North Carolina Criminal Law

I am pleased to announce that the updated chapters in the Criminal Series of the Clerks’ Manual are now available.

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The School of Government has published a new resource on initial appearances and pretrial release. Although any judicial official is authorized to preside at an initial appearance, in most cases […]

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Sometimes a defendant is injured prior to or during arrest. When the injury is serious, the defendant may need to go directly to the hospital. May a judicial official, such […]

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[Author’s Note:  This post has been substantively edited to make corrections in response to helpful comments from readers.] A person generally may not lawfully be arrested unless there is probable […]

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[Author’s note:  State v. Townsend was withdrawn and replaced by a subsequent opinion, available here.  The portion of the opinion discussed below was unchanged by the subsequent opinion.] No one gets […]

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Magistrates walk a tight rope of sorts in setting conditions of pretrial release for defendants charged with impaired driving offenses.  In addition to taking into account all of the factors […]

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