State v. Holloman, 369 N.C. 615 (Jun. 9, 2017)

Reversing the Court of Appeals, the Supreme Court held that the trial court’s self-defense instructions were not erroneous. The court began by considering whether “North Carolina law allows an aggressor to regain the right to utilize defensive force based upon the nature and extent of the reaction that he or she provokes in the other party.” Although historically North Carolina law did not allow an aggressor using deadly force to regain the right to exercise self-defense when the person to whom his or her aggression was directed responds by using deadly force in defense, changes in statutory law allow aggressor to regain that right under certain circumstances. But, G.S. 14-51.4(2)(a), allowing an aggressor to regain the right to utilize defensive force under certain circumstances, does not apply where the aggressor initially uses deadly force against the person provoked. Thus, the trial court did not err by instructing that a defendant who was the aggressor using deadly force had forfeited the right to use deadly force and that a person who displays a firearm to his opponent with the intent to use deadly force against him or her and provokes the use of deadly force in response is an aggressor. The court continued, noting that it also must determine whether the trial court erred by failing to instruct the jury, in accordance with the defendant’s request, that he might have regained the right to use defensive force based on the victim’s reaction to any provocative conduct in which the defendant might have engaged. The court concluded that a defendant “could have only been entitled to the delivery of such an instruction to the extent that his provocative conduct involved non-deadly, rather than deadly, force.” Here, there was a complete absence of any evidence tending to show that the defendant used non-deadly force.