At approximately 1:00 a.m. on January 1, 2018, the defendant woke Mr. and Mrs. Ridenhour by loudly banging on the front door of their residence. Mr. Ridenhour, thinking a neighbor was at the door, went to the front door and flipped the deadbolt. The defendant violently pushed the front door open, knocking Mr. Ridenhour backwards. The defendant entered the house and began beating Mr. Ridenhour, who shouted for his wife to call the police and grab his pistol. The defendant struck Mr. Ridenhour multiple times, causing him to fall down a flight of stairs and knocking him unconscious. Mrs. Ridenhour entered the hall, pointed a gun at the defendant, and told him to leave. The defendant then left the house, and Mr. Ridenhour regained consciousness and locked the door. The defendant briefly walked in the front yard but returned and began banging on the front door again. Caldwell County Sheriff’s Deputies arrived at the scene and detained the defendant at the front door. The defendant was indicted for first-degree burglary and the lesser included offense of felonious breaking and entering.

During a bench trial, the defendant twice moved to dismiss, arguing that the State had not presented sufficient evidence of his intent to commit an underlying felony when he entered the Ridenhour house, as required for first-degree burglary. The trial court denied both motions. In a subsequent charge conference, the trial court stated it was considering larceny, attempted murder, and a violation of G.S. 14-54(a1) (breaking or entering a building with intent to terrorize or injure an occupant) as potential underlying felonies for the first-degree burglary charge. However, the trial court, as finder of fact, convicted the defendant of first-degree burglary solely on the basis of G.S. 14-54(a1), stating that “the defendant . . . committed first-degree burglary by committing the felony of [G.S. 14-54(a1)] when he broke and entered into the building with the intent to terrorize and injure the occupant, because that’s what happened.” Slip op. at 5.

On appeal, the defendant challenged the sufficiency of the evidence, specifically arguing that G.S. 14-54(a1) cannot be an underlying felony for first-degree burglary because “grammatically and logically, the initial breaking and entering must be distinct from the crime which a burglar subsequently intends to commit therein.” Slip op. at 6. The Court of Appeals agreed with the defendant, reasoning that “for G.S. 14-54(a1) to satisfy the felonious intent element of first-degree burglary, a defendant must (1) break and enter a dwelling (2) with the intent to therein (3) break or enter a building (4) with the intent to terrorize or injure an occupant” Slip op. at 8–9. (emphasis in original). The Court held that sufficient evidence was not presented to support the inference that the defendant broke and entered the Ridenhours’ residence with the intent to subsequently break or enter another building within the residence and therein terrorize the Ridenhours and as a result, the defendant’s motion to dismiss should have been granted. Moreover, the Court explained that in determining that the first-degree burglary charge was only supported by the defendant’s intent to violate G.S. 14-54(a1), the trial court acquitted the defendant of the other potential underlying felonies, including attempted murder, assault inflicting serious bodily injury, and larceny. The Court reversed the defendant’s first-degree burglary conviction and remanded for entry of judgment for misdemeanor breaking or entering, a lesser included offense that does not require proof of intent to commit an underlying felony.

(1) The evidence was sufficient to support a conviction for attempted first-degree burglary. In this case, which involved an attempted entry into a home in the wee hours of the morning, the defendant argued that the State presented insufficient evidence of his intent to commit a larceny in the premises. The court concluded that the case was controlled by State v. McBryde, 97 N.C. 393 (1887), and that because there was no evidence that the defendant’s attempt to break into the home was for a purpose other than to commit larceny, it could be inferred that the defendant intended to enter to commit a larceny inside. The court rejected the defendant’s argument that the evidence suggested that he was trying to enter the residence to seek assistance or was searching for someone. (2) Applying the McBryde inference to an attempted breaking or entering that occurred during daylights hours, the court held that the evidence was sufficient to support a conviction for that offense.

In a first-degree burglary case, the evidence was insufficient to establish that the defendant broke and entered an apartment with the intent to commit a felonious restraint inside. Felonious restraint requires that the defendant transport the person by motor vehicle or other conveyance. The evidence showed that the defendant left his car running when he entered the apartment, found the victim, pulled her to the vehicle and drove off. The court reasoned: “In view of the fact that the only vehicle in which Defendant could have intended to transport [the victim] was outside in a parking lot, the record provides no indication Defendant could have possibly intended to commit the offense of felonious restraint against [the victim] within the confines of [the] apartment structure . . . .” The court rejected the State’s argument that the intent to commit a felony within the premises exists as long as the defendant commits any element of the intended offense inside.

The evidence was insufficient to establish that the defendant intended to commit a larceny in the vehicle. The evidence suggested that the defendant’s only intent was to show another how to break glass using a spark plug and that the two left without taking anything once the vehicle’s glass was broken.