State v. Bonilla, 209 N.C. App. 576 (Feb. 15, 2011)

(1) The evidence was sufficient to establish that the defendant confined and restrained Victims Alvarez and Cortes for the purpose of terrorizing them and doing them serious bodily harm. The evidence was sufficient to establish a purpose of terrorizing Alvarez when the defendant beat and kicked Alvarez repeatedly while wrestling him to the floor; the defendant bound Alvarez’s hands and feet and placed a rag in his mouth; the defendant and an accomplice threatened to kill Alvarez; the defendant pulled Alvarez’s pants down, and the accomplice forced a bottle into his rectum; and Alvarez testified that he thought he was going to die. There was sufficient evidence as to the purpose of doing serious bodily harm to Alvarez given the sexual assault. As to Cortes, the defendant and the accomplice knocked him to the floor, and kicked him in the stomach repeatedly; Cortes was hog-tied so severely that his spine was fractured; he had lacerations to the lips and abrasions on his face, neck, chest, and abdomen; tissue paper was in his mouth; the spine fracture would have paralyzed the lower part of his body; and cause of death was a combination of suffocation and strangulation, with a contributing factor being the fracture of the thoracic spine. (2) The trial court’s instruction clearly and appropriately defined “terrorizing” and “serious bodily harm” as required for kidnapping. The trial court instructed that: “Terrorizing means more than just putting another in fear. It means putting that person in some high degree of fear, a state of intense fright or apprehension, or doing serious bodily injury to that person. Serious bodily injury may be defined as such physical injury as causes great pain or suffering.”