Miranda v. State

2026 UT App 91

THE UTAH COURT OF APPEALS

ADOLFO MIRANDA,
Appellee,
v.
STATE OF UTAH,
Appellant.

Opinion
No. 20241305-CA
Filed June 11, 2026

Fourth District Court, Provo Department
The Honorable Kraig Powell
No. 190400474

Jeffrey S. Gray and Christopher D. Ballard,
Attorneys for Appellant
Ann M. Taliaferro and Debra M. Nelson,
Attorneys for Appellee

JUDGE GREGORY K. ORME authored this Opinion, in which
JUDGES DAVID N. MORTENSEN and AMY J. OLIVER concurred.

ORME, Judge:

¶1 A jury convicted Adolfo Miranda on six counts of
aggravated sexual abuse of a child and three counts of rape of a
child for acts perpetrated against his step-daughter, Beth. 1
Following an unsuccessful direct appeal, see State v. Miranda
(Miranda I), 2017 UT App 203, 407 P.3d 1033, cert. denied, 417 P.3d
581 (Utah 2018), Miranda sought postconviction relief, arguing
that his trial counsel was ineffective for not requesting a specific
unanimity instruction and that his appellate counsel was
ineffective for not raising that issue in his direct appeal. The State
conceded deficient performance but argued that Miranda was not

1. A pseudonym.
Miranda v. State

prejudiced by the lack of such an instruction. The postconviction
court was persuaded by Miranda’s argument and vacated
Miranda’s convictions. We reverse. Under the facts of this case,
our confidence in the jury’s verdict is not undermined.
Accordingly, we vacate the postconviction court’s order and
reinstate Miranda’s convictions.

BACKGROUND 2

The Abuse

¶2 Beth’s mother (Mother) and Miranda married in 2010,
separated in 2012, and divorced in 2013. They then remarried in
late 2013, but that second marriage lasted only 7 months. Shortly
after Miranda and Mother separated for the second time, Beth
disclosed to Mother that she did not want Miranda to come back,
saying, “[H]e raped me.” Beth’s trial testimony regarding
Miranda’s years-long sexual abuse is recounted below. 3

¶3 Miranda sexually abused Beth during the first marriage,
beginning when Beth was around 9 years old and ending when
she was around 12 years old. What began as “cuddling” and
“spooning” in bed while watching television together turned into
Miranda touching Beth inappropriately. The touching “got
progressively worse” over time, beginning with Miranda
touching Beth’s buttocks and breasts (first over and then under
her clothes), and later advancing to him touching the outside and
then the inside of her vagina. Miranda also sometimes exposed
his penis and told Beth to “grab it and . . . start moving it back and

2. “We review the record facts in a light most favorable to the
jury’s verdict and recite the facts accordingly, and we present
conflicting evidence only as necessary to understand issues raised
on appeal.” State v. Fraughton, 2024 UT App 118, n.1, 556 P.3d 118
(quotation simplified).

3. Beth was 14 years old at the time of trial.

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forth.” While she did that, Miranda would insert his finger in her
vagina. On one occasion, Miranda removed Beth’s pants and
“licked” her vagina, but she pushed him away. This sexual abuse
that took place under the guise of watching television in bed
together occurred on a nearly daily basis in an upstairs bedroom
and later, after the basement was finished, in a basement
bedroom.

¶4 During the summers, Miranda took Beth to work with him
at a Provo mini mall, where he also inappropriately touched her.
During his breaks when no one was around, Miranda would have
Beth come into his office, sit on his lap, and “pull” his exposed
penis “up and down” while he touched her vagina. Beth stated
that this occurred around five times but possibly more.
Afterwards, Miranda would give Beth money to spend at a
nearby dollar store. On one occasion, Miranda took Beth to the
mini mall at night, after it had closed. Miranda found an area
outside the view of the security cameras where he touched Beth’s
vagina while she was standing and made her stroke his penis.

¶5 After the mini mall closed down, Miranda took Beth to his
job at an arcade in Orem. Beth recounted an instance in a
co-worker’s office when Miranda moved a camera to the side, had
Beth sit on his lap, and abused her in the same manner as he did
in his office at the mini mall: he touched her vagina while having
her stroke his penis.

¶6 Beth also testified that Miranda raped her “five or six”
times, with the first instance occurring when she was 11 or 12.
During this first instance, Miranda told Beth to come “cuddle” in
the basement bedroom. There, he bent her over the side of the bed,
pulled down her pants, and inserted his penis into her vagina.
Thereafter, Miranda raped Beth in that same manner in the
basement bedroom. Beth testified that one of those instances
occurred when Mother “gave birth to [her] little brother.” Beth
stated, “[Mother] was in the hospital while I was home with
[Miranda], and I slept with him on his bed.”

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Miranda v. State

¶7 Beth testified that Miranda also once raped her at the house
of a close friend of his who also worked at the arcade. That day,
Miranda and Beth left the arcade to retrieve something from the
friend’s house, where they found themselves alone. Miranda laid
Beth on her back on the friend’s bed, removed her pants, and
raped her. Afterward, they returned to the arcade.

¶8 Beth also recounted an instance that took place after
Miranda and Mother separated for the first time. Miranda came
over to the house to visit the then-one-year-old son he shared with
Mother. While sitting on the couch, Miranda exposed his penis to
Beth. Beth pulled down her own pants and was about to “sit on
it” when she suddenly “got really nervous” and told Miranda that
she “didn’t feel comfortable doing this.” Miranda then “put his
penis back in his pants,” and Beth pulled up her own pants and
left the room. The sexual abuse did not resume when Miranda
moved back into the house during the second marriage.

Criminal Proceedings and Direct Appeal

¶9 In 2014, following Beth’s disclosure of the sexual abuse to
Mother and the ensuing police investigation, the State charged
Miranda with six counts of aggravated sexual abuse of a child and
three counts of rape of a child, all first-degree felonies. A
three-day jury trial was held in 2015. Beth testified as outlined
above. Mother also testified.

¶10 Miranda took the stand in his own defense. He
categorically denied ever raping or otherwise sexually abusing
Beth. He asserted that he and Mother were engaged in
contentious divorce proceedings involving custody of their
shared son, and he posited that Mother had coached Beth to lie
about the sexual abuse to obtain a custody advantage. He also
suggested that Beth had fabricated the allegations in retaliation
for him “not wanting to come back” after the second separation.

¶11 At the close of the defense case, the trial court instructed
the jury. While the jury was generally informed that it must
“consider each charge separately” and that its verdict on each

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Miranda v. State

charge must be unanimous, the instructions failed to link a
specific act to each charge or otherwise clarify that the jurors must
agree on the same underlying act for each conviction. The jury
was further instructed that “[e]ach act of sexual touching
constitutes a separate offense, even if the two acts arose out of a
single incident of contact.”

¶12 During closing argument, both sides agreed that the case
hinged on credibility. The prosecutor told the jury that “this really
is a contest of truth” between Beth’s allegations and Miranda’s
denial. He then proceeded to argue at length that the State’s
witnesses, including Beth and Mother, were more credible than
the defense witnesses, particularly Miranda. 4 Miranda’s trial
counsel similarly told the jury, “[O]ne very difficult question that
you need to answer . . . is who’s telling the truth.” Trial counsel
then put forward two possible reasons why Beth would have
fabricated the allegations: she “want[ed] their family to be
together again”5 and the allegations advantaged Mother in the
ongoing divorce proceedings.

¶13 During closing argument, the prosecutor also addressed
the six counts of aggravated sexual abuse of a child, summarizing
Beth’s testimony that Miranda touched her buttocks, vagina, and
breasts; “inserted his finger in her vagina”; and made her

4. In addition to Miranda, the defense called as witnesses a former
operator of a stand at the mini mall, which was located near
Miranda’s office, as well as the stand operator’s daughter who
played with Beth almost every day at the mini mall. The stand
operator testified that she never witnessed Miranda
inappropriately touch Beth, and the daughter testified that Beth
never disclosed any sexual abuse to her.

5. It is not entirely clear how falsifying claims of sexual abuse
against Miranda would increase the chances of the family
reuniting. Trial counsel may have been referencing Miranda’s
suggestion that the allegations were retaliation for him “not
wanting to come back.”

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Miranda v. State

“masturbate him” and “take indecent liberties with him.” The
prosecutor reiterated the jury instruction that “each act of sexual
touching constitutes a separate offense whether that happened in
one incident or over multiple incidents.” The prosecutor provided
an example, stating that if the jury found that Miranda “touched
her buttocks and her vagina in one incident of abuse, that can be
two counts.” And pointing to Beth’s allegations that Miranda
“touched her so many times that she can’t count them,” the
prosecutor indicated that the six counts were “a representative
example of . . . those multiple times” and that the jury must find
that there are “at least six occasions when [Miranda] did this.” But
the prosecutor cautioned that the jury “must consider each one of
those separately in light of the evidence and not say well, he did
it once, he must have done it six” times. The prosecutor further
explained,

There is plenty of evidence to support that
conclusion. There’s plenty of evidence to show that
he touched her more than once at their home . . . so
that would be two counts. . . . [T]here’s plenty of
evidence that he touched her more than once at the
mini mall in Provo. That’s two more counts. Then
finally that he touched her more than once at the
[arcade], and that would be the fifth and sixth
counts.

¶14 As for the three counts of rape of a child, the prosecutor
told the jury that the evidence showed that Miranda raped Beth
“five to six times”—“more than once in the . . . basement
bedroom” and once at the house of Miranda’s friend.

¶15 The jury returned guilty verdicts on all nine counts after
less than 90 minutes of deliberation. Miranda subsequently
moved for a new trial based on several evidentiary claims. The
trial court denied that motion, stating that Beth “gave direct
evidence by testifying in detail and credibly,” and it further found
that her testimony “was impressive and resolute.”

20241305-CA 6 2026 UT App 91
Miranda v. State

¶16 Miranda then pursued an unsuccessful direct appeal of his
convictions. See Miranda I, 2017 UT App 203, ¶ 52, 407 P.3d 1033,
cert. denied, 417 P.3d 581 (Utah 2018). In that appeal, Miranda’s
appellate counsel did not argue that the jury instructions failed to
properly instruct the jury on the unanimity requirement. See id.
¶¶ 23–25.

Postconviction Proceedings

¶17 Following his direct appeal, Miranda filed a pro se petition
for postconviction relief. Several years later, after obtaining
postconviction counsel, Miranda filed an amended petition
arguing, among other things, that his trial and appellate counsel
were ineffective for not requesting a specific unanimity jury
instruction or raising that issue on appeal, respectively. At the
ensuing hearing, the State conceded that both trial and appellate
counsel’s performance was deficient, leaving the postconviction
court to determine only whether the deficient performance
prejudiced Miranda. 6

¶18 The postconviction court concluded that Miranda had
demonstrated prejudice. Citing State v. Chadwick, 2024 UT 34, 554
P.3d 1098, the court held that “there are certain circumstances that
inherently undermine confidence in the unanimity of a verdict,”
such as multiple-acts cases in which “the counts charged are
identical and the counts are not linked to specific underlying
conduct.” See id. ¶ 40.The court further concluded that “[n]ot only
did the general unanimity instructions in this case leave room for
confusion, but statements made by the prosecution during closing
argument at trial suggested that different members of the jury had
the option to pick and choose from the various alleged incidents,
in violation of the unanimous verdict requirement.” And the court
stated that as a result of this, the jury was “encouraged . . . to gloss
over the specific facts required to unanimously establish each
element of each separate crime, thereby undermining confidence

6. Different judges presided over the postconviction proceedings
and the trial.

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Miranda v. State

in the verdict.” Thus, the court “conclude[d] by a preponderance
of the evidence that there is a reasonable probability that, but for
these errors, the result of the proceeding would have been
different.”

¶19 The court accordingly vacated Miranda’s convictions and
ordered a new trial. The State appeals.

ISSUE AND STANDARD OF REVIEW

¶20 The State argues that the postconviction court erred in
concluding that Miranda was prejudiced by the omission of a
specific unanimity jury instruction. “On appeal from a ruling on
a petition for post-conviction relief, we review the post-conviction
court’s legal conclusions for correctness and its factual findings
for clear error.” Carter v. State, 2025 UT 13, ¶ 67, 570 P.3d 315
(quotation simplified). See also State v. Torres-Orellana, 2024 UT 46,
¶ 66, 562 P.3d 706 (holding that a lower court’s “application of the
Strickland standard, including its prejudice prong, is reviewed for
correctness”).

ANALYSIS

¶21 The Utah Constitution mandates that jury verdicts in
criminal cases “be unanimous.” Utah Const. art. I, § 10. More
precisely, the verdict must be unanimous “as to a specific crime”
and “on all elements of a criminal charge.” State v. Hummel, 2017
UT 19, ¶¶ 28–29, 393 P.3d 314 (quotation simplified). Put
differently, a jury may not render “a generic ‘guilty’ verdict that
does not differentiate among various charges” based merely on a
unanimous finding “that a defendant is guilty of a crime.” Id. ¶ 26
(emphasis in original; quotation otherwise simplified). To ensure
unanimity in cases where the evidence details more criminal acts
than the number of counts charged, “the jury instructions must
either (1) link an alleged criminal act to a charge or (2) inform the
jury that it must unanimously agree that the same alleged

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criminal act has been proven beyond a reasonable doubt.” State v.
Mike, 2025 UT App 163, ¶ 40, 581 P.3d 590 (quotation simplified).

¶22 The postconviction court in this case ruled that the failure
to ensure that the jury was properly instructed on the unanimity
requirements constituted ineffective assistance by both trial and
appellate counsel. See Utah Code Ann. § 78B-9-104(1)(d)
(LexisNexis Supp. 2025) (listing ineffective assistance of counsel
as a ground for which criminal defendants may obtain
postconviction relief from their conviction or sentence); id.
§ 78B-9-106(3)(a) (2022) (“[A] petitioner may be eligible for relief
on a basis that the ground could have been but was not raised in
the trial court, at trial, or on appeal, if the failure to raise that
ground was due to ineffective assistance of counsel.”). Ineffective
assistance of counsel occurs when (1) defense “counsel’s
performance was deficient” and (2) “the deficient performance
prejudiced the defense.” Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668, 687
(1984). See also Utah Code Ann. § 78B-9-104(2)(a) (“The court may
not grant relief from a conviction or sentence unless in light of the
facts proved in the postconviction proceeding, viewed with the
evidence and facts introduced at trial or during sentencing . . . the
petitioner establishes that there would be a reasonable likelihood
of a more favorable outcome[.]”). Because the State concedes that
trial and prior appellate counsel performed deficiently, only the
prejudice prong is at issue here.

¶23 “An error by counsel, even if professionally unreasonable,
does not warrant setting aside the judgment of a criminal
proceeding if the error had no effect on the judgment.” Strickland,
466 U.S. at 691. Accordingly, the defendant bears the burden of
showing “that there is a reasonable probability that, but for
counsel’s unprofessional errors, the result of the proceeding
would have been different.” Id. at 694. “A reasonable probability
is a probability sufficient to undermine confidence in the
outcome.” Id. In other words, “our prejudice analysis asks
whether we remain confident that the verdict would be the same”
absent the deficient performance. State v. McNeil, 2016 UT 3, ¶ 31,
365 P.3d 699. Given the facts of this case, we are not persuaded

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that it is reasonably likely that the outcome of the trial would have
been different if the jury had been properly instructed on
unanimity.

¶24 As an initial matter, the postconviction court erred in
presuming prejudice. The court’s reliance on State v. Chadwick,
2024 UT 34, 554 P.3d 1098, in support of its conclusion that
multiple-acts cases in which the number of alleged criminal acts
exceeds the number of corresponding charges “inherently
undermine confidence in the unanimity of a verdict” is misplaced.
In Chadwick, our Supreme Court addressed the prejudice standard
for preserved unanimity issues, concluding that—much like other
preserved constitutional errors—the absence of a specific
unanimity instruction carries a rebuttable presumption of
prejudice. See id. ¶¶ 30, 57. But in cases of unpreserved unanimity
issues, like the case here, the defendant bears the burden of
satisfying the Strickland prejudice standard. See id. ¶¶ 49, 54. See
also State v. Baugh, 2024 UT 33, ¶ 42, 556 P.3d 35 (applying the
Strickland prejudice standard to an ineffective assistance claim
challenging a lack of a specific unanimity instruction); State v.
Bond, 2015 UT 88, ¶¶ 43, 46–47, 361 P.3d 104 (stating that “even
federal constitutional errors so serious as to be deemed structural
are subject to preservation requirements” and a “harmlessness
analysis”). And applying the Strickland prejudice standard, this
court has held in several cases that the defendant was not
prejudiced by the lack of a proper unanimity instruction. See, e.g.,
Mike, 2025 UT App 163, ¶ 43; State v. Farmer, 2025 UT App 57, ¶ 72,
569 P.3d 267, cert. denied, 574 P.3d 522 (Utah 2025); State v. Naranjo,
2023 UT App 131, ¶ 49, 538 P.3d 1278; State v. Mottaghian, 2022 UT
App 8, ¶ 72, 504 P.3d 773, cert. denied, 525 P.3d 1256 (Utah 2022).
We likewise conclude so here.

¶25 The jury was instructed “to consider each charge
separately.” Turning first to the three rape-of-a-child counts, the
prosecutor told the jury during closing argument that the
evidence showed that Miranda raped Beth “five to six times”—
once at the house of Miranda’s friend and the remaining times in
the basement bedroom of the family home. Given that the jury

20241305-CA 10 2026 UT App 91
Miranda v. State

convicted Miranda on all three counts, all jurors necessarily found
beyond a reasonable doubt that Miranda raped Beth in the
basement bedroom at least twice. Given Beth’s testimony that
Miranda raped her “five or six” times, with one of those times
being at the friend’s house, four to five of those instances occurred
in the basement bedroom. And we see no basis in the evidence
from which to conclude that any juror would have believed that
Miranda raped Beth in the basement only twice, but not the
additional two or three times to which she testified. Cf. Mike, 2025
UT App 163, ¶ 43 (“Given the jury’s finding that [the defendant]
assaulted [his sister] by repeatedly punching her, the jury
certainly unanimously agreed on that same underlying conduct
when it convicted him on the intoxication charge.”). Indeed, in
denying Miranda’s earlier motion for a new trial, the judge who
presided over the trial stated that Beth testified “in detail and
credibly” about the sexual abuse and that her testimony “was
impressive and resolute.” 7 Accordingly, we see no reasonable
probability that the jury would not have unanimously agreed that

7. Miranda asserts that Beth’s account that Miranda raped her “at
the very time [Mother] was in the hospital giving birth” was
“highly incredible.” But Beth’s testimony did not go so far. Beth
stated, “I remember one time that she gave birth to my little
brother . . . . She was in the hospital while I was home with
[Miranda], and I slept with him on his bed[.]” We do not take this
statement to mean that the rape occurred while Mother was
actively giving birth. Rather, Beth simply stated that the rape
occurred while Mother was in the hospital. It makes sense that
Miranda would have left the hospital to care for any children who
remained at home while Mother was recuperating with the baby.
Miranda also asserts that “Beth made several completely new
accusations for the first time at trial,” including her allegation of
rape while Mother was at the hospital. This does not alter our
analysis. Even if certain jurors disregarded that specific allegation,
we have no reason to believe that the jury rejected Beth’s other
three or four allegations of rape that occurred in the basement—
particularly when it necessarily credited at least two of those
allegations.

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Miranda v. State

Miranda raped Beth for a third time in the basement bedroom
after already finding that it occurred twice.

¶26 We are similarly not persuaded that Miranda was
prejudiced with respect to the six counts of aggravated sexual
abuse of a child. The postconviction court took issue with the
prosecutor’s closing argument, stating that the prosecutor
“suggested that different members of the jury had the option to
pick and choose from the various alleged incidents, in violation of
the unanimous verdict requirement.” Specifically, the court
pointed to the following excerpt from the prosecutor’s closing
argument:

[Beth] testified that [Miranda] touched her so many
times that she can’t count them. These six charges of
aggravated sexual abuse of a child related to that
sexual touching are a representative example of . . .
those multiple times. You must consider each one of
those separately in light of the evidence and not say
well, he did it once, he must have done it six
[times]. . . . [Y]ou must believe that there are six—at
least six occasions when [Miranda] did this.

There is plenty of evidence to support that
conclusion. There’s plenty of evidence to show that
he touched her more than once at their home . . . . so
that would be two counts. . . . [T]here’s plenty of
evidence that he touched her more than once at the
mini mall in Provo. That’s two more counts. Then
finally that he touched her more than once at the
[arcade], and that would be the fifth and sixth
counts.

The court held that the lack of a specific unanimity instruction,
combined with the prosecutor’s closing argument, “encouraged
the jurors to gloss over the specific facts required to unanimously

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Miranda v. State

establish each element of each separate crime, thereby
undermining confidence in the verdict.” We disagree.

¶27 The State may sometimes alleviate the prejudice resulting
from jury unanimity problems during closing argument by
“clearly identifying for the jury which factual circumstance
formed the basis for the charge.” State v. Macleod, 2024 UT App 32,
¶ 66, 546 P.3d 366 (quotation simplified), cert. denied, 558 P.3d 87
(Utah 2024). We read the prosecutor’s closing argument as first
instructing the jury that it must separately consider each of the six
charges and that it could not convict Miranda of all six charges
based on a finding that “he did it once.” Second, the prosecutor
linked each of the six charges with the location that the touching
was alleged to have occurred: counts one and two occurred at the
house, counts three and four at the mini mall, and counts five and
six at the arcade.

¶28 Given this clarification, our confidence in the jury verdict
remains strong. Although the prosecutor did not further link a
specific touch to each charge, under the facts of this case, the
geographical link was sufficient to alleviate any potential
prejudice. We are not convinced that a jury that was unanimously
persuaded by Beth’s testimony that Miranda inappropriately
touched her at each of three locations would have disagreed on
points of Beth’s account regarding what kind of touching
occurred at each place—particularly in light of the trial court’s
assessment that Beth offered detailed, credible, impressive, and
resolute testimony. Specifically, on the record here, we remain
confident that had the jurors been properly instructed that they
needed to agree on specific acts of touching to convict on the
sexual abuse counts, they would have reached a consensus. In
other words, on this record we see it as highly unlikely that the
jury would not have agreed on the touching that occurred—and
they may have all agreed that all the claimed touching was
proven—and thus would have convicted on all counts.

¶29 Lastly, we address Miranda’s contention that he was
prejudiced by the lack of a specific unanimity instruction because

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it prevented his trial counsel from focusing on assailing specific
alleged acts. As explained above, see supra ¶ 21, although the
unanimity requirement is certainly satisfied by having the jury
instructions specifically “link an alleged criminal act to a charge,”
the requirement is also satisfied if the instructions “inform the
jury that it must unanimously agree that the same alleged
criminal act has been proven beyond a reasonable doubt.” Mike,
2025 UT App 163, ¶ 40 (quotation simplified). The second option
would have been equally restrictive, still preventing trial counsel
from focusing the defense on specific allegations. And indeed, in
cases involving prolonged sexual abuse such as this one, we can
readily envision the prosecution choosing the latter approach
instead of limiting its case to specific instances of abuse. For this
reason, this claim of prejudice likewise fails.

CONCLUSION

¶30 Based on the facts of this case, we are not persuaded that
there is a reasonable likelihood that the outcome of Miranda’s trial
would have been different if the jury had been properly instructed
on the unanimity requirement. Because Miranda has not shown
he was prejudiced, his ineffective assistance claims fail, and we
reverse the postconviction court’s order for a new trial and
reinstate Miranda’s convictions.

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