In this Lincoln County case, the defendant stole a car left running outside of a gas station. A three-year old child was in the backseat. Once officers attempted to stop the car, the defendant led police on a high-speed chase and ultimately crashed. The child was not harmed. During the chase, the defendant called 911 and attempted to bargain for the child’s release. He was charged with first-degree kidnapping, abduction of a child, larceny of a motor vehicle, possession of stolen property, and habitual felon. The jury convicted on all counts. The defendant did not appeal, but later filed a petition for writ of certiorari seeking review of his convictions, which was granted.

(1) The child abduction statute includes language that the offense must occur “without legal justification or excuse.” See G.S. § 14-41(a). The defendant contended that this language required the State to prove that the defendant acted willfully, and that the failure to instruct the jury on mens rea improperly treated the crime as a strict liability offense. The Court of Appeals disagreed. There is no requirement of “willfulness” in the language of the statute. While the offense is not a strict liability crime, it is also not a specific intent crime as defendant argued. Rather, the offense is a general intent crime, requiring a showing only that the defendant acted “knowingly.” The “without justification or excuse” language in the statute allows the defendant to argue defenses like mistake of fact, necessity, or others, but does not create a specific intent requirement. This argument was therefore rejected. 

(2) There was sufficient evidence to support the conviction for child abduction. The evidence showed that the defendant continued driving the car at high speeds while fleeing police, even after realizing that a child was in the backseat. After the point at which the defendant called 911 and acknowledged the presence of the child in the car, he continued to disobey police and dispatch commands to stop and continued fleeing for at least 15 minutes. Though “[a] defendant may exculpate a mistake though subsequent conduct,” the defendant here made no such showing. Slip op. at 10.

(3) There was no error, much less plain error, in the trial court’s failure to instruct the jury that the defendant must have acted willfully in abducting the child, for the same reasons that the statute does not create a specific intent crime. There was therefore no error in the trial court’s instructions to the jury for that offense.

(4) During a pretrial conference, the parties agreed that the jury would be instructed only on removal as the State’s theory for first-degree kidnapping, which was the theory alleged in the indictment. At charge conference, the State requested and received jury instructions on all three possible theories (restraint, removal, or confinement). See G.S. § 14-39. Trial counsel for the defendant assented to those instructions and did not otherwise object. Despite trial counsel’s agreement, this argument was not waived and could be reviewed for plain error. However, the court found no plain error based on the evidence (which supported each theory), and the fact that there was no conflicting evidence as to the three theories. “Defendant cannot demonstrate plain error because it is undisputed that the evidence at trial supported the theory of kidnapping alleged in the indictment––removal––and also supported the two additional theories of kidnapping included in the instruction––restraint and confinement.” French Slip op. at 12.

(5) The trial court erred in sentencing the defendant for possession of stolen goods (the car) and larceny of a motor vehicle. “A defendant cannot be convicted of both [of these] offenses when the subject property is the same.” Id. at 14. The Court of Appeals therefore vacated the conviction for the possession of stolen goods conviction and found no error as to the defendant’s other convictions.