State Of North Carolina v. Lewis
| Decision Date | 17 August 2010 |
| Docket Number | NO. COA08-1595,No. 02CRS51200-01,No. 03CRS247,COA08-1595,02CRS51200-01,03CRS247 |
| Parties | STATE OF NORTH CAROLINA v. PAUL BRANTLEY LEWIS |
| Court | North Carolina Court of Appeals |
Attorney General Roy A. Cooper, by Assistant Attorney General Leonard Green, for the State.
Reita Pendry, for Defendant.
An unpublished opinion of the North Carolina Court of Appeals does not constitute controlling legal authority. Citation is disfavored, but may be permitted in accordance with the provisions of Rule 30(e)(3) of the North Carolina Rules of Appellate Procedure.
Appeal by Defendant from judgments entered 17 July 2008 by Judge Laura J. Bridges in Avery County Superior Court. Heard in the Court of Appeals 9 June 2009.
Defendant Paul Brantley Lewis appeals from judgments entered on his convictions of felonious robbery with a dangerous weapon, felonious breaking and entering, and first-degree sexual offense. For the reasons stated below, we reverse and remand with instructions to the trial court to dismiss Defendant's charges.
On 1 December 2 0 02 in the early morning, G.F.1 awoke to a knocking on her door at her residence. G.F. saw two men that she did not recognize. She spoke with the taller of the two men whoinformed her that they had been in an accident and needed to use her telephone. G.F. described the taller man, later identifying him as Defendant, as "an unkempt person, had a scruffy unshaven look, dirty blond hair" and "very tall." Before G.F. had the opportunity to open the door, Defendant kicked in the door, knocked her down and entered her home.
Defendant unzipped his pants, held a knife to G.F.'s throat, grabbed her by the hair, and put his penis in her mouth. When Defendant bent down, Fields was able to see his face. G.F. described Defendant's knife as a "yellow and brown handled pocketknife" that was "very dull and old." Meanwhile, the second man was looking through Fields' kitchen cabinets.
Defendant then pushed G.F. to the floor and G.F. testified that she did not remember much but thought that she might have passed out. G.F. testified that after some time, she woke up, pulled herself across the room, and managed to reach her Lifeline unit. The Lifeline unit was a mechanism that allowed her to summon help to report that she had been attacked.
On the morning of 1 December 2002, Derek Roberts, a detective with the Avery County Sheriff's Office, met with G.F. at Cannon Memorial Hospital. Roberts testified that G.F. described her attacker as "very tall, lanky, had a shaggy beard, dirty blonde hair and looked older." After G.F. told Roberts she thought she would be able to identify a photograph of the attacker, Roberts went to the Sheriff's office to pick up a photo of Defendant. Roberts presented G.F. with the single photograph and testifiedthat G.F. became "very emotional, very upset" and said "yes, that's him[.]"
Roberts testified that G.F. described the knife used in the attack as a "[l]ighter-tan-colored bone handle style pocketknife, three-and-a-half inch blade approximately; dirty, discolored blade[.]" Roberts retrieved a knife from Defendant's residence that matched the description G.F. had given him, but did not show the knife to G.F.
Carolyn Lewis, Defendant's mother, testified that she was living with Defendant on Sunday, 1 December 2 0 02, and that she and Defendant were together from the evening of 29 November 2002 until the morning of 1 December 2002.
Defendant was charged with robbery with a dangerous weapon, felonious breaking and entering, and first-degree sexual offense. In 2003, Defendant was found guilty of these charges. This Court affirmed Defendant's convictions in State v. Lewis (I), 168 N.C. App. 730, 609 S.E.2d 498 (2005) (unpublished). Defendant then filed a motion for appropriate relief which was denied by the Avery County Superior Court. Defendant appealed to this Court, which reversed the Superior Court and ordered a new trial.
Venue for the second trial was changed and the trial was held in Wataugua County, North Carolina. On 17 July 2008, the jury returned verdicts of guilty on all the charges. Defendant was sentenced to consecutive terms of 94 to 122 months for robbery with a dangerous weapon, 11 to 14 months for felonious breaking and entering, and 307 to 378 months on the first-degree sexual offense.
Defendant first argues that the trial court erred by granting the State's motion in limine, preventing Defendant from either cross-examining Roberts to impeach his credibility or introducing evidence of jury-tampering from Defendant's first trial. We agree.
Defendant's counsel argued at trial that he wished to question Roberts regarding jury tampering that occurred during the first trial. During Defendant's first trial, Eddie Hughes, a deputy with the Avery County Sheriff's Department was called as a juror. Hughes was familiar with Defendant through his work with the Avery County Jail, having transported him to Central Prison in Raleigh on two occasions. Hughes also knew Roberts because he had assisted Roberts in preparing a photographic lineup for this case, including at least three pictures of Defendant. State v. Lewis (II), 188 N.C. App. 308, 309, 654 S.E.2d 808, 809 (2008). Hughes testified at the hearing for the motion for appropriate relief that Roberts had approached him, informing him that Defendant had failed a polygraph test and said, "if we have... a deputy sheriff for a juror, he would do the right thing." In Hughes' affidavit however, Hughes recounted that Roberts had said, "[s]ince we have a deputy on the jury, he should have this information so that he can do the right thing." Id. at 312, 654 S.E.2d at 810. This Court held that the trial court's ruling was erroneous and amounted to an abuse of discretion concluding that:
[t]his was not a "harmless conversation" between a juror and a third person not tendingto influence or prejudice the jury in their verdict. This was a conversation between a sheriff's deputy and a lead detective that was intended to influence the verdict. This was not a "clearly fair and proper" trial, but rather one where an "outside influence was improperly brought to bear upon a juror."
Defendant argues that the "misconduct in which Roberts engaged in the first trial was directly relevant to his credibility." He also argues that his cross-examination of Roberts would have addressed Roberts' bias against Defendant. The State filed a pretrial motion in limine to exclude any evidence "raised and litigated in a M[otion] for A[ppropriate] R[elief] hearing wherein the Defendant was subsequently ordered to have a new trial." The State sought to exclude any evidence of alleged jury tampering by Roberts from the first trial, contending that it would be irrelevant, unfairly prejudicial, of no probative value, and would confuse the issues, thereby misleading the jury. The trial court granted the State's motion, ruling that "[d]ue to unfair prejudice and confusion of the jury[,]... nothing should be said about a trial having been held, or any kind of conviction, or anything that went on in [the first] trial."
It is well established that, State v. Alvarez, 168 N.C. App. 487, 498, 608 S.E.2d 371, 378 (2005) (citing Jones v. Rochelle, 125 N.C. App. 82, 85-86, 479 S.E.2d 231, 233 (1997)). "An abuse of discretion results when 'the court's ruling is manifestly unsupported by reason or is so arbitrary that it could not have been the result of a reasoned decision.'" State v. Whaley, 362 N.C. 156, 160, 655 S.E.2d 388, 390 (2008) (quoting State v. Peterson, 361 N.C. 587, 602-03, 652 S.E.2d 216, 227 (2007)).
"'[A] witness may be cross-examined on any matter relevant to any issue in the case, including credibility.'" Whaley, 362 N.C. at 159, 655 S.E.2d at 390 (quoting N.C. Gen. Stat. § 8C-1, Rule 611(b)). A defendant may question a witness "'on cross-examination [about] particular facts having a logical tendency to show that the witness is biased against him or his cause, or that the witness is interested adversely to him in the outcome of the litigation.'" Alvarez, 168 N.C. App. at 498, 608 S.E.2d at 378 (quoting State v. Hart, 239 N.C. 709, 711, 80 S.E.2d 901, 902-03 (1954)). Under North Carolina Rules of Evidence 608(b), specific instances of conduct offered to attack the credibility of a witness may be admissible provided that:
(1) the purpose of producing the evidence must be to impeach or enhance the witness' credibility by proving that the witness' conduct indicates his character for truthfulness or untruthfulness; (2) the conduct in question must be both probative of truthfulness or untruthfulness, and not too remote in time; (3) the conduct in question must be conduct that did not result in a conviction; and (4) the inquiry into the conduct must take place during crossexamination.
State v. Brown, 148 N.C. App. 683, 686, 560 S.E.2d 170, 173 (2002). Nevertheless, the trial court may exclude such evidence under Rule 403 if it determines that "'its probative value is substantially outweighed by the danger of unfair prejudice, confusion of the issues, misleading the jury, or by considerations of undue delay, waste of time, or needless presentation of cumulative evidence.'" Whaley, 362 N.C. at 159-60, 655 S.E.2d at 390 (quoting N.C. Gen. Stat. § 8C-1, Rule 403).
In the present case, Defendant sought to cross-examine Roberts about his conduct during the investigation into G.F.'s attack and about his behavior during the first trial. Evidence of such conduct is relevant to the jury's assessment of the truthfulness of a witness. The cross-examination would also have addressed specific conduct that was not too remote in time because it occurred at Defendant's first trial in 2003, and...
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