Smith's Criminal Case Compendium
Table of Contents
Criminal Procedure
Indictment & Pleading Issues
Arrest, Search, and Investigation
Criminal Offenses
Drug Offenses
State v. Mills, 221 N.C. App. 409 (Jun. 19, 2012)
The trial court did not err by permitting detectives to offer lay opinions that a substance found on a lawn chair used to beat the victim was blood. One detective testified that there was blood in the driveway and that a lawn chair close by had blood on it. He based this conclusion on his 7 years of experience as an officer, during which he saw blood on objects other than a person several times and found that blood has a distinct smell and appearance. A second detective opined that there was blood on the lawn chair based on the “hundreds and maybe thousands” of times that he had seen blood in his life, both in the capacity as an officer and otherwise.