Each year the School of Government summarizes legislation enacted by the North Carolina General Assembly affecting criminal law and procedure and motor vehicle laws. The summaries for this legislative session are now available and can be accessed here. Each summary provides a brief description of the act in question along with a link to the text of the act and, where available, links to blogs my colleagues and I wrote. In addition to legislation that my colleagues and I discussed in previous posts, below are some other noteworthy criminal law enactments: increased punishment and amended pretr ..read more

Looking to solve court appearance issues in your jurisdiction? Find tools that work for you with the Court Appearance Toolbox! This new, online resource from the UNC School of Government Criminal Justice Innovation Lab has off-the-shelf tools to promote court appearance and improve responses to missed appearances. You’ll find implementation guides, videos, templates, fact sheets, and much more. The Toolbox includes examples from North Carolina and across the country. Its resources can be adapted for any jurisdiction. To learn more about the Toolbox and how to use it, join the Lab’s FREE 30-min ..read more

A Wisconsin official who posted a photo of his marked ballot on Facebook during the April 2022 election had felony charges against him dropped Monday. Paul Buzzell, a member of a local school board, faced maximum penalties of 3.5 years behind bars and $10,000 in fines and would have been barred from holding elected office if convicted. Ozaukee County Judge Paul Malloy dismissed the charges against Buzzell, expressing that a state law prohibiting voters from showing their marked ballots to anyone else is in violation of the constitutional right to freedom of speech. According to this ..read more

This post summarizes the published criminal opinions from the North Carolina Court of Appeals released on November 21, 2023. These summaries will be added to Smith’s Criminal Case Compendium, a free and searchable database of case summaries from 2008 to the present. Probation violation report contained sufficient allegations to prepare defendant for possible revocation at hearing; evidence supported finding that defendant committed new offense of exploitation of a minor. State v. Bowman, COA23-384, ___ N.C. App. ___ (Nov. 21, 2023). In this Forsyth County case, defendant appealed the revocatio ..read more

One of the central differences between delinquency matters and criminal matters is that juvenile records are not subject to public inspection. This includes juvenile court records (G.S. 7B-3000(b)); all law enforcement records and files concerning juveniles, unless jurisdiction has been transferred to superior court (G.S. 7B-3001(b)); and all records and files maintained by the Division of Juvenile Justice (G.S. 7B-3001(c)). Part II of Session Law 2023-114 adds a new G.S. 7B-3103 to the Juvenile Code to establish a limited exception to the confidentiality of juvenile records. It allows the rel ..read more

My colleague Jeff Welty recently wrote about S.L. 2023-123 and changes to our death by drug distribution laws. He mentioned changes to the mandatory drug trafficking fines for certain drugs there, but I wanted to follow up on that point with the details. The new law, with new fines for certain controlled substances, takes effect on December 1, 2023. This post examines the coming changes to drug trafficking fines and explores how defenders may challenge them. Current Opiate/Opioid Trafficking Fines. G.S. 90-95(h) lays out a scheme of mandatory fines that typically accompany a trafficking convic ..read more

This post summarizes published criminal law and related cases released by the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals during October 2023. Cases of potential interest to state practitioners are summarized monthly. Previous summaries of Fourth Circuit cases are available here. Trial delays primarily attributable to COVID-19 pandemic did not violate defendant’s statutory or constitutional speedy trial rights U.S. v. Pair, 84 F.4th 577 (Oct. 24, 2023). The defendant was charged with distribution of fentanyl in the Eastern District of Virginia. His trial was initially scheduled for April 2020. Widespread ..read more

The Supreme Court announced on Monday its adoption of a Code of Conduct setting out the ethics rules and principles that guide the justices. In a statement accompanying the rules, the Court stated that for the most part, the provisions were not new as the Court historically has been governed by “common law ethics rules” derived from a variety of sources. The Court stated that it was adopting the Code to “dispel” the “misunderstanding” that justices regard themselves as unrestricted by ethics rules. Adoption of the ethics rules did not quell the criticism related to recent reports of gifts and ..read more

Our cell phones and laptops normally are subject to a reasonable expectation of privacy, meaning that police cannot search them without a search warrant or an applicable exception to the warrant requirement. But when a person abandons a digital device, he or she relinquishes that expectation of privacy and police may examine the device without a warrant or an exception. This post discusses when a device has been abandoned and explores several common fact patterns. Abandonment generally. “The law is well established that a person who voluntarily abandons property loses any reasonable expectatio ..read more

Is fentanyl an opiate?  That’s the question the prosecutor asked a witness in State v Gibbs.  The trial court overruled the defendant’s objection, and the witness was permitted to testify that fentanyl was both an opioid and an opiate.  In an unpublished opinion (“Gibbs I”), the Court of Appeals ruled this was error, reversing a conviction for trafficking by possession.  Our Supreme Court then reversed the Court of Appeals.  In a concise, per curiam opinion, our Supreme Court declared that whether fentanyl is an opiate is a question of law, and it remanded for reconsid ..read more