In response to the stabbing of Iryna Zarutska in Charlotte on August 22, North Carolina legislators are proposing various criminal justice reforms. Brittany noted last week that Republican legislators are advocating for various changes such as restarting the death penalty,…

In February, I blogged about State v. Thomas, 295 N.C. App. 564 (2024), and whether law enforcement can review ankle-monitoring data without a warrant. The defendant in Thomas was on post-release supervision when officers pulled his location data, and the…

This post summarizes the published criminal opinions from the North Carolina Court of Appeals released on August 6, 2025. The State presented sufficient evidence to establish that a hammer was used as a dangerous weapon to support conviction for robbery…

The town of Wendell, NC, recently purchased two drones and associated equipment for $20,000 to support the police department. Officials state the drones will help locate missing or endangered people, find criminal suspects, investigate traffic crashes, and support special operations.…

Special thanks to Sloan Godbey, Summer Law Fellow at UNC SOG, for their significant contributions to this post. In March of last year, I did a thorough review of North Carolina cases addressing the authentication of surveillance video. I created…

Character evidence is one of the most challenging areas of evidence law to navigate, as Jessie Smith observes here. Jessie’s blog features a useful chart to apply Rules 404 and 405 and also links to the bench book chapter. I…

Two immigration enforcement bills have passed at the General Assembly and are now on Governor Josh Stein’s desk. The deadline for his signature or veto is today. The first bill, SB 153, contains several provisions, one of which would require state law enforcement…

Suppose you are a defender representing a client charged with Possession of Firearm by Felon. You receive a plea offer in the case, along with the AOC-CR-600B, the “Worksheet” regularly used for calculating the Prior Record Level (PRL) before sentencing.…

New data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) indicates that drug overdose deaths in the U.S. declined significantly in 2024 as compared to 2023, reaching their lowest levels since 2019. Experts from the CDC state that increased…

A common evidence question that arises is how to properly authenticate digital communications. We have written on the topic in several blogs: How Can a Party Show Authorship of a Social Media Post or Other Electronic Communication?, Authenticating Photographs Obtained…