out of proportion.”
Son said that he just wanted “to be there for” his friend.

¶3 Paramoure continued to argue with Son via text message,
eventually saying, “I hope you’re not bullshitting me on this.” Son
replied, “Jesus you are so messed up in the head.” Paramoure
again asked Son for his friend’s address, and Son replied, “Are
you serious, fuck off I’m going to [my friend’s house].”
Paramoure said, “I’m going to kick your ass when I see you” and
“I have f****** had it with you.” 2 Paramoure then told Son he
would come pick him up soon.

¶4 When Paramoure arrived outside the house where Son
lived with his mother (Mother) and her boyfriend, he texted Son,
“Let’s go.” Son came outside and found Paramoure leaning
against his car with his arms crossed. Paramoure asked Son “if

1. “On appeal, we review the facts in a light most favorable to the
jury’s verdict and recite the facts accordingly,” presenting
“conflicting evidence only as necessary to understand issues
raised on appeal.” State v. Macbeth, 2026 UT App 3, n.1, 583 P.3d
1147 (quotation simplified). We employ this standard even when
we conclude the jury was given an erroneous instruction. See id.
¶ 2.

2. These text messages are quoted verbatim.

20240381-CA 2 2026 UT App 74
State v. Paramoure

[he] wanted to go,” which Son took as asking whether he “wanted
to fight.” Paramoure pushed Son, who ran back toward the
front porch of the house while telling Paramoure to “F off.”
Paramoure followed Son to the porch and “pulled” Son down by
the shoulders, getting on top of him and pinning him to the
ground.

¶5 Hearing Son’s voice, Mother unlocked the front door and
saw Paramoure pull Son down, get on top of him, and hit him.
She called the police, and her boyfriend pulled Son inside the
house. Paramoure returned to his car.

¶6 An officer (Officer) arrived at the house soon after and
spoke with Paramoure in the driveway. Paramoure told Officer
that he had “slapped” and “hit his kid a couple of times” to “deal[]
with him” because “he needed to be disciplined.” Officer
observed a cut above Son’s eye but reported no “redness, no
bruising, no marks of any kind,” although Son and Mother later
reported that a scab from a prior injury to his hand had reopened
and there was swelling around his eye as well as bruising and
scrapes on his back. Officer issued a citation to Paramoure, and he
was later charged with one count of child abuse.

¶7 At trial, Son, Mother, Mother’s boyfriend, and Officer
testified for the State. Paramoure testified in his own defense. He
admitted to pushing and slapping Son and pinning him down.
But he testified that he “was trying to defuse the situation” and
“calm [Son] down.”

¶8 After Paramoure’s testimony, counsel and the court
discussed the jury instructions, specifically the instruction
regarding Paramoure’s affirmative defense of reasonable
discipline. The State—believing that the case did not involve
“serious bodily injury”—raised concerns that the proposed
instruction nevertheless “talk[ed] a lot about serious bodily

20240381-CA 3 2026 UT App 74
State v. Paramoure

injury.” Paramoure’s counsel (Counsel) 3 urged the court to
include a discussion of serious bodily injury, arguing that the jury
should be informed that force may be considered reasonable even
if it results in injury. The State reiterated that the discussion of
serious bodily injury should be removed, arguing “it incorrectly
implies” that discipline is always reasonable “unless there is
serious bodily injury.” But Counsel reiterated that the instruction
should include a sentence stating that the presence of physical
injury does not, by itself, render force unreasonable. The court
stated that Counsel’s suggestion would go “too far” and would
be “commenting on the evidence.” The court then removed all
language regarding any physical injury—serious or otherwise—
from the instruction on the defense of reasonable discipline.

¶9 The court then instructed the jury that to find Paramoure
guilty of child abuse, it would have to find beyond a reasonable
doubt “[t]hat the defense of reasonable discipline does not apply.”
A separate instruction explained:

Conduct which is justified is a defense to
prosecution for any offense based on the conduct.
For child abuse, this defense may be claimed when
the actor’s conduct is reasonable discipline of
minors by parents, guardians, teachers, or other
persons in loco parentis.

Under the defense of Reasonable Discipline, an
actor is not guilty of Child Abuse for conduct that
constitutes reasonable discipline or management of
a child, including withholding privileges.

The jury must consider all of the facts and
circumstances presented at trial, in determining

3. Paramoure was represented at trial by two attorneys. For ease,
we refer to them collectively as “Counsel.”

20240381-CA 4 2026 UT App 74
State v. Paramoure

whether the defense of Reasonable Discipline
applies.

You must decide whether the defense of Reasonable
Discipline applies in this case. If you determine that
Mr. Paramoure’s actions amounted to reasonable
discipline, as defined in these instructions, his
actions are “justified” and therefore, not unlawful.
If the acts were justified, he is entitled to a finding of
not guilty.

Another instruction defined “Reasonable” as “fair, proper, or
moderate under the circumstances” and “Reasonableness” as “an
objective standard, determined by the jury, not a subjective
standard determined by any person involved.”

¶10 During deliberation, the jury submitted a question to the
court:

Judge,

We feel we are close, but some hangups on
definition of reasonable.

Is there any guidance (additional) you can provide
for reasonable discipline?

The court informed both parties of the jury’s question and
provided a proposed answer, which read:

The issue of what is reasonable discipline is
considered from the viewpoint of an objectively
reasonable person. In other words, would an
objectively reasonable person, considering all the
facts and circumstances that the Defendant was
confronted with, use the force the Defendant did to
discipline his child.

20240381-CA 5 2026 UT App 74
State v. Paramoure

The court stated, “What I worry about here is that what [the jury
is] struggling with is how to apply the test. And I think what is
basic law is that you ask yourself what a reasonable objective
person would do through the eyes of the defendant.”

¶11 The State noted that “one potential negative” with the
proposed answer was that “the instruction as worded could
imply that there was one correct thing to do, did the defendant do
the one thing that a reasonable person would have done, where
. . . a reasonable person could have . . . done multiple different
things.” The parties then conferred on the court’s proposed
answer, and when they returned, Counsel stated that “the
problem with the second sentence is that there’s a lot of
reasonable people who wouldn’t use any force” and that the
instruction as worded by the court would result in “burden
shifting” and “the false presumption that any reasonable person
would use some force.” Counsel emphasized that the instruction
should direct the jury to focus on “what a reasonable person
would think because there’s a lot of reasonable people that
wouldn’t use any force at all.”

¶12 When the court stated it would submit its answer as
written, Counsel again argued, “Our objection to that is that it’s
burden shifting, because . . . within the umbrella of reasonable
person, there isn’t one right thing. And this is making it like a
reasonable person either would have or wouldn’t have done
that.” The court acknowledged that this was a “fair point” and
stated that it would “add a statement on the bottom . . . that the
burden to show that this was [not] objectively reasonable remains
with the State.”

¶13 The court then submitted a supplemental instruction to the
jury which stated,

The issue of what is reasonable discipline is
considered from the viewpoint of an objectively
reasonable person. In other words, would an

20240381-CA 6 2026 UT App 74
State v. Paramoure

objectively reasonable person, considering all the
facts and circumstances that the Defendant was
confronted with, use the force the Defendant did to
discipline his child.

The burden to prove that the defense of reasonable
discipline does not apply is on the prosecution. If
the prosecution fails to convince you that the
defense of reasonable discipline does not apply you
must find the Defendant not guilty.

So instructed, the jury found Paramoure guilty. 4

ISSUE AND STANDARD OF REVIEW

¶14 On appeal, Paramoure argues that both the trial court’s
initial and supplemental instructions failed to properly instruct
the jury on the affirmative defense of reasonable discipline. “We
review challenges to jury instructions under a correctness
standard.” Meeks v. Peng, 2024 UT 5, ¶ 33, 545 P.3d 226 (quotation
simplified). 5 “When reviewing jury instructions, we must
consider the challenged instruction in context.” Id. (quotation
simplified). “And we will affirm when the instructions taken as a

4. Paramoure was charged with class A misdemeanor child abuse
for “intentionally or knowingly” inflicting physical injury on a
child. See Utah Code Ann. § 76-5-109(3)(a) (LexisNexis 2022). But
he was convicted of a class B misdemeanor for “recklessly”
inflicting physical injury on a child. See id. § 76-5-109(3)(b).

5. As long as “the jury instructions are legally correct, the precise
wording and specificity . . . is left to the sound discretion of the
trial court.” State v. Hunt, 2025 UT 54, ¶ 45, 582 P.3d 772 (quotation
simplified).

20240381-CA 7 2026 UT App 74
State v. Paramoure

whole fairly instruct the jury on the law applicable to the case.”
Id. (quotation simplified). 6

ANALYSIS

¶15 Paramoure was convicted of child abuse under then-Utah
Code section 76-5-109(3)(b). See Utah Code Ann. § 76-5-109(3)(b)
(LexisNexis 2022). At trial, he raised the affirmative defense of
reasonable discipline under then-section 76-5-109(8)(a), which
provided that “[a] person is not guilty” of child abuse “for
conduct that constitutes . . . reasonable discipline or management
of a child.” Id. § 76-5-109(8)(a). This required the State to “disprove
that defense beyond a reasonable doubt.” Bountiful City v. Baize,
2021 UT 9, ¶ 79, 487 P.3d 71 (quotation simplified). And it entitled
Paramoure to a reasonable discipline jury instruction. See State v.
Devan, 2024 UT App 193, ¶ 54, 562 P.3d 1233, cert. denied, 568 P.3d
261 (Utah 2025).

¶16 The trial court instructed the jury on reasonable discipline
in both the initial and supplemental instructions. Paramoure takes
issue with both. First, he argues that the initial instruction
misstated the law and that the court should have given his
requested reasonable-discipline instruction instead. He argues
that under our Supreme Court’s decision in Baize, the initial
reasonable-discipline instruction should have clarified that “the
presence of a non-serious injury does not prevent a jury from
concluding that a parent engaged in reasonable discipline.”

¶17 Baize “obviously did not involve the contours of a defense
in context of jury instructions,” State v. Cover, 2025 UT App 34,

6. Paramoure also argues that Counsel provided constitutionally
ineffective assistance in failing to object to statements the
prosecutor made about reasonable discipline during the State’s
closing argument. Because we reverse based on the jury
instructions, we need not address this issue.

20240381-CA 8 2026 UT App 74
State v. Paramoure

¶ 31, 566 P.3d 788 (quotation simplified), because that case
involved an appeal from a bench trial, see Baize, 2021 UT 9, ¶ 2.
Nor did Baize “purport to establish a rigid . . . test that trial courts
must always incorporate into jury instructions.” Cover, 2025 UT
App 34, ¶ 31. But in Baize, our Supreme Court agreed with this
court’s prior conclusion that “inflicting something less than
serious physical injury is not always reasonable, nor is it always
unreasonable.” 2021 UT 9, ¶ 46 (quotation simplified).

¶18 While “parties are entitled to have the jury instructed
accurately on the law” but “are not entitled to have the jury
instructed with any particular wording,” State v. Hunt, 2025 UT
54, ¶ 45, 582 P.3d 772 (quotation simplified), we take Paramoure’s
point that an accurate statement of the law regarding reasonable
discipline, at least in this case, may well have required an
instruction clarifying that the mere presence of injury does not
necessarily mean that the force used in inflicting it was
unreasonable. We do not decide this definitively, though, because
what we view as the bigger problem here is the court’s
supplemental jury instruction.

¶19 After the jury expressed, during its deliberations, its
“hangup” with the concept of reasonable discipline, the court
further instructed, with our emphasis,

The issue of what is reasonable discipline is
considered from the viewpoint of an objectively
reasonable person. In other words, would an
objectively reasonable person, considering all the facts
and circumstances that the Defendant was confronted
with, use the force the Defendant did to discipline his
child.

The burden to prove that the defense of reasonable
discipline does not apply is on the prosecution. If
the prosecution fails to convince you that the

20240381-CA 9 2026 UT App 74
State v. Paramoure

defense of reasonable discipline does not apply you
must find the Defendant not guilty.

¶20 Paramoure argues that the emphasized portion of this
instruction improperly lowered the State’s burden to disprove his
reasonable-discipline defense. In Paramoure’s view, “the question
is not whether an objectively reasonable person ‘would . . . use the
force [he] did to discipline his child’—the correct question is if the
State met its burden of proving that no objectively reasonable person
would use the force [he] did to discipline Son under the
circumstances.” Paramoure stresses that a reasonable person
could have taken any number of disciplinary actions—using force
or not—but that this portion of the instruction implied that the
affirmative defense of reasonable discipline applied only if a
reasonable person would have used the very force he did under
the circumstances. We agree that this instruction lowered the
State’s burden to disprove Paramoure’s reasonable-discipline
defense.

¶21 “Because the burden of proof for an affirmative defense is
counterintuitive, instructions on affirmative defenses must clearly
communicate to the jury what the burden of proof is and who
carries the burden.” State v. Lee, 2014 UT App 4, ¶ 27, 318 P.3d
1164 (quotation simplified). The instruction here asked the jury to
determine whether a reasonable person would use the same force
that Paramoure had used in disciplining Son. But the proper
inquiry was whether no reasonable person would have used that
level of force. So while the second paragraph of the supplemental
instruction explicitly allocated the burden to the State, the first
paragraph effectively lowered it.

¶22 But even “if a jury instruction is erroneous, we will reverse
only if the defendant shows a reasonable probability the error
affected the outcome of his case.” State v. O’Bannon, 2012 UT App
71, ¶ 15, 274 P.3d 992 (quotation simplified). See State v. Hawkins,
2016 UT App 9, ¶ 52, 366 P.3d 884 (“To reverse a trial verdict, we

20240381-CA 10 2026 UT App 74
State v. Paramoure

must find not a mere possibility, but a reasonable likelihood that
the error affected the result.”) (quotation simplified), cert. denied,
379 P.3d 1181 (Utah 2016). “A reasonable probability is a
probability sufficient to undermine confidence in the outcome.”
Wyatt v. State, 2021 UT 32, ¶ 34, 493 P.3d 621 (quotation
simplified). See O’Bannon, 2012 UT App 71, ¶ 41 (“An error is
prejudicial if it tends to mislead the jury to the prejudice of the
complaining party or insufficiently or erroneously advises the
jury on the law.”) (quotation simplified).

¶23 Given its question to the trial court during its deliberations,
the jury was clearly focused on the reasonable discipline defense.
And the jury was clearly confused about how to evaluate
reasonable discipline. We are therefore convinced that had the
supplemental instruction properly framed the question for the
jury by requiring it to find that no reasonable person would have
used the force Paramoure used in disciplining Son, there is a
reasonable probability that Paramoure would have been
acquitted.

¶24 Thus, we conclude that the supplemental jury instruction
misstated the law in lowering the State’s burden to disprove the
reasonable-discipline affirmative defense, thereby prejudicing
Paramoure’s defense.

CONCLUSION

¶25 The trial court’s supplemental jury instruction misstated
the law regarding reasonable discipline, effectively lowering the
State’s burden of disproving Paramoure’s reasonable-discipline
affirmative defense. Because we conclude that the erroneous
instruction harmed Paramoure, we reverse his conviction and
remand the matter for a new trial.

20240381-CA 11 2026 UT App 74