Smith's Criminal Case Compendium
Smith's Criminal Case Compendium
Table of Contents
Smith's Criminal Case Compendium
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This compendium includes significant criminal cases by the U.S. Supreme Court & N.C. appellate courts, Nov. 2008 – Present. Selected 4th Circuit cases also are included.
Jessica Smith prepared case summaries Nov. 2008-June 4, 2019; later summaries are prepared by other School staff.
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In this Wake County case, defendant appealed his convictions for second-degree murder and assault with a deadly weapon, arguing (1) the substitution of an alternate juror after deliberation began justified granting him a new trial, and (2) error in denying his motion to suppress the results of GPS tracking from his ankle monitor. The Court of Appeals granted a new trial due to the substitution in (1) but affirmed the order denying the motion for (2).
In November of 2019, surveillance footage caught a red car at a convenience store where a shooting occurred. An informant linked defendant to being an occupant of the car, and police determined that defendant was under post-release supervision (PRS) and wearing a GPS ankle monitor. A Raleigh police officer accessed the location history of defendant’s monitor, and found results tying him to the scene of the shooting. Defendant was subsequently indicted for the shooting and came to trial in December of 2021. During jury selection, one of the jurors informed the court that he had a scheduled vacation but could serve if the trial concluded before that date. The juror was seated, but due to the trial schedule, the jury was still in deliberations when his scheduled vacation arrived. Neither the State nor defendant objected when the trial court released the juror and replaced him with an alternate. The jury subsequently returned a verdict of guilty.
Taking up (1), the Court of Appeals pointed to State v. Chambers, 898 S.E.2d 86 (N.C. App. 2024), as controlling precedent. Under Chambers, any substitution of a juror after deliberation violated defendant’s constitutional right to a unanimous verdict. The court noted “[a]lthough the Supreme Court of North Carolina has granted discretionary review of Chambers, this Court remains bound by Chambers and we are therefore required to grant Defendant’s request for a new trial based upon the juror substitution.” Slip Op. at 8.
Because the issue would arise again in the new trial, the court next considered (2). Defendant argued “the State exceeded the scope of the search allowed by [G.S.] 15A-1368.4 because the law enforcement officer who accessed the data from his ankle monitor was not his supervising officer under his PRS.” Id. at 9. The court first established defendant was subject to PRS and outlined the statutory basis under G.S. 15A-1368.4 for his ankle monitor. In particular, the court noted “subsection (e)(13) does not limit the access to electronic monitoring data to the supervisee’s post-release supervision officer or any particular law enforcement agency[. . .] a supervisee can be required to ‘remain in one or more specified places’ at specific times and to ‘wear a device that permits the defendant’s compliance with the condition to be monitored electronically[.]’” Id. at 18. The limitations for warrantless searches of a PRS supervisee’s person and vehicle are different than those imposed on electronic monitoring, and the court concluded that “under these circumstances, [the police officer’s] accessing the ankle monitor data was not a ‘search’ as defined by law.” Id. at 20-21. The court also clarified that “[a]s a supervisee under PRS under [G.S.] 15A-1368.4, Defendant had a lower expectation of privacy than the offenders subject to lifetime SBM under the [State v. Grady, 259 N.C. App. 664 (2018)] caselaw.” Id. at 23.
In this Macon County case, defendant appealed after entering a guilty plea to trafficking in opiates/heroin and marijuana, arguing the trial court erred by denying his motion to suppress the evidence obtained during a warrantless search of his residence. The Court of Appeals affirmed the denial of defendant’s motion.
Beginning in September of 2017, defendant’s live-in girlfriend was on supervised probation, which included conditions that she submit to warrantless searches of her home and that she not use, possess or control any illegal drug or controlled substance. During her probation, probation officers repeatedly found defendant’s girlfriend with pills and evidence of drug use. In August of 2018, the girlfriend screened positive for cocaine, THC, and opiates. After the positive screening, probation officers decided to search her vehicle, finding additional pills, and subsequently decided to search her residence, which was defendant’s home. Officers smelled marijuana in the residence; after establishing the existence of marijuana in the home, the officers obtained a search warrant for the entire premises, finding drug paraphernalia, opiates, sealed bags of marijuana, and $42,594 in cash. After the trial court denied defendant’s motion to suppress, defendant pleaded guilty to the charges, reserving his right to appeal.
On appeal, the court considered three questions: (1) whether the probation officers properly concluded that defendant’s home was his girlfriend’s residence; (2) did probable cause exist to support the issuance of a search warrant when details from the girlfriend were included without proper evaluation of her reliability as a witness; and (3) was the warrantless search of defendant’s home directly related to the purposes of defendant’s girlfriend’s supervised probation, as required by G.S. § 15A-1343(b)(13)? Rejecting defendant’s argument in (1), the court explained that, although the record suggested that defendant’s girlfriend had moved out on July 24, 2018, an officer observed her back in defendant’s yard on July 29, 2018, and the girlfriend confirmed her address as defendant’s residence on August 8, 2018. Additionally, defendant did not object that his girlfriend had moved out when probation officers arrived to perform a warrantless search on August 15, 2018, something a reasonable person would have done if defendant’s home was not her residence. Slip Op. at 17.
Reviewing (2), the court explained that the detective who prepared the affidavit for the search warrant included his own observations and experience in law enforcement related to narcotics investigations. The court also pointed out that the trial court “identified [defendant’s girlfriend’s] statements as hearsay” and found her credibility “highly questionable” for purposes of the affidavit. Id. at 24. Despite this, the testimony of the officers involved supported the issuance of the search warrant, and the trial court did not give undue weight to defendant’s girlfriend’s statements.
Turning finally to (3), the court examined State v. Powell, 253 N.C. App. 590 (2017), and recent changes to G.S. § 15A-1343(b)(13) requiring a search of a residence by a probation officer to be “directly related to the probation supervision.” Slip Op. at 25-26. The court drew a contrast between Powell, explaining that in the current matter, defendant’s girlfriend failed a drug test screening and was found in possession of narcotics on her person and in her vehicle, activity that was directly related to violations of her probation, and it was these actions that led to the screening. Id. at 28. Despite the presence of other law enforcement at the scene, the court found that “[a]lthough the search may have served two purposes, (1) to further the supervisory goals of probation, and (2) to investigate other potential criminal behavior . . . the dual purpose of the search did not make the search unlawful under [G.S. § 15A-]1343(b)(13).” Id. at 29.
The defendant was on probation for a conviction of possession of a firearm by a convicted felon, and he was classified by his probation officer as “extreme high risk” for supervision purposes. Officers from several law enforcement agencies, working in conjunction with probation officers, conducted warrantless searches of the residences of high risk probationers in the county, including the defendant. Officers found drugs and paraphernalia during the search of defendant’s residence, and he was charged with several drug-related felonies. The defendant moved to suppress the evidence from the warrantless search, arguing that it was illegal because it was not “directly related” to his probation supervision, as required by G.S. 15A-1343(b)(13). The appellate court disagreed and affirmed the denial of the defendant’s suppression motion. The facts of this case were distinguishable from State v. Powell, __ N.C. App. __, 800 S.E.2d 745 (2017). In Powell, a U.S. Marshals task force conducted warrantless searches of random probationer’s homes as part of an ongoing operation for its own purposes and did not even notify the probation office. The Powell court held that those warrantless searches were not “directly related” to probation supervision. By contrast, the defendant in this case was selected for the enforcement action by his probation officer based on “his risk assessment, suspected gang affiliation, and positive drug screen,” and the “purpose of the search was to give the added scrutiny and closer supervision required of ‘high risk’ probationers such as the Defendant.” The search was therefore directly related to his supervision.
Because the State failed to meet its burden of demonstrating that a warrantless search was authorized by G.S. 15A-1343(b)(13), the trial court erred by denying the defendant’s motion to suppress. The defendant was subjected to the regular condition of probation under G.S. 15A-1343(b)(13). This provision requires that the probationer “Submit at reasonable times to warrantless searches by a probation officer of the probationer's person and of the probationer's vehicle and premises while the probationer is present, for purposes directly related to the probation supervision . . . .” Here, the search of the defendant’s home occurred as part of an ongoing operation of a US Marshal’s Service task force. The court noted that while prior case law makes clear that the presence or participation of law enforcement officers does not, by itself, render a warrantless search under the statute unlawful, the State must meet its burden of satisfying the “purpose” element of the statute. The State failed to meet its burden here. To conclude otherwise would require the court to read the phrase “for purposes directly related to the probation supervision” out of the statute. The court emphasized however that its opinion should not be read as diminishing the authority of probation officers to conduct warrantless searches of probationers’ homes or to utilize the assistance of law enforcement officers in conducting such searches. Rather, it held that on the specific facts of this case the State failed to meet its burden of demonstrating that the search was authorized under the statute.