Expunction Changes and Updated Expunction Guide for 2026
The 2025 legislative session was relatively quiet for expunction law but still potentially important for some people. I have incorporated the changes in the law into the latest version of […]
January 29, 2026
The 2025 legislative session was relatively quiet for expunction law but still potentially important for some people. I have incorporated the changes in the law into the latest version of […]
January 28, 2026
Debbie Defendant is charged with misdemeanor stalking under G.S. 14-277.3A. She fails to appear in district court on January 23, 2026. The district court judge issues an order for Debbie’s […]
January 22, 2026
In Part I of this three-part series revisiting Simeon v. Hardin, 339 N.C. 358 (1994), I explored the district attorney’s calendaring practices that were challenged in the landmark case, and […]
January 13, 2026
A short-form murder indictment generally will not support a conviction for assault. That, at any rate, was the rule prior to State v. Singleton, 386 N.C. 183 (2024) (holding that […]
January 6, 2026
The last few years have brought about several changes to the laws surrounding pretrial release. Before many of these changes, there was a general rule that a defendant charged with […]
December 9, 2025
In an earlier blog post, I summarized North Carolina’s harm reduction immunity laws, including our safe syringe exchange law, G.S. 90-113.27, our Good Samaritan law, G.S. 90-96.2, and others. North […]
November 20, 2025
The Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment and Article 1, Section 26 of the North Carolina Constitution prohibit the exercise of peremptory challenges to strike prospective jurors based on their race. […]
November 4, 2025
Last month, the General Assembly passed Session Law 2025-93 (H 307), also known as Iryna’s Law. The legislation makes a number of changes to proceedings involving pretrial release; adds a new […]
October 23, 2025
Law enforcement officers regularly work with Confidential Informants (CIs) when investigating organized crime or building cases against individuals in leadership positions within criminal enterprises. CIs are most commonly involved in […]
October 16, 2025
Child welfare records maintained by a department of social services (DSS) contain sensitive information that parties in various proceedings are often interested in seeing. A complex web of state and […]