A multi-state search for a woman wanted in connection with a January murder at a Hickory furniture plant is ongoing this week and a U.S. Marshal said that there is a good chance that the woman and her husband, who also is wanted on suspicion of being an accessory after the fact, are still in the greater Hickory area. Keep reading for more on this story and other news.
Case Summaries: N.C. Court of Appeals (Feb. 16, 2021)
This post summarizes published criminal decisions from the North Carolina Court of Appeals released on February 16, 2021. Gabrielle Supak and Shea Denning prepared these summaries. As always, they will be added to Smith’s Criminal Case Compendium, a free and searchable database of case summaries from 2008 to present.
Case Summaries: Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals (Jan. 2021)
This post summarizes published criminal and related decisions decided in January 2021 by the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals which may be of interest to state practitioners (along with one from December that I missed before).
News Roundup
The Fayetteville Observer reports that Fayetteville law enforcement is asking the public for information about a disturbing series of burglaries in the city over the past few months. On several occasions, home security cameras have captured images of a masked person wearing kneepads burglarizing people’s homes while they slept inside. A police spokesman said that the suspect appears to be intentionally targeting the homes of elderly people. Keep reading for more news.
Criminal Contempt on the Web
Every practicing attorney and judge has by now likely seen the video of the Texas attorney who appeared at a court hearing conducted via Zoom in the form of a fluffy, white kitten. “I’m here live. I’m not a cat,” has emerged as the mantra of the week. The enthusiasm with which the recording has been shared reflects both the ubiquity of web-based hearings and the technological mishaps that can derail them. But technology is not the only thing that can go awry in a remote proceeding. Sometimes the problems are more fundamentally human, arising from behaviors that, were they committed in the courtroom, might lead to a finding of direct criminal contempt. Repeatedly talking over a judge or another litigant, arguing with a judge after having been asked to be quiet, cursing at a judge or another person present, using a racial slur, or appearing in a state of undress are examples. When a person engages in this sort of behavior in a remote proceeding, may the judge summarily punish the act as direct criminal contempt? Or must the judge issue an order to show cause and address the contemptuous behavior in a subsequent proceeding?
Acting Indirectly
I was recently updating a list of review questions for a course on larceny offenses when I came across a version of this scenario: a woman tells her friend that she left one of her items behind in the store and asks the friend to go retrieve it for her, but in fact the woman never purchased it. If the friend goes back and gets it, what’s the crime and who gets charged?
The question usually prompts a good discussion about conventional charging options like conspiracy, acting in concert, aiding and abetting, or being an accessory. Phil Dixon wrote this helpful post summarizing the most common theories of principal liability and their pleading requirements, but none of those are a perfect fit for these facts. The woman wasn’t present at the scene and didn’t personally take the item, and the friend was unaware of what was happening so there was no common purpose or criminal intent on her part.
I think the best answer is the rarely mentioned “other” theory of principal liability we have in North Carolina: Acting Indirectly, also known as the Innocent Agent doctrine.
News Roundup
As USA Today reports, fallen United States Capitol Police Officer Brian Sicknick, who was killed during a violent insurrection by extremist supporters of former President Donald Trump in early January, laid in honor in the Capitol Rotunda on Wednesday before his interment at Arlington National Cemetery. Sicknick is the third Capitol Police officer to receive that honor, the first two being Jacob Chestnut and John Gibson who were shot by an armed intruder in 1998. Keep reading for more news.
Case Summaries: N.C. Court of Appeals (Feb. 2, 2021)
This post summarizes published criminal decisions from the North Carolina Court of Appeals released on February 2, 2021. Gabrielle Supak and Jamie Markham prepared these summaries. As always, they will be added to Smith’s Criminal Case Compendium, a free and searchable database of case summaries from 2008 to present.
Changes in North Carolina Jail Populations During COVID-19
We have issued a series of reports on North Carolina state and county-level jail occupancy rates, including one in October 2020 focusing on changes in total county and statewide jail occupants during the COVID-19 pandemic (our earlier reports are here, here and here). This report provides updated jail population numbers through November 2020. Please refer to our prior reports for information on data sources and calculations.