Smith's Criminal Case Compendium
Smith's Criminal Case Compendium
Table of Contents
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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In a plurality opinion the Court affirmed the holding below that the defendant’s confrontation clause rights were not violated when the State’s DNA expert testified to an opinion based on a report done by a non-testifying analyst. The defendant Sandy Williams was charged with, among things,...
In a straightforward application of Melendez-Diaz v. Massachusetts, 557 U.S. 305 (June 25, 2009) (holding that forensic laboratory reports are testimonial and thus subject to Crawford), the Court held that substitute analyst testimony in an impaired driving case violated ...
Forensic laboratory reports are testimonial and thus subject to the rule of Crawford v. Washington, 541 U.S. 36 (2004). For a detailed analysis of this case, see the paper entitled “Melendez-Diaz & the Admissibility of Forensic Laboratory Reports & Chemical...
In this Cabarrus County case, the defendant was convicted of first-degree kidnapping and second-degree rape. After developing a friendship with the victim, he drugged her without her knowledge, took her to a friend’s house and raped her. The defendant appealed, raising numerous challenges.
...Reversing the Court of Appeals’ decision in an unpublished case, the court held that no confrontation clause violation occurred when an expert in forensic science testified to her opinion that the substance at issue was cocaine and that opinion was based upon the expert’s independent analysis of...
Reversing the Court of Appeals, the Court held that no Crawford violation occurred when the State proved that the substance at issue was cocaine through the use of a substitute analyst. The seized evidence was analyzed at the SBI by Assistant Supervisor in Charge Nancy Gregory. At trial...
The court held that admission of lab reports through the testimony of a substitute analyst (Agent Schell) violated the defendant’ confrontation clause rights where the testifying analyst did not give her own independent opinion, but rather gave “surrogate testimony” that merely recited the...
In a substitute analyst case, the court per curiam and for the reasons stated in Ortiz-Zape, reversed the Court of Appeals’ decision in State v. Hurt, 208 N.C. App. 1 (2010) (applying Crawford to a non-capital Blakely sentencing hearing in a murder case and...
Reversing the Court of Appeals, the court held that any confrontation clause violation that occurred with regard to the use of substitute analyst testimony was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt where the defendant testified that the substance at issue was cocaine. When cocaine was discovered...
Reversing the Court of Appeals, the court held that by failing to make a timely objection at trial and failing to argue plain error in the Court of Appeals, the defendant failed to preserve the question of whether substitute analyst testimony in a drug case violated his confrontation rights. The...
With one Justice not taking part in the decision and the others equally divided, the court, per curiam, left undisturbed the decision below, State v. Hough, 202 N.C. App. 674 (Mar. 2, 2010). In the decision below, the Court of Appeals held that no Crawford violation occurred...
The court vacated and remanded State v. Burrow, 218 N.C. App. 373 (Feb. 7, 2012), after allowing the State’s motion to amend the record to include a copy of the State’s notice under G.S. 90-95 indicating an intent to introduce into evidence a forensic report without testimony of the...
A Crawford violation occurred when the trial court admitted opinion testimony of two non-testifying experts regarding a victim’s cause of death and identity. The testimony was admitted through the Chief Medical Examiner, an expert in forensic pathology, who appeared to have read the...
In this Columbus County case, defendant appealed her conviction for second-degree murder based on driving while impaired (DWI) and reckless driving, arguing error in (1) denying her motion to suppress the results of a blood sample, (2) admitting a lab report prepared by an expert who did not...
In this Robeson County case, defendant appealed his conviction for driving while impaired, arguing the trial court erred by admitting a toxicology report without authentication and allowing the arresting officer to testify to defendant’s specific blood alcohol concentration. The Court of Appeals...
In this Martin County case, the defendant was convicted of assault with a deadly weapon inflicting serious injury, felony serious injury by vehicle and driving while impaired for his driving of a vehicle after consuming prescription medications, crossing into oncoming traffic, hitting two other...
The defendant was arrested for impaired driving. Because of his extreme intoxication, he was taken to a hospital for medical treatment. The defendant was belligerent and combative at the hospital, and was medicated in an effort to calm his behavior. After the defendant was medically subdued, a...
In this murder and attempted murder case, the trial court did not err in allowing a substitute expert witness to testify to another expert’s conclusions on cell site location data connected to the defendant. The defendant complained that his rights to confront the witness were violated by the...
In this drug case, the court held—with one judge concurring in result only—that the trial court did not err by admitting evidence of the identification and weight of the controlled substances from a substitute analyst. Because Erica Lam, the forensic chemist who tested the substances was not...
In a murder case, the defendant’s right of confrontation was not violated when Dr. Jordan, an expert medical examiner, testified that in his opinion the cause of death was methadone toxicity. As part of his investigation, Jordan sent a specimen of the victim’s blood to the Office of the Chief...
In a drug case, the trial court did not err by allowing one analyst to testify to the results of an analysis done by another non-testifying analyst. The analysis at issue identified the pills as oxycodone. The defendant did not object to the analyst’s testimony at trial or to admission of the...
(1) Admission of a forensic report identifying a substance as a controlled substance without testimony of the preparer violated the defendant’s confrontation clause rights. (2) The trial court erred by allowing a substitute analyst to testify that a substance was a controlled substance based on...
(1) The defendant’s confrontation rights were not violated when the State’s expert testified about DNA testing on the victim’s rape kit done by a non-testifying trainee. The trainee worked under the testifying expert’s direct observation and supervision and the findings were his own. (2) The...
Assuming arguendo that the defendant properly preserved the issue for appeal, no confrontation clause violation occurred when the State’s expert forensic pathologist, Dr. Deborah Radisch, testified about the victim’s autopsy and gave her own opinion concerning cause of death. Distinguishing ...
(1) In a triple murder case, no confrontation clause violation occurred when the State’s expert medical examiner was allowed to testify in place of the pathologist who performed the autopsies. The medical examiner provided her own expert opinion and did not simply regurgitate the non-testifying...
Holding, in a drug case, that although the trial court erred by allowing the State’s expert witness to testify as to the identity and weight of the “leafy green plant substance” where the expert’s testimony was based on analysis performed by a non-testifying forensic analyst, the error was not...
The trial court did not err by allowing the Chief Medical Examiner to testify regarding an autopsy of a murder victim when the Medical Examiner was one of three individuals who participated in the actual autopsy. The Medical Examiner testified to his own observations, provided information...
Even if the defendant’s confrontation clause rights were violated when the trial court allowed a substitute analyst to testify regarding DNA testing done by a non-testifying analyst, the error was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt.
Applying Locklear and Mobley, both discussed above, the court concluded that testimony of a substitute analyst identifying a substance as cocaine base violated the defendant’s confrontation clause rights. The court characterized the substitute analyst’s testimony as “merely...
No Crawford violation occurred when a substitute analyst testified to her own expert opinion, formed after reviewing data and reports prepared by non-testifying expert. For a more detailed discussion of this case, see my blog post...
A Crawford violation occurred when the State’s expert gave an opinion, in a drug trafficking case, as to the weight of the cocaine at issue, based “solely” on a laboratory report by a non-testifying analyst. For a more detailed discussion of this case, see my...