Smith's Criminal Case Compendium
Smith's Criminal Case Compendium
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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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The defendant was found guilty of criminal contempt relating to his unauthorized Facebook livestreaming of Macon County criminal superior court proceedings. The trial judge sentenced the defendant to 30 days in jail but suspended the sentence on numerous conditions. One condition required the defendant to compose a 2,000-3,000-word essay on respect for the judicial system and to post it to his social media. He was further ordered to monitor the posts of the essay on social media and delete any negative or disparaging remarks made by third parties. The defendant was not allowed to return to court in the district until the essay was posted online. On appeal, the defendant argued that his sentence was illegal and not authorized by the contempt statutes.
As summarized here, the Court of Appeals determined that the trial court had the discretion to suspend a contempt sentence and that the terms of probation were reasonably related to the nature of the offense (and therefore within the trial court’s discretion). Judge Brook dissented in part, noting the potential First Amendment problems with compelling the defendant to delete the comments of third parties on social media. He would have vacated that condition as not reasonably related to the offense or circumstances of the defendant. Based on that partial dissent, the defendant appealed to the North Carolina Supreme Court. In a per curiam order, the North Carolina Supreme Court affirmed. [Jonathan Holbrook blogged in part about the Court of Appeals decision in the case here.]
In this Davidson County case, the defendant pled guilty to a drug offense and received 12 months of supervised probation. His probation officer filed a violation report alleging positive drug screens and other violations. At the violation hearing, the defendant chose to represent himself. The court found a willful violation and agreed to extend probation by six months and to hold the defendant in custody for up to two weeks until he could begin drug treatment at a treatment center. The defendant said “that’s crazy,” accused the court of activating his sentence, and suggested that the court be “f—king honest with [him].” After being warned about his language, he accused his probation officer of “start[ing] this sh— all over again.” The court began contempt proceedings, found the defendant in direct criminal contempt and sentenced him to 30 days. He sought appellate review.
As to the probation modification, the Court of Appeals first found that he had no right to appeal. In criminal cases, appellate rights are provided entirely by statute, and G.S. 15A-1347(a) allows an appeal of a probation violation only when the court activates a sentence or imposes special probation. The trial court did neither in this case.
The defendant therefore sought certiorari review. The lead opinion, relying on State v. Edgerson, 164 N.C. App. 712 (2004), concluded that certiorari review is not available for probation modifications. Two judges concurred separately, each disagreeing with the lead opinion on that point, but the panel was unanimous that even if such authority exists, the defendant’s petition was “wholly frivolous” and so certiorari review should be denied.
As to the contempt finding, the Court agreed to review the matter under its certiorari jurisdiction. After finding the defendant in contempt, the trial court stated, “Enter notice of appeal for his contempt citation,” to which the defendant responded, “Thank you.” Although this was not a proper notice of appeal, the defendant’s intent to appeal was obvious so certiorari review was justified. The court proceeded to uphold the contempt conviction, finding that the defendant’s “words and actions willfully interrupted the proceedings and impaired the respect due the [trial] Court’s authority” in violation of G.S. 5A-11(a).
In this Gaston County case, the defendant was summarily found in direct criminal contempt by a magistrate. The contempt order arose out of a situation where the defendant came to the magistrate’s office to report a death threat she had received on her cell phone. The magistrate declined to look at the phone because cell phones were not permitted in the courtroom. The magistrate then told the defendant “that she needed to leave and take the cell phone out or [he] would hold her in contempt.” ¶ 5. The magistrate sat in silence for two or three minutes while the defendant repeated her claim, and then shut the blinds to the magistrate’s window, saying “we’re finished.” Id. The defendant left and made it to her car, but by that point the magistrate had informed the sheriff’s office that he was holding the defendant in contempt. Officers returned the defendant to the courtroom where the magistrate, without any additional proceedings, passed the contempt order through the window and gave it to the defendant. On appeal, the superior court found, among other things, that the magistrate told the defendant “that she was going to have to leave the courtroom and stop arguing with him, or he would hold her in contempt of court.” ¶ 8. The superior court concluded that the magistrate twice gave the defendant summary notice of the contempt charge and the conduct on which it was based, and then gave the defendant an opportunity to respond. The superior court entered an order holding the defendant in contempt and sentenced her to 48 hours of time already served.
On appeal to the Court of Appeals, the defendant argued that some of the trial judge’s findings of fact were not supported by the evidence. The Court of Appeals agreed, concluding that the evidence did not support the finding that the magistrate told the defendant to stop arguing with him. Rather, the magistrate told the defendant to leave the courtroom on account of the phone, and did not say anything further before ultimately closing the window blinds. Additionally, the Court concluded that there was insufficient evidence to support the trial court’s finding that the defendant continued to argue with the magistrate in response to being given notice that she would be held in contempt. To the contrary, the magistrate’s own testimony indicated that the defendant was repeating her claim about the underlying death threat, not arguing with the magistrate’s contempt warning.
The Court went on to note that the superior court appeared to be reviewing validity of the proceedings leading up to the magistrate’s order rather than conducting a de novo review. Moreover, the Court noted that summary contempt proceedings by the magistrate were not appropriate in any event where the contempt was not imposed substantially contemporaneously with the offending acts. Here, the magistrate effectively closed court by closing the window blinds and did not actually hold the defendant in summary contempt until she had left the courtroom for her car. Once court was closed, there was no proceeding to be delayed or disrupted, and summary contempt proceedings were therefore inappropriate.
The Court reversed the trial court’s order.
The defendant was served with subpoenas for her and her children to testify in a murder trial. She was first served by telephone by the Watauga County Sheriff’s deputy and later served personally. The defendant and her children did not appear as commanded. (This led to an improperly declared mistrial and ultimately resulted in a double jeopardy violation. See State v. Resendiz-Merlos, 268 N.C. App. 109 (Oct. 15, 2019)). The day before failing to appear as required by the subpoena, the defendant met with the prosecutor and acknowledged her obligation to appear and testify. After the trial, the defendant acknowledged to law enforcement that she had purposefully failed to comply with the subpoena. A show cause order was issued, and the defendant was found in criminal contempt. She was sentenced to an active term of 30 days and appealed.
(1) The subpoena personally served on the defendant only had one page of the AOC subpoena form (AOC-G-100). Page two of that document lists the rights and protections for a person under subpoena, and the defendant argued this rendered the process invalid. The Court of Appeals agreed that the subpoena personally served on the defendant did not comply with the requirements for service of a subpoena, but found the subpoena served by telephone was proper.
(2) The defendant also argued that the trial court lacked jurisdiction to find her in contempt based on the invalid subpoena. Because the telephone subpoena was properly served, the trial court had jurisdiction to enforce it. Contempt under these circumstances was permissible as a matter of Rule 45 of the North Carolina Rules of Civil Procedure or under G.S. 5A-11 (Criminal contempt). A show cause order alleging failure to comply with a court order and referencing the prior order gives a trial court jurisdiction for the trial court to act, and the show cause order here did so. In the court’s words:
[B]ecause the trial court entered a show cause order requiring defendant to appear in court and explain why she failed to appear in accordance with the subpoena served upon her, it was fully authorized to find her in criminal contempt of court. Gonzalez Slip op. at 9.
(3) An additional argument that the trial court failed to apply the beyond-a-reasonable-doubt standard to her contempt conviction was likewise rejected. The trial court announced in open court its use of that standard but failed to check the appropriate box on the form order. The oral pronouncement was sufficient to indicate the trial court’s application of the correct standard of proof, and the district court’s judgment was therefore affirmed in all respects. Judges Carpenter and Arrowood concurred.
The defendant in this case was found in criminal contempt after failing to appear as a witness at an assault on a female trial involving her husband where she was the alleged victim. The court first determined that failing to appear as a witness when subpoenaed is punishable as criminal contempt because it constitutes willful disobedience of, resistance to, or interference with a court’s lawful process. The court then rejected the defendant’s jurisdictional argument that the show cause order issued by the district court was facially defective for failing to comply with G.S. 15A-924(5), explaining that the statute’s requirements for pleadings in criminal cases in superior court do not apply to proceedings for criminal contempt. The court concluded by rejecting the following arguments advanced by the defendant: (1) that the district court’s failure to indicate that it used the reasonable doubt standard of proof deprived the superior court of jurisdiction on appeal from the district court’s order; (2) that it was error for the superior court to allow the district court judge to testify in the de novo hearing on appeal from the district court’s order; and (3) that competent evidence did not support the trial court’s findings of fact related to the defendant’s failure to appear.
Judge Berger concurred in a separate opinion, expressing his view that the majority should not have considered the defendant’s argument under Evidence Rule 605 regarding the competency of the district court judge as a witness, as well as his view that the majority should not have engaged in plain error review of the witness competency issue as it was a matter within the trial court’s sound discretion.
In this direct criminal contempt case involving summary proceedings where the defendant was sentenced for two instances of contempt, the Court of Appeals determined as a matter of first impression that the defendant did not have a statutory right to appointed counsel under G.S. 7A-451(a)(1). The court explained that precedent from the United States Supreme Court and the North Carolina Supreme Court establishes that there is no Sixth Amendment right to counsel in summary proceedings for direct criminal contempt. The court further explained that discussion in Jolly v. Wright, 300 N.C. 83 (1980), overruled on other grounds by McBride v. McBride, 334 N.C. 124 (1993), suggested that the language in G.S. 7A-451(a)(1) entitling an indigent defendant to appointed counsel in “any case” in which imprisonment or a fine of $500 or more is likely to be adjudged should be construed to refer to “any criminal case to which Sixth Amendment protections apply.” The court went on to point out that the contemporaneous nature of summary proceedings for direct criminal contempt where the trial court acts on its own first-hand observations supported the conclusion that the statutory right to counsel does not apply, but cautioned trial courts to exercise restraint in such proceedings.
The court remanded the matter to the trial court to correct a clerical error regarding the length of one of the defendant’s contempt sentences. The court also found that the trial court’s written judgment ordering that one of the sentences run consecutive to the other violated the defendant’s right to be present at sentencing because the trial court did not specify the consecutive nature of the sentence when rendering it orally while the defendant was present in the courtroom, and remanded for the entry of a new judgment in the defendant’s presence.
The defendant entered into a plea agreement with the State in superior court, after he appealed for a trial de novo, under which he would plead guilty to misdemeanor larceny and first-degree trespassing and receive a suspended sentence of 180 days, with a split sentence of 30 days. The arrangement also stated that “[u]ltimate sentencing shall be in the discretion of the court[.]” The defendant pled guilty, and the superior court judge imposed an active sentence of imprisonment of 120 days for the larceny and 60 days for the trespass, to run consecutively. The defendant made an unintelligible remark after sentencing, and the judge held him in direct criminal contempt and imposed an additional 30 days in jail. Thereafter, the superior court entered a consent order allowing the defendant to withdraw his plea, vacating the judgment for misdemeanor larceny and first-degree trespass, and allowing the State to proceed on the original plea offer. The appeal concerned the contempt judgment only. The Court of Appeals reversed the contempt judgment, holding that the trial judge failed to give the defendant summary notice and an opportunity to be heard before entering judgment in accordance with G.S. 5A-14(b). Although the findings and order signed by the trial judge contain a preprinted finding that “the contemnor was given summary notice of the charges and summary opportunity to respond,” the Court found that the record directly contradicted the form language and that no notice or opportunity to be heard was given. The Court rejected the State’s argument that because the defendant had already served the contempt sentence, the defendant’s appeal was moot. That argument, if accepted, would allow a defendant to be criminally confined without judicial review so long as the sentence was completed.
The trial judge in this case issued a show cause order for defendant to appear and show cause why he should not be held in criminal contempt for recording the proceedings before the trial judge and posting them on Facebook, contrary to courtroom policy and warnings. (1) The Court of Appeals affirmed the trial judge’s denial of the defendant’s motion to recuse, finding no evidence to suggest that the trial judge could not preside over the contempt hearing in an objective, impartial manner. (2) The evidence supported the trial judge’s finding of criminal contempt; it showed that the defendant understood the courtroom policy and warnings not to record inside the courtroom and willfully disregarded them. (3) The Court of Appeals held that the trial judge was authorized to impose a suspended sentence of imprisonment with conditions of probation, including the condition that the defendant write an essay about respect for the courtroom and publish it on his social media and internet accounts. The dissent found that although this condition had a reasonable relationship to the defendant’s criminal contempt and was permissible, it was impermissible—because not reasonably related to the contempt and potentially a violation of the First Amendment—to require the defendant to monitor comments by third parties on his accounts and delete negative ones.
At the conclusion of a probation revocation hearing, the defendant yelled vulgarities within earshot of the court. The trial court found the defendant in criminal contempt and sentenced him to an additional 30 days, consecutive to his other sentences. The trial court did not give the defendant an opportunity to respond to the alleged contempt, in violation of G.S. 5A-14(b). The judge also struck language from the contempt order that would normally document the fact that the defendant was warned and given an opportunity to be heard. “’[T]he judicial official’s findings in a summary contempt proceeding should clearly reflect that the contemnor was given an opportunity to be heard’ and without that finding, the trial court’s findings do not support the imposition of contempt.” The contempt order and judgment were therefore reversed.
The trial court did not err by holding the defendant in direct criminal contempt for statements he made during closing arguments in this pro se case. On appeal, the defendant argued that his actions were not willful and that willfulness must be considered in the context of his lack of legal knowledge or training. The trial court repeatedly instructed the defendant that he could not testify to matters outside the record during his closing arguments, given that he chose not to testify at trial. The trial court reviewed closing argument procedures with the defendant, stressing that he could not testify during his closing argument, and explaining that he could not tell the jury “Here’s what I say happened.” Although the defendant stated that he understood these instructions, he began his closing arguments by attempting to tell the jury about evidence that he acknowledges was inadmissible. The trial court excused the jury and again admonished the defendant not to discuss anything that was not in evidence. The defendant again told the trial court that he understood its instructions. When the jury returned however the defendant again attempted to discuss matters not in evidence. The trial court excused the jury and gave the defendant a final warning. Once again the defendant informed the trial court that he understood its warnings. However when the jury returned he continued his argument by stating matters that were not in evidence. This final incident served as the basis for the trial court’s finding of criminal contempt. On this record, the trial court did not err by finding that the defendant acted willfully in violation of the trial court’s instructions.
(1) The court rejected the defendant’s argument that the trial court considered inadmissible hearsay in finding him in criminal contempt, reasoning that the evidence was admitted not for the truth of the matter asserted but rather for corroboration. At the show cause hearing the trial court found that the defendant was seen by a testifying State’s witness to have made a hand gesture indicating a gun to his head and shaking his head. This interaction interrupted the State’s direct examination of the witness. At the hearing, the State introduced two transcripts into evidence. The first was a one-page excerpt of the witness’s trial testimony. The second reflected an additional interview with the witness taken after the witness’s trial testimony was completed. Over the defendant’s hearsay objection, the trial court admitted the transcripts. The State further called three witnesses to testify to the events in question, one of whom was the ADA who testified that he saw the defendant make the gesture. The trial court found the defendant to be in willful contempt of court and entered a civil judgment for attorney’s fees and costs. The defendant gave oral notice of appeal. He later filed a petition for a writ of certiorari seeking a belated appeal of the civil judgment. On appeal the defendant argued that he was found in criminal contempt based on inadmissible hearsay. The court rejected this argument, noting that the first transcript was used to illustrate the context in which the incident arose and to corroborate other testimony that the witness seemed agitated and distracted on the stand. The second transcript was used to corroborate the ADA’s testimony. The court concluded: “Because [the transcripts] were used to corroborate the testimony of the State’s witnesses, and were not offered into evidence to prove that Defendant was speaking and making a gun gesture, the trial court did not err when admitting them into evidence.”
(2) The trial court’s findings of fact support its conclusion that the defendant’s conduct was willful. The trial court found, in part, that the defendant’s willful behavior committed during court was intended to interrupt the proceedings and resulted in the witness ceasing testimony and challenging the defendant’s action on the stand in front of the jury. The court held that this finding of fact supported the trial court’s conclusion that the defendant willfully interrupted the proceedings.
(3) The court granted the defendant’s petition for certiorari with respect to review of the civil judgment and held that the trial court erred by entering the civil judgment against the defendant for attorney’s fees without first affording the defendant an opportunity to be heard. Before entering a civil judgment under G.S. 7A-455(b) the defendant must be given notice and an opportunity to be heard. Here, after the defendant was convicted of criminal contempt, the trial court asked defense counsel how much time she spent on the case. After counsel responded that she spent about 9½ hours, the court set a civil judgment in the amount of $570. Because the defendant was present in the courtroom when attorney’s fees were imposed, the defendant received notice. However he was not given an opportunity to be heard. The court vacated the judgment and remanded to the trial court for further proceedings.
The trial court did not err by imposing consecutive sentences for multiple findings of contempt. The trial court had sentenced the defendant to six consecutive 30-day terms of imprisonment based on six findings of direct criminal contempt.
Trial court did not err by holding the defendant in criminal contempt for willfully violating the Consent Order provision which forbade her from allowing the children to be in the presence of a convicted sex offender.
A criminal contempt order was fatally deficient where it failed to indicate that the standard of proof was proof beyond a reasonable doubt.
For reasons discussed in the opinion, the court affirmed the trial judge’s order finding defense counsel in contempt of court for willfully disobeying a court order regarding permissible inquiry under the Rape Shield statute.