Case Summaries: N.C. Court of Appeals (August 3, 2021)

This post summarizes published criminal decisions from the North Carolina Court of Appeals released on August 3, 2021. As always, these summaries will be added to Smith’s Criminal Case Compendium, a free and searchable database of case summaries from 2008 to present. (1) The trial court properly excluded proffered evidence that another person committed the crime. (2) An alleged error in a photographic lineup did not constitute plain error when the defendant did not also object to the witness’s in-court identification. (3) The prosecutor’s statement at closing about a defendant’s failure to produce alibi witnesses was not impermissible. (4) The State’s objection to the defendant’s closing argument referencing the defendant’s current appearance was properly sustained. (5) Admission of the defendant’s out-of-court statements did not give rise to a reasonable possibility that the jury would have reached a different result. (6) The short-form murder indictment was sufficient to confer jurisdiction on the court. State v. Abbitt, 2021-NCCOA-403 (Aug. 3, 2021). In this Rowan County case, two defendants, Sindy Abbitt and Daniel Albarran, were convicted of first-degree murder on the basis of premeditation and deliberation and felony murder, attempted robbery with a dangerous weapon, and assault with a deadly weapon after they entered a victim’s apartment and shot her over a dispute about money. A witness to the shooting identified the defendants with certainty in photographic lineups, and cellular phone analysis conducted by the FBI showed the defendants were in locations near the victim on the night of the crime. (1) The defendants [...]