State v. Farmer

Decision Date18 December 2020
Docket NumberNo. 8A19,8A19
Citation852 S.E.2d 334,376 N.C. 407
Parties STATE of North Carolina v. Jimmy Lee FARMER
CourtNorth Carolina Supreme Court

Joshua H. Stein, Attorney General, by Derrick C. Mertz, Special Deputy Attorney General, for the State-appellee.

Jarvis John Edgerton IV, for defendant-appellant.

MORGAN, Justice.

This appeal involves a criminal defendant's contention that the passage of time between the issuance of the indictments for the offenses that he was alleged to have committed and his trial for these alleged offenses was so lengthy that it constituted a violation of defendant's right to a speedy trial as provided by the Constitution of the United States and the North Carolina Constitution. In applying the pertinent constitutional provisions, the salient principles which prescribe a criminal defendant's right to a speedy trial which were established by the Supreme Court of the United States in Barker v. Wingo , 407 U.S. 514, 92 S.Ct. 2182, 33 L.Ed.2d 101 (1972), and the controlling considerations which govern an alleged offender's right to a speedy trial which were determined by this Court pursuant to Barker , we hold that the scheduling and procedural circumstances existent in the present case, albeit unsettling, do not constitute an infringement upon defendant's constitutional right to a speedy trial.

Factual Background and Procedural History

The evidence at defendant's trial tended to show the following facts. On 8 March 2012, four-year-old "Savannah"1 was allegedly molested by defendant—her step-grandfather—while Savannah was visiting the home shared by her grandmother and defendant. Savannah's grandmother was married to defendant at this time. On the date of the alleged offenses, Savannah was playing outside of her grandmother's home with members of her family when she asked to go inside for a snack. Defendant volunteered to take Savannah inside in order to get an apple. However, when defendant carried Savannah into the home, he did not take her to the kitchen but instead took Savannah into the master bedroom. Savannah was lying on the bed and defendant removed Savannah's clothing and touched her genitals.

After a while, Savannah's grandmother felt that the amount of time that defendant and Savannah had been inside the home was "odd," and upon entering the residence and going to the kitchen, the grandmother did not see either Savannah or defendant. Upon hearing his wife enter the home, defendant hastily pulled up Savannah's underwear and shorts, leaving them twisted. Savannah's grandmother noticed that the door to the master bedroom was ajar, and when she investigated, she saw Savannah lying on her back on the bed in the master bedroom and noticed that the child's "pants weren't right." Savannah got off of the bed while continuing to pull up her underwear and asked her grandmother to hold her. Defendant rushed out of the room without making eye contact with his wife. Originally, Savannah explained that her underwear had gotten disarranged because she had been jumping on the bed. Savannah gave her grandmother this explanation because it was the version of the story that defendant had instructed Savannah to say. However, on the ride home with her mother from the grandmother's residence later in the day, Savannah told her mother that defendant had touched Savannah's genital area. Savannah's mother contacted the Rowan County Sheriff's Office. It began an investigation into the matter which led to the arrest of defendant on 24 April 2012. At his first appearance in court on 26 April 2012 following his arrest, defendant received court-appointed counsel. On 7 May 2012, defendant was indicted on charges of first-degree sex offense with a child and indecent liberties with a child.

Defendant waived arraignment on 24 May 2012 and 5 November 2012. On 15 July 2013, defendant filed a motion requesting a bond hearing to reduce his bond, a motion for funds for a private investigator, and notice of his intent to request expert funds. On 29 July 2013, the trial court allowed defendant's motion for funds for a private investigator; however, defendant's bond hearing was not calendared. On 21 January 2014, defendant filed another notice of his intent to request expert funds and a motion for funds for an expert analyst, and the motion was heard and allowed without objection by the State on the following day of 22 January 2014. Defendant did not meet with any of the experts whom he had retained until 5 March 2014.

Defendant's trial was scheduled to start on 30 January 2017; however, counsel for defendant and the State agreed to continue the case and to reschedule it for the 17 July 2017 trial session of court. On 6 March 2017, defendant filed a motion for a speedy trial and asked the trial court either to dismiss the charges or to schedule the trial for an immovable court date by way of a peremptory setting. Defendant additionally filed a motion to dismiss on 11 July 2017, alleging a violation of the right to a speedy trial as established by the Constitution of the United States. In his motion to dismiss, defendant stated that he had maintained "the same counsel throughout the life of [the] case."

The speedy trial motion came before the Honorable Lori I. Hamilton, who conducted the hearing regarding defendant's motions on 17 July 2017 during the trial session of Superior Court, Rowan County, during which defendant's criminal trial was rescheduled. At the hearing, defendant called Rowan County Assistant Clerk of Court Amelia Linn to testify concerning the allegedly unconstitutional delay in bringing defendant to trial following his indictment. Linn testified that her office was the keeper of legal records in Rowan County and that she was the supervisor of the criminal records division. Linn also represented that no fewer than sixty-five trial sessions had occurred during the period of time between defendant's 7 May 2012 date of indictment and the 17 July 2017 trial date.

Within this time period, defendant's case had no trial activity from a calendared date of 9 May 2012 to the 30 January 2017 trial session of court, according to Rowan County court records which were introduced into evidence at the hearing.

After reviewing the evidence which was introduced and hearing the arguments which were made by both parties, the trial court applied the factors established in Barker to assess whether defendant's constitutional right to a speedy trial had been violated. The trial court determined that defendant's right to a speedy trial had not been violated; accordingly, defendant's motion to dismiss was denied and the matter proceeded to trial.

During trial, the evidence regarding the series of events which allegedly occurred on 8 March 2012 involving Savannah and defendant along with the purported actions and circumstances which followed was presented as described above. In addition, defendant's niece testified that defendant had sexually molested her in the late 1970s and early 1980s when the niece was between the ages of five and nine years old. The State offered that the lengthy period of time which elapsed between the alleged incidents involving defendant's activity with the niece and with Savannah was explained, at least in part, by defendant's lengthy imprisonment for two counts of murder in 1983, resulting from defendant's killing of his previous wife and his eight-year-old daughter. Defendant did not offer any evidence at trial. On 20 July 2017, the jury returned verdicts finding defendant guilty as charged of first-degree sex offense with a child and indecent liberties with a child. Thereupon, the trial court entered consecutive sentences totaling 338 months to 476 months with credit given to defendant for time served while awaiting trial. Defendant gave oral notice of appeal in open court.

The Court of Appeals Decision

In the Court of Appeals, defendant argued that the trial court erred by denying defendant's motion to dismiss the charges against him. Defendant contended that the State violated his constitutional right to a speedy trial by failing to calendar his trial date for approximately five years following the issuance of the indictments against him. See State v. Farmer , 262 N.C. App. 619, 822 S.E.2d 556 (2018).2 The majority of the panel of the lower appellate court acknowledged that the five-year delay during which defendant waited to proceed to trial on the charges against him was "significantly long." Id. at 621–22, 822 S.E.2d at 559 ; see State v. Spivey , 357 N.C. 114, 119, 579 S.E.2d 251, 255 (2003) (noting that a delay between indictment and trial of one year is presumptively prejudicial). However, after reviewing all of the Barker factors, the Court of Appeals majority ultimately held that there was no speedy trial violation based on the specific facts of this case and therefore affirmed the trial court's denial of defendant's motion to dismiss. Farmer , 262 N.C. App. at 625, 822 S.E.2d at 561.

The Court of Appeals majority cited in its authored opinion our decision in State v. McKoy , 294 N.C. 134, 240 S.E.2d 383 (1978), for the proposition that

[t]he right to a speedy trial is different from other constitutional rights in that, among other things, deprivation of a speedy trial does not per se prejudice the ability of the accused to defend himself; it is impossible to determine precisely when the right has been denied; it cannot be said precisely how long a delay is too long; there is no fixed point when the accused is put to a choice of either exercising or waiving his right to a speedy trial; and dismissal of the charges is the only possible remedy for denial of the right to a speedy trial.

Farmer , 262 N.C. App. at 622, 822 S.E.2d at 559 (quoting McKoy , 294 N.C. at 140, 240 S.E.2d at 388 ). Under Barker , the factors to be considered in making the difficult and highly fact-specific evaluation of whether a possible speedy trial violation has occurred include "(1) the length of delay, (2) the reason for the...

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