Smith's Criminal Case Compendium
Smith's Criminal Case Compendium
Table of Contents
Smith's Criminal Case Compendium
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This compendium includes significant criminal cases by the U.S. Supreme Court & N.C. appellate courts, Nov. 2008 – Present. Selected 4th Circuit cases also are included.
Jessica Smith prepared case summaries Nov. 2008-June 4, 2019; later summaries are prepared by other School staff.
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Criminal Offenses > Burglary, Breaking or Entering, and Related Offenses > Breaking or Entering a Vehicle, Etc.
In this Guilford County case, defendant appealed his convictions for possession of a stolen motor vehicle and associated charges related to several vehicle break-ins, arguing error in (1) denying his motion to dismiss, (2) admitting lay opinion testimony, and (3) sentencing defendant to a more severe sentence than his prior vacated sentence in violation of G.S. 15A-1335. The Court of Appeals found no error.
The Court of Appeals previously considered defendant’s case and granted him a new trial in State v. Thomas, 281 N.C. App. 722 (2022) (unpublished). In 2019, the High Point Police Department investigated several vehicle break-ins and thefts, including the use of stolen credit cards from vehicles at retailers in the area. After spotting a stolen vehicle, officers pursued, but lost the vehicle and later found it abandoned. Inside were items related to several of the break-ins. The police were able to use surveillance footage and other evidence to tie the stolen vehicle and thefts to defendant.
In (1), defendant argued that the State failed to present evidence of “lack of consent” from the owner of one of the vehicles, a van, that he broke into, because the owner did not testify. The Court of Appeals disagreed, noting that while lack of consent is an essential element of breaking and entering and larceny, circumstantial evidence can support a finding of lack of consent. Here, defendant was caught on surveillance video walking around the van, then trying the door handles to determine if the door was unlocked. After finding the door unlocked, he quickly went through the van’s contents while “rarely go[ing] more than a second without looking up at the storefront or around the parking lot.” Slip Op. at 11. Defendant then kept his headlights off until he drove away from the parking area. This circumstantial evidence supported the inference that defendant did not have consent to enter the vehicle.
Moving to (2), defendant argued that testimony from one of the police officers identifying defendant as the person shown on surveillance video represented improper lay opinion testimony. The court noted that here the standard of review was plain error, as defendant did not object at trial, and defendant did not show that he was prejudiced by the possible error, as overwhelming evidence of his guilt was already in the record.
Reaching (3), the court explained that G.S. 15A-1335 prohibits a more severe sentence than the prior sentence, unless the increased sentence is statutorily required. Here, the trial court added a point to defendant’s prior record level “which raised his prior record level from III to IV.” Id. at 17. The court looked to the language of the companion statute G.S. 15A-1340.14, noting that subsection (b)(6) specifies how points are assigned and does not provide for a discretionary allocation by the trial court. The court disagreed with defendant’s interpretations of applicable caselaw and the language of the relevant statutes, explaining that “[i]n the absence of any mitigating factors, the trial court was not statutorily authorized to impose any lesser sentence than the sentence entered.” Id. at 18.
The defendant was charged with felony breaking or entering a pickup truck that was parked overnight at a business. The trial record did not include any evidence that the truck contained an item of even trivial value, and there was no evidence that anything had been taken from inside. In responding to the defendant’s motion to dismiss at trial, the State did not address the element of “goods, wares, freight, or other thing of value,” nor did the State argue that the evidence presented was sufficient to support that element. The Court of Appeals held there was insufficient evidence that the motor vehicle contained “goods, wares, freight, or other thing of value” and reversed the defendant’s conviction for felony breaking or entering a motor vehicle.
The trial court did not commit plain error by failing to instruct the jury on first-degree trespass as a lesser-included of breaking or entering a motor vehicle. Although the defendant argued that he may have broken into the vehicle in order to sleep and thus lacked the intent to commit a larceny therein, no evidence supported that argument.
(1) When an indictment charging breaking or entering into a motor vehicle alleged that the defendant broke and entered the vehicle, the trial court did not err by instructing the jury that it could find the defendant guilty if he broke or entered the vehicle. The statute required only a breaking or entering, not both. (2) There was sufficient evidence to establish that either the defendant or his accomplice entered the vehicle where among other things, the defendant was caught standing near the vehicle with its door open, there was no pollen inside the vehicle although the outside of the car was covered in pollen, the owner testified that the door was not opened the previous day, and the defendant and his accomplice each testified that the other opened the door. (3) There was sufficient evidence that the defendant broke into the vehicle “with intent to commit any felony or larceny therein." Citing prior case law, the court held that the intent to steal the motor vehicle itself may satisfy the intent element.
The trial court erred by denying the defendant’s motion to dismiss charges of breaking or entering a boat where the State failed to present evidence that the boats contained items of value. Although even trivial items can satisfy this element, here the record was devoid of any evidence of items of value. The batteries did not count because they were part of the boats.
Citing State v. Jackson, 162 N.C. App. 695 (2004), in this breaking or entering a motor vehicle case, the court held that the evidence was insufficient where it failed to show that that the vehicle contained any items of value apart from objects installed in the vehicle.
An indictment properly alleges the fifth element of breaking and entering a motor vehicle—with intent to commit a felony or larceny therein—by alleging that the defendant intended to steal the same motor vehicle.