While I was finishing up my post last Wednesday on Senate Bill 682 (the bill implementing the 2018 constitutional amendments expanding victims’ rights), the Governor was signing that bill into law. In the week since S.L. 2019-216 was chaptered, I’ve fielded a couple of questions about the responsibilities for notifying victims of court hearings and the interplay between victims’ state constitutional rights and defendants’ rights under the state and federal constitutions. This post sets forth my (admittedly preliminary) thoughts on those matters.
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Author’s note: Senate Bill 682 was signed by the Governor on September 4, 2019, and was chaptered as S.L. 2019-216.
Last week, the General Assembly ratified Senate Bill 682, which implements the 2018 constitutional amendment that expanded the rights of crime victims. The bill, ratified one day before the constitutional amendment took effect, awaits the Governor’s signature. This post briefly reviews the history of state-law protections for crime victims and the provisions of the 2018 amendment before discussing some of the more significant aspects of SB 682.
The North Carolina Supreme Court held in State v. Terrell, __ N.C. __ (Aug. 16, 2019), that a private party’s limited search of a defendant’s thumb drive did not frustrate the defendant’s legitimate expectation of privacy in the entire contents of the electronic storage device. The detective who searched on the heels of the private party could not be virtually certain that he would find nothing else of significance on the device or that his search would do no more than corroborate what the private searcher had told him. Thus, the court concluded that the detective could not lawfully search additional folders on the thumb drive without a warrant after the private party turned the device over to law enforcement.
Category: Search and Seizure | Tags: fourth amendment, jacobson, orin kerr, private search, state v. terrell, thumb drive
This post provides summaries of the opinions of the North Carolina Court of Appeals published on August 20, 2019.
Category: Uncategorized | Tags: anthony, bailey, case summaries, court of appeals, ellis, miles, rutledge, thompson
An elementary school student writes “BOMB INCOMING” on the wall of the boys’ bathroom at school. The student does not, in fact, know of any plans to bomb the school and has made no such plans himself. Has the student committed a crime or an act of juvenile delinquency? If so what crime or crimes has he committed?
Populate the poll below with your answer or answers and keep reading for mine.
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Category: Crimes and Elements | Tags: bomb threat, DWLB, graffiti, mass violence, school, State v. Mortimer, threats
A light went out on the halls of justice over the weekend. And we are mourning.
Category: Uncategorized
I recently traveled to New York City to do some sight-seeing. I noticed that I wasn’t the only one doing the looking. The New York Police Department has mounted security cameras on poles all over Manhattan. They are well-marked and conspicuous. Seeing them made me wonder about challenges to this kind of surveillance in light of the Supreme Court’s decision two terms ago in Carpenter v. United States, 585 U.S. ___, 138 S.Ct. 2206 (2018), holding that a person has a legitimate expectation of privacy in the record of his or her physical movements as captured through cell-site location information (CSLI). The court based its opinion in part on a person’s reasonable expectation that law enforcement will not constantly surveil his physical movements. Though video recorded by a law enforcement camera differs from CSLI in its scope and in the type of information collected, some have argued that the privacy interests identified in Carpenter also are implicated by the government’s use of pole-mounted surveillance cameras.
Category: Search and Seizure
People often say that district court is not a court of record for purposes of criminal cases. Is that right?
Back in 2017, I wrote about murder charges premised on the unlawful distribution of drugs and what the State must prove to establish a defendant’s guilt. One element the State must prove is malice.
This legislative session the General Assembly created two new crimes penalizing the distribution of certain drugs resulting in a person’s death: death by distribution and aggravated death by distribution. S.L. 2019-83 (H 474). A distinguishing feature of the new crimes is that they require no proof of malice. Continue reading →
Category: Crimes and Elements | Tags: 14-18.4, 2019 legislation, death by distribution, drug offenses, H 474, murder, opioid epidemic, SL 2019-83
Last month, I traveled to a hotel located on the Eastern Cherokee Indian Reservation, or Qualla Boundary, in Cherokee, North Carolina to teach at the summer conference for North Carolina prosecutors. Probably because I had crime and criminal prosecution on my mind, I found myself wondering what happens when a person commits a crime on the reservation. What law applies? Who enforces the law? Who prosecutes the person – and where? I thought I’d do a little research and quickly find the answers. As it turns out, a complicated combination of federal, state, and tribal law governs Indian Country, including the Qualla boundary. And the answers to these questions vary depending on the race of the perpetrator and the victim and the nature of the crime.
