State v. Latta, COA24-407, ___ N.C. App. ___ (May. 21, 2025)

In this Durham County case, defendant appealed the denial of his motion to withdraw his plea agreement to robbery and kidnapping charges. The Court of Appeals vacated and remanded for a new sentencing hearing.

In 2002, defendant entered a plea agreement conditioned on his testimony against a co-defendant, receiving an active sentence of 61 to 83 months as a prior record level I. However, defendant failed to appear at the sentencing hearing, and disappeared from North Carolina for 20 years, picking up several criminal convictions in other states during the interim. Defendant was subsequently arrested in Vance County in 2022 for possession of a controlled substance, and transferred back to Durham County, where his previous charges were reinstated. At trial, defendant filed a motion to set aside his plea agreement, which the trial court denied, and defendant was sentenced as a prior record level IV in the mitigated range of 71 to 95 months.

The Court of Appeals considered whether it was error to deny defendant’s motion before the trial court pronounced a sentence, and whether defendant should have had an opportunity to withdraw his plea after the trial court imposed a sentence greater than defendant had agreed to in the original plea. The court concluded that there was no error beforehand, as “there is no evidence to indicate that Defendant ever asserted legal innocence, nor was there evidence of incompetent counsel or misunderstanding of what a guilty plea entails.” Slip Op. at 4. However, afterwards there was error, as G.S. 15A-1024 allows a defendant to withdraw a plea as a matter of right when a trial court imposes a sentence greater than agreed to by the defendant. The court explained that “[a]lthough the sentencing occurred during the same hearing that Defendant separately moved to withdraw the guilty plea, the trial judge did not inform Defendant that he may withdraw his plea because the sentencing would be different than that which he agreed to.” Id. at 6. On remand, the court directed that the defendant either be sentenced to a term within his original plea agreement, or be afforded the opportunity to withdraw his plea if the trial court determined a greater sentence was warranted.