I am not against sports. I am against using public money to enrich billionaire team owners while public institutions struggle to perform basic duties. When I go out to eat in Mecklenburg County, I pay the county’s additional 1 percent tax on prepared food and beverages, just like everyone else in town. While not a property tax, it still involves the government taking money and giving it to someone else. Calling it hospitality revenue, tourism money, or a restricted fund does not change its source. The restriction may control where government spends the money, but it does not make the money private.

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A recently filed lawsuit involving Fox Business anchor Jackie DeAngelis shows why the distinction between pets and legitimate service animals can have consequences well beyond whether a dog belongs in the grocery store.

A September 5, 2026 article in the New York Post reports DeAngelis sued Whole Foods over a dog attack inside its Columbus Circle store in Manhattan. According to the lawsuit, filed August 20, DeAngelis was shopping in the store when a black pit bull allegedly bit her left hand. She says the September 2023 attack required surgery and left her with permanent scarring, disfigurement, and limited mobility.

The post Fake Service Dogs in North Carolina | Legal or Not So Much? appeared first on Carolina Criminal Defense & DUI Lawyer Updates.

You may encounter one heading north on I-77 toward Huntersville and Lake Norman, moving steadily along at 64 mph beside another vehicle traveling 64 mph in the next lane, apparently unaware that a small civilization has developed behind them.

It is annoying. It can impede traffic. Under some circumstances, it can violate North Carolina law. But here is where the subject becomes more interesting than another complaint about bad driving.

The post Camping in the Left Lane | Legal or Not So Much? appeared first on Carolina Criminal Defense & DUI Lawyer Updates.

Reporting in the August 11, 2026 Wall Street Journal (Herbal Product Sold at Gas Stations Is Being Blamed for an Addiction Crisis) describes dependency, withdrawal, illness, and death associated with products sold under the kratom label. Much of the present regulatory concern centers on enhanced 7-OH tablets, gummies, shots, and extracts rather than traditional kratom leaf. Treating every product as chemically and legally identical obscures the analysis.

Kratom Laws in North Carolina Do Not Currently Create a Statewide Possession Ban

North Carolina’s Controlled Substances Act does not presently list kratom, mitragynine, or 7-hydroxymitragynine. As a matter of statewide controlled-substance law, an adult’s possession of botanical kratom is therefore not illegal merely because the product contains the naturally occurring kratom alkaloids.

The General Assembly considered several different approaches. House Bill 328 began as one form of kratom legislation and later produced a conference proposal that would prohibit knowing possession or sale of synthetic kratom and restrict possession and sale of other kratom products to those age 21 or older. The North Carolina House did not adopt that conference report. The bill’s latest official action was referral to the House Rules Committee on July 30, 2026. The Legislative Incarceration Fiscal Note is undeterminative, as the fiscal cost cannot be calculated due to the lack of reliable metrics.

Proposed legislation would create:

• Two new Class D felonies
• Three new Class E felonies
• Three new Class F felonies
• Six new Class G felonies
• Six new Class H felonies
• Three new Class I felonies
• Six new Class A1 misdemeanors
• One new Class 1 misdemeanor
• Two new Class 2 misdemeanors
• Two new Class 3 misdemeanors.

The proposed effective date written into the conference document also did not take effect because the legislation did not become law.

Local rules require separate attention. Dare County, for example, adopted 2026 restrictions addressing sales to customers under age 21 and adulterated kratom products in unincorporated areas. Those local sales provisions do not create a statewide North Carolina ban on adult possession.

The contents of the package remain important. A product labeled as kratom may present a different legal issue if laboratory testing identifies fentanyl, another controlled substance, or a prohibited adulterant that the label does not disclose.

Botanical Kratom and Concentrated 7-OH Require Different Analysis

Kratom generally refers to the leaves of Mitragyna speciosa and products derived from those leaves. Mitragynine is the plant’s predominant studied alkaloid. The plant also contains smaller quantities of 7-hydroxymitragynine, commonly called 7-OH. The body can also convert mitragynine into 7-OH after ingestion.

The commercial market now includes products formulated to deliver isolated, enhanced, or synthetically produced 7-OH in tablets, gummies, extracts, and liquid shots. Those products may have a chemical profile far removed from ground leaf or brewed tea. According to the National Institute on Drug Abuse, kratom products can produce reported stimulant-like effects as well as opioid-like or sedative effects. The agency also cautions that research has not established a simple rule under which a particular dose or method of use reliably produces one category of effects.

The FDA has taken the position that kratom is not lawfully marketed in the United States as an approved drug, dietary supplement, or food additive. Its enforcement actions against 7-OH companies address federal product and marketing law. They do not mean that a North Carolina consumer automatically commits a state controlled-substance offense by possessing botanical kratom.

The Drug Enforcement Administration published a notice of intent on July 6, 2026, to place 7-OH above a specified threshold temporarily in federal Schedule I. The proposed threshold reaches botanical material containing more than 0.050 percent 7-OH by dry weight. For synthetic or further-processed products, it reaches concentrations above 0.050 percent or more than 1 milligram of 7-OH in the article.

The notice itself did not schedule the substance. DEA stated that a later temporary order would take effect on the date of publication in the Federal Register. As of August 16, 2026, that temporary order has not been published. Botanical kratom falling below the proposed threshold would not be covered by the announced 7-OH action.

Kratom | North Carolina Driving While Impaired

The legality of possession does not answer whether a substance may support an impaired-driving charge. N.C.G.S. § 20-4.01(14a) defines an impairing substance to include alcohol, a controlled substance, and “any other drug or psychoactive substance capable of impairing a person’s physical or mental faculties.” The final category reaches psychoactive substances even when they are not listed in the North Carolina Controlled Substances Act.

Kratom and concentrated 7-OH can produce dizziness, drowsiness, confusion, agitation, and other effects relevant to physical or mental faculties. That gives the State a basis to argue that a kratom product falls within the statutory definition. It does not establish that every product, dose, or use appreciably impaired a particular driver.

Under N.C.G.S. § 20-138.1(a)(1), the State may prosecute a driver alleged to have operated a vehicle while under the influence of an impairing substance. Subsection (b) further provides that legal entitlement to use alcohol or a drug is not a defense. A product purchased openly from a gas station or smoke shop can therefore become part of a DWI prosecution if the State claims it impaired the driver.

The inverse is equally important. Availability at a retail counter does not establish that the product was safe to use before driving. Yet possession of a package, an admission of earlier use, or the psychoactive capacity of kratom presently does not per se establish appreciable impairment at the time of driving.

Kratom DWI | No Numerical Limit Comparable to 0.08

North Carolina provides three statutory paths for proving impaired driving. Alcohol concentration of 0.08 or more supplies one path. Any amount of a Schedule I controlled substance listed in N.C.G.S. § 90-89, or its metabolites, supplies another. The remaining methodology requires proof that the driver was under the influence (DUI) of an impairing substance.

Kratom and 7-OH are not presently included in the North Carolina Schedule I list. Their presence in blood or urine therefore does not, under current state law, satisfy the Schedule I prong merely because the laboratory detected them. The prosecution generally must connect the substance to actual impairment under N.C.G.S. § 20-138.1(a)(1).

No North Carolina statute supplies a mitragynine or 7-OH concentration at which impairment is presumed. Scientific research has not produced an accepted kratom equivalent to the 0.08 alcohol standard. The National Institute on Drug Abuse reports that the effects of kratom intoxication on driving have not been extensively studied.

The evidence may include driving behavior, a collision, speech, balance, coordination, divided-attention testing, video, statements about the product and time of use, product packaging, blood or urine results, and observations by a Drug Recognition Expert. Pursuant to Rule 702(a1)(2), a currently certified DRE may give an opinion about impairment and the category of substance. The statute does not transform a category opinion into chemical identification of kratom or proof of a specific dose.

Blood Testing | Kratom and 7-OH Forensic Questions

An alcohol breath analysis does not measure mitragynine or 7-OH. A kratom investigation may instead involve blood testing and forensic toxicology, urine, seized-product testing, or some combination of all the above. The North Carolina State Crime Laboratory describes the use of chromatography and mass spectrometry to examine blood and urine samples for prescription and illicit drugs, but the actual analytical scope and reporting decisions must be established from the specifics of the unique fact pattern and evidence seized.

A laboratory may identify mitragynine without separately identifying every minor alkaloid. DEA has acknowledged that forensic laboratories commonly prioritize mitragynine and may not extend the analysis to 7-OH. A generic negative screen also does not necessarily establish that a sample was tested for kratom alkaloids.

Detection of 7-OH presents another interpretive problem and possibly the need for Rule 702 Expert Testimony. Because 7-OH can occur in botanical kratom and can form in the body as a metabolite of mitragynine, a blood result identifying 7-OH does not necessarily prove that the driver consumed a concentrated 7-OH tablet or shot. DEA has recognized the difficulty in distinguishing botanical kratom ingestion from isolated 7-OH use through biological testing alone.

A sound forensic review separates several questions. It examines what the laboratory tested, what it identified, whether the method distinguishes related alkaloids, whether a concentration was measured, when the sample was collected, what other substances were present, and what the science permits the analyst to say about impairment at the relevant time.

Presence can establish prior exposure more readily than it establishes impaired driving. Without a statutory concentration and a validated concentration-to-effect relationship, the State’s proof ordinarily depends on the toxicology result considered together with the remaining evidence.

Federal Scheduling Could Change the Legal Analysis

A later DEA temporary order could make covered 7-OH products federal Schedule I substances on the publication date stated in that order. North Carolina has a separate conformity process. Pursuant to N.C.G.S. § 90-88(d), the responsible state commission must decide at a qualifying meeting whether to control the substance similarly or object to the federal action.

The federal notice of intent and the stalled North Carolina legislation should not be described as completed bans. Publication of a federal temporary order, state commission action, or enactment of a new General Assembly bill could change the answer. Any article discussing 7-OH should therefore identify its update date and link to the governing sources.

North Carolina Kratom and DWI | Frequently Asked Questions

Kratom-Related DWI Charges | Substance-Specific Review

Kratom DWI charges in North Carolina generally should not be evaluated by treating botanical leaf, enhanced extracts, concentrated 7-hydroxymitragynine, synthetic 7-OH, and adulterated products as all being equal. The legal analysis depends on the product consumed, its actual ingredients and concentration, the amount and timing of use, the biological sample, the laboratory method, how it affects the driver, and the precise theory of driving under the influence, consistent with N.C.G.S. § 20-138.1.

To be clear, Kratom does not have to be illegal or classified as a controlled substance to qualify as an “impairing substance” under N.C.G.S. § 20-4.01(14a). Lawful possession therefore does not answer the question of whether or not the accused defendant drove while impaired. A product label, admission of recent use, or positive toxicology result does not necessarily establish the amount consumed, when it was consumed, or whether it impaired the defendant at the legally relevant time.

Bill Powers has represented clients in North Carolina impaired-driving cases since 1992. He is the author of the North Carolina DWI Quick Reference Guide, a former President of the North Carolina Advocates for Justice, and the current NCAJ representative on the Governor’s DWI Task Force. He has served in that capacity under three governors: Governor McCrory, Governor Cooper, and Governor Stein. His professional work includes analyzing statutory, forensic, and courtroom issues involving alleged impairment by substances that do not fit the familiar alcohol model. He also teaches continuing legal education seminars addressing those subjects.

If you face a kratom or 7-OH impaired-driving charge in Charlotte or a surrounding judicial district such as Iredell, Union, Gaston, Rowan, or Lincoln Counties, North Carolina, Powers Law Firm may be available to help. Analysis of a kratom or 7-OH DWI charge begins with the specific product, toxicology, recorded evidence, and exact legal theory alleged by the State. Call now to schedule a confidential consultation: 704-342-4357

The post Kratom Laws in North Carolina, 7-OH, and DWI Charges appeared first on Carolina Criminal Defense & DUI Lawyer Updates.

No statute covers it. No ordinance reaches it. No officer is coming. The conversation continues, the volume rises, and the rest of the room learns things about Greg that Greg’s own mother does not need or want to know.

North Carolina has managed to regulate a remarkable amount of human behavior. There are statutes governing where a person may fish, how a person may transport a load in an open truck bed, and what a person may do with a shopping cart that does not belong to them. Somewhere in that same code there is room for a modest proposal. One might reasonably suggest that before a retailer hands over a device capable of broadcasting a private conversation into a public space, the purchaser should be required to complete training and pass a short practical examination on how to use a cell around other people.

What North Carolina Law Actually Says About Cell Phone Use While Driving

Satire aside, there are laws in North Carolina regarding the use of cell phones while driving.  In those instances, a speaker phone conversation is, frankly, likely more safe that holding the receiver to your ear. Clearly, texting, checking emails, or checking out socials are both dangerous and illegal.

N.C.G.S. § 20-137.4A – Unlawful use of mobile telephone for text messaging or email prohibits texting while driving. A violation is an infraction carrying a fine of one hundred dollars plus court costs, unless you’re driving a school bus at the time, which is deemed a Class 2 misdemeanor. Contrary to common sense, the Chapter 20 motor vehicle law does not allow for driver’s license points, and it does not add insurance points. Furthermore, and again contrary to common sense and the obvious dangers of texting while driving, failure to comply with the law “shall not” (words of mandamus) constitute either negligence per se or contributory negligence per se. Go figure.

Drivers under the age of eighteen face a broader restriction under N.C.G.S. § 20-137.3, which limits mobile telephone use behind the wheel with narrow exceptions and carries a $25 fine.

What North Carolina does not have, despite years of proposed legislation, is a comprehensive hands-free law.

Bills carrying the Hands Free NC name have been filed and refiled in Raleigh, and would prohibit holding a device, supporting it with the body, watching video, and similar conduct behind the wheel, with escalating fines and insurance points for repeat violations. Those bills have not become law. A number of states have already moved to full handheld bans. North Carolina remains among the states that prohibit texting while permitting a handheld call, with very little real consequences or truly meaningful penalty.

Why Rudeness Is Not a Crime in North Carolina

The deeper reason no speakerphone statute exists is that the criminal law does not punish annoyance, and a great deal of obnoxious speech is protected speech under the First Amendment.

North Carolina’s N.C.G.S. § 14-288.4, Disorderly Conduct statute applies to behaviors that are genuinely disruptive, including fighting known as an “affray,” violent behavior involving assault and battery, and language or gestures intended and likely to provoke immediate violent retaliation.

It does not reach a loud phone call while standing in line at the DMV.

Prosecutors understand the difference, and so do judges. A statute broad enough to capture rudeness would sweep in political argument, religious speech, street preaching, and the ordinary noise of people living near one another. Drafting a law that punishes only the conduct everyone agrees is intolerable turns out to be almost impossible, which is why the remedy for a loud caller remains what it has always been. A polite request, a change of seat, or the quiet judgment of everyone in the room.

That gap between what feels wrong and what is actually unlawful runs throughout criminal law. People charged with a crime routinely arrive at a courthouse believing that conduct which offended someone must therefore be criminal, and people who report conduct routinely learn the opposite. The essential “prima facie” elements of an attempt crime or other offense often matter. What the State can prove also matters. The distance between bad manners and a criminal charge is the subject at hand.

Frequently Asked Questions | North Carolina Cell Phone & Public Disturbance Laws

Disorderly Conduct & Trespassing Charges in Mecklenburg County

Cases like these start small. A manager asks someone to leave. The conversation continues in the parking lot. An officer arrives to two versions of the same ninety seconds and writes down one of them. By the time the case reaches district court, the citation reads like a settled account of what happened, and the defendant is left facing criminal charges and explaining to their lawyer that the account is wrong.

District courts move quickly, and a defendant who has never been charged with anything sometimes assumes the outcome depends on prior character or on a lack of a record. While charges may sometimes seem silly or inconsequential, being charged (and possibly even arrested) with a criminal offense even for something as simple as trespassing or disorderly conduct deserves the attention of an experienced lawyer.

Bill Powers has tried criminal cases in North Carolina courtrooms for more than three decades and has spent years teaching other lawyers continuing legal education on evidence and trial practice. He served as President of the North Carolina Advocates for Justice and received the North Carolina State Bar Distinguished Service Award.

Powers Law Firm handles criminal defense and impaired driving matters in the Charlotte metro area and may be available to help with charges pending in Mecklenburg County and the surrounding district courts. Call now to schedule a confidential consultation: 704-342-4357

The post Public Speakerphone Conversations | Legal or Not So Much? appeared first on Carolina Criminal Defense & DUI Lawyer Updates.

The reports released after lawmakers voted tell a harder story. The public record describes problems involving government procurement, private security contracts, reduced armed coverage, unfilled positions, weak fare enforcement, lack of direct camera integration with CMPD, unclear enforcement of transit exclusions, and delayed safety spending. North Carolina nevertheless imposed broad statewide changes upon the criminal courts before the public had even received the State Auditor’s preliminary findings about CATS.

The response fits a pattern addressed in a series of video commentaries by Bill Powers at the Powers Law Firm in Charlotte, NC.

The General Assembly puts a pot on the stove, cranks the burner to high, clamps down the lid, and walks away. When it boils over, lawmakers ask why the judicial system did not do more to clean up the mess.

Mental-health policy makes the point impossible to miss. In S.L. 2025-89, enacted 16 days before Zarutska was killed, lawmakers reduced recurring single-stream funding by $18,562,645, reduced recurring three-way-bed funding for inpatient psychiatric treatment at local hospitals by $15,675,205, and cut $10 million in recurring funding from the Mental Health and Substance Use Task Force Reserve Fund. The law then directed regional LME/MCOs to offer at least the same level of service utilization as the year before. In plain English, the State ordered the system to do the same work with less money.

The system lacked capacity already. In an October 14, 2025, letter to the General Assembly, Governor Josh Stein reported that 350 of North Carolina’s 900 psychiatric beds were vacant because low pay left state hospitals short-staffed. A separate Medicaid shortfall led NCDHHS to impose provider-rate reductions ranging from 3 to 10 percent in October 2025. Courts later required restoration of those rates, and NCDHHS said the underlying $319 million gap remained. These are not problems a bond order can solve.

As a criminal defense lawyer practicing in North Carolina since 1992, I see the courthouse as the end user of these policy choices. Judges and magistrates cannot staff psychiatric hospitals. Prosecutors and defense lawyers cannot create community treatment slots. Police officers and sheriffs cannot make a treatment bed appear by transporting a sick person to another locked door. Yet when the treatment system fails, everyone in the legal system inherits the emergency and is expected to manage the consequences of the General Assembly’s abdication of responsibility for funding and maintaining functional mental-health treatment capacity.

The courts are not above criticism. Judges, magistrates, prosecutors, defense lawyers, clerks, sheriffs, and police officers can and do make mistakes. Every part of the criminal justice system has room to improve. But lawmakers write the statutes, appropriate the money, and decide whether treatment capacity exists. The larger institutional failure starts upstream. Blaming the courthouse after the system collapses is politically easy. It is not serious public-safety policy. When lawmakers reduce treatment capacity, impose new burdens on the courts, and then fault courthouse actors for the resulting failures, the argument is not merely obtuse. It is disingenuous.

The harder question is not whether one magistrate’s decision deserved review. It is why City, County, and State officials moved so quickly to blame the courts and rewrite statewide law while local security failures, mental-health funding cuts, procurement decisions, and private contracting escaped comparable scrutiny.

Lawmakers Passed Iryna’s Law Before the Public Knew What Failed on Charlotte’s Light Rail

Iryna Zarutska was tragically killed on August 22, 2025. The General Assembly completed passage of the legislation later named for her on September 23, 2025. The State Auditor issued its preliminary CATS report on September 30, one week after the legislative vote. Governor Josh Stein signed S.L. 2025-93 on October 3, 2025.

The Federal Transit Administration announced 18 findings of noncompliance in February 2026. The State Auditor did not issue its follow-up CATS special report until August 17, 2026.

That chronology is difficult to ignore.

North Carolina rewrote pretrial release across all 100 counties before lawmakers received the State Auditor’s preliminary report on Charlotte’s security contracting and nearly a year before the follow-up report. The General Assembly chose a statewide legal remedy before investigators completed their examination of the local government systems surrounding Zarutska’s killing.

That does not mean the defendant should have been released. It means lawmakers rewrote statewide law while the public still lacked a complete account of the City and State failures surrounding the killing.

Iryna’s Law Tightened Pretrial Release Without Funding Mental-Health Treatment

Individual state legislators have a fair response to criticism: What was the General Assembly supposed to do? Wait for another preventable killing before acting?

That concern deserves a serious answer. The murder of Iryna Zarutska warranted immediate scrutiny of the release decision of the accused, available court records, CATS security, CMPD  Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department coordination, and the systems responsible for responding to serious mental illness. In a fair analysis, one would be remiss in failing to preface the conversation with the fact that government should not use an incomplete investigation as an excuse for paralysis when public safety may remain at risk.

But urgency does not excuse choosing a remedy that fails to address the underlying problem. It also does not excuse lawmakers from acknowledging their own role in creating the conditions that made the problem predictable.

Horrible Optics | The NC General Assembly defunded mental health

Sixteen days before Zarutska was killed, the General Assembly enacted recurring reductions to community behavioral-health funding, local psychiatric inpatient treatment, and the Mental Health and Substance Use Task Force Reserve Fund. When treatment disappears, serious mental illness does not disappear with it. The resulting crises arrive in emergency departments, police encounters, involuntary-commitment proceedings, jail bookings, bond hearings, capacity evaluations, and criminal courtrooms.

Judges are not psychiatrists. Magistrates are not clinical evaluators. Prosecutors and defense lawyers cannot create psychiatric beds or community treatment placements. Sheriffs operate detention facilities, not long-term psychiatric hospitals. Jails may provide mental-health services and temporary stabilization, but pretrial confinement is not a substitute for a functioning treatment system.

Detention may be necessary when the evidence establishes that a defendant presents a danger that cannot reasonably be addressed through available release conditions. That is a legitimate public-safety judgment. But Iryna’s Law did not create a narrow rule limited to defendants whose circumstances resemble those surrounding Zarutska’s killing. It repealed written promises to appear statewide, created new presumptions against release, required secured financial conditions in broad categories of cases, and expanded reliance upon electronic monitoring and private vendors.

The practical result is that more defendants may remain in county custody because they cannot satisfy a secured bond, cannot pay a monitoring provider, or live in a judicial district without adequate monitoring capacity. Many of those cases will bear little resemblance to the Charlotte light rail murder. The State still pays for detention, transportation, medical care, court appearances, and the administrative consequences of a larger jail population.

The expense is substantial. The precise daily cost of county pretrial detention varies. North Carolina reports an average daily prison cost of $149.92 for FY 2024-25, including $154.29 for medium custody and $181.68 for close custody. Even using a more conservative estimate of $110 per day for Mecklenburg pretrial detention, holding one defendant for 30 days costs approximately $3,300. Holding 100 additional defendants for the same period costs approximately $330,000. Those figures do not capture additional medical expenses, transportation costs, courthouse delays, lost employment, or the financial consequences imposed on families. North Carolina Department of Adult Correction

The concern is no longer theoretical. Mecklenburg County’s average jail population reportedly increased from 1,530 in November 2025, immediately before Iryna’s Law took effect, to 2,016 in June 2026. That is an increase of approximately 32 percent. Sheriff Garry McFadden acknowledged that the legislation was not the only cause, but the growth demonstrates the cost of expanding detention requirements in a system with finite space, staffing, and medical capacity. North Carolina Health News

North Carolina may therefore confine more people, spend well over $100 per person each day, and place additional pressure on crowded jails without treating the illness that helped produce the original crisis. A defendant with untreated schizophrenia does not become healthy merely because a secured bond keeps him in jail. The illness remains. The State has simply moved the problem behind a locked door.

Immediate action was justified. Finger-pointing was inevitable.

Legislation that expands detention while leaving treatment capacity unfunded does not resolve the public-safety failure. It postpones the same crisis, transfers its cost to counties and taxpayers, and leaves courts and law enforcement responsible for managing a mental-health system they neither control nor possess the clinical capacity to replace – Bill Powers, NC Lawyer

Charlotte Expanded the CATS Security Contract Without Clear Evidence of Competitive Bidding

The State Auditor’s preliminary report also contains some of the most troubling facts in the public record.

In 2022, the City of Charlotte divided its security solicitation into armed and unarmed components. The unarmed component was open only to firms certified through the Charlotte Business Inclusion program. The State Auditor concluded that this requirement functionally excluded other qualified vendors.

Professional Security Services, also identified in the reports as “PSS,” received the unarmed work. A City official purportedly explained during the City Council process that dividing the solicitation allowed PSS to move from a subcontractor role into the prime-contractor position and described that opportunity as a benefit of the arrangement.

Strategic Security Corporation received the armed-security work. In June 2024, the City canceled that contract because the company failed to satisfy contract requirements and perform to CATS’s satisfaction. The City then amended the PSS contract to allow PSS to provide both armed and unarmed services. According to the Auditor, there was no clear evidence that the City issued another request for proposals or otherwise used a competitive procurement process before adding the armed work.

The amended PSS contract funded up to 219 positions, including 39 armed personnel. The earlier G4S contract appears to have provided at least 68 armed personnel. Although the total funded security workforce grew, the armed component declined by approximately 42.6 percent. Around the time of the killing, CATS reported that PSS had filled 186 of the 219 funded positions.

Since 2022, CATS has entered into private security contracts collectively valued at more than $49 million. Those facts do not establish improper conduct by PSS. They do suggest the need for a serious examination of whether the City received the staffing, deployment, qualifications, supervision, and performance for which the public paid.

After the Charlotte Light Rail Murder, City Officials Added $23.1 Million in Transit Security Spending

Charlotte’s response to the 2026 report relies heavily upon later spending and staffing announcements. The City states that its authorized security-services contract increased from $5.8 million in FY 2022 to $23.1 million in FY 2027. It reports that contracted staffing grew from approximately 110 to 262 positions. It also cites added off-duty law-enforcement coverage, new dispatch capacity, fare inspectors, transit ambassadors, and planned technology.

One might reasonably ask, “What took so long? Y’all were well aware of the transit security issues and did nothing until you were called out.”

Those facts may describe meaningful improvements. They may also describe an expensive reaction to earlier failures. An authorized contract amount does not establish that every post was staffed, that deployed personnel had appropriate authority, that invoices matched hours actually worked, that supervisors documented performance, or that contract remedies were enforced when staffing fell short.

The City also states that Blue Line crime declined by approximately 69 percent during the first quarter of 2026 when compared with the same quarter in 2025, while bus-related assaults declined by roughly 67 percent. Its response does not provide the underlying incident counts, data definitions, or methodology needed to evaluate those percentages. A short comparison period can be informative. It is not a substitute for transparent performance data across a system receiving tens of millions of dollars in additional security commitments.

When the government responds to a failed or questioned contract by expanding contract spending, public scrutiny should increase both with the expenditure and why something wasn’t done before an innocent was murdered.

Fare Evasion Exposes CATS Failures but Does Not Explain the Charlotte Light Rail Murder

The 2026 report states that approximately 45 percent of CATS bus and rail riders did not pay, subject to a margin of error. CATS estimated that it lost between $5 million and $6.5 million each year. Fare-evasion citations declined from 4,763 in 2023 to 2,018 in 2025. CATS collected only $550 in light-rail fare-evasion fines during state fiscal year 2025.

From a taxpayer standpoint, that alone is unexcusable. How does a transit system allow that to happen?

An uncomfortable truth remains. Fare enforcement would not suddenly make riders without money able to pay. But enforcement is not merely about collecting a few dollars. Consistent enforcement may have prevented repeat and career offenders, including some unhoused people suffering from untreated serious mental illness, from using the light rail as a de facto shelter while repeatedly harassing paying, law-abiding passengers. It would not guarantee safety, but it would establish and enforce basic boundaries.

It’s not unreasonable to infer administrative incompetence and an enforcement system that failed at its most basic function. With an estimated 45 percent of riders not paying, annual losses of $5 million to $6.5 million, sharply declining citations, and only $550 collected in light-rail fare-evasion fines during FY 2025, CATS cannot credibly describe its fare controls as effective. The record supports serious consideration of controlled-access fare gates, simpler payment systems, increased inspections, and collection practices that can produce actual compliance.

They do not establish that fare evasion necessarily caused the killing, but it’s not a far leap to that conclusion.

The Auditor’s report moves quickly from an unpaid fare to a public-safety narrative. That is a policy argument, not a finding of legal causation. The FTA press release used even broader language when it attributed Zarutska’s death to systemic transit failures. Yet the federal review examined compliance with 49 C.F.R. Part 673 and agency safety-plan requirements. It was not a criminal investigation, civil trial, or formal determination of proximate cause.

North Carolina can support improved transit security without pretending that fare payment alone separates a safe passenger from a dangerous one.

The State Auditor’s CATS Report Has Important Limitations

The State Auditor’s factual findings deserve attention. The label attached to the document deserves equal care.

The final page states that the special report relied upon limited information, was not exhaustive, and did not constitute an audit or attestation engagement performed pursuant to generally accepted government auditing standards. The preliminary report also stated that the Auditor had not reached a conclusion about the quality of PSS’s services.

That leaves unanswered questions at the center of the private-contracting issue. A genuine contract-performance examination would compare invoices with payroll, time records, post schedules, patrol logs, training credentials, incident reports, supervisory records, vacancy credits, liquidated damages, hourly rates, contract amendments, subcontractor charges, insurance costs, and payments for unfilled positions. It would identify who approved invoices and what documentation supported payment.

The available evidence supports investigation of whether private vendors benefited from weak government oversight. It does not support stating as fact that a contractor engaged in fraud, corruption, or improper profiteering. Those conclusions require the financial and performance records the report did not examine.

House Bill 307 Became Iryna’s Law in Two Legislative Days

The legislation’s history, known as Iryna’s Law, deserves public attention.

House Bill 307 was filed in March 2025, months before Zarutska’s killing, under the title “Various Criminal Law Revisions.” Its original subjects included post-conviction filing deadlines, xylazine, kratom, child exposure to controlled substances, district-court recording, autopsy information, witness immunity, and the authority of district attorneys.

The original version passed the House in April 2025. On September 22, after the Charlotte killing, the Senate adopted a committee substitute that substantially rewrote and retitled the legislation as Iryna’s Law. The Senate passed the new package that day. The House concurred the following day by a vote of 81-31. The official bill history records the sequence.

The package reached far beyond transit security or a tailored correction to pretrial procedure. It changed bail law, added a public-transit sentencing factor, modified magistrate suspension, directed studies of mental health and execution methods, prohibited recreation of a racial-equity task force without legislative approval, modified death-penalty proceedings, changed procedures for defendants found incapable of proceeding, extended juvenile supervision, and funded additional Mecklenburg prosecutors and legal assistants.

The General Assembly used a pending criminal-law bill as the vehicle for a sweeping package assembled and approved under the political pressure created by a recent homicide. That does not make S.L. 2025-93 invalid. It does raise legitimate questions about deliberation, fiscal analysis, operational readiness, and whether every provision belonged in legislation bearing the victim’s name.

Iryna’s Law Changed Pretrial Release Across North Carolina

The legal changes did not apply only to Mecklenburg County or to defendants resembling the accused in the CATS killing.

N.C.G.S. § 15A-531(9) now defines a broad category of “violent offenses.” Pursuant to N.C.G.S. § 15A-534(b1), a defendant charged with a covered offense faces a rebuttable presumption that no release condition will reasonably assure appearance and community safety. If release is authorized for a first covered offense, the judicial official must impose a secured appearance bond or house arrest with electronic monitoring. More restrictive monitoring requirements apply in specified repeat-offense circumstances.

N.C.G.S. § 15A-534(a)(1) also repealed release on a written promise to appear as an available condition. Pursuant to N.C.G.S. § 15A-534(b), a defendant with three qualifying convictions in separate sessions of court during the prior ten years must receive a secured bond or electronic house arrest, even when the pending charge does not fall within the new violent-offense definition. N.C.G.S. § 15A-534(d) requires written findings when release is authorized in covered cases.

These changes affect allegations made before trial. A charge is not a conviction, and the presumption of innocence remains part of our legal system. Yet the statute places substantial practical pressure toward detention and secured financial conditions before the State has proved guilt.

Our earlier analysis explains the mechanics of Iryna’s Law and North Carolina pretrial release. The later CATS reports add another question. Why did the State place such a large share of the institutional response upon the criminal courts when its own investigations later documented serious failures outside the courthouse?

Iryna’s Law Created New Private Monitoring Costs

S.L. 2025-93 did more than authorize electronic house arrest. Section 1(g) directs every judicial district lacking that capability to enter a memorandum of agreement with a qualified vendor. It also provides that a defendant released under electronic house arrest must pay the vendor.

N.C.G.S. § 15A-534(a) separately requires a defendant placed on electronic house arrest to execute a secured appearance bond. Depending upon the circumstances, release may therefore require both a secured bond and payment to a private monitoring company.

The statute creates an obvious financial consequence. Private monitoring providers receive a state-created market. Expanded use of secured bonds may also increase demand for commercial surety services. A defendant who cannot satisfy the financial conditions may remain in county custody, leaving the county to pay the cost of detention.

Government responded to a killing associated with a publicly funded transit system by creating new statewide requirements under which accused defendants pay private vendors as a condition of liberty.

At the local level, Charlotte’s answer includes authorized security-services contracting that grew from $5.8 million to $23.1 million. At the state level, the legislative answer created more private monitoring and secured-bond business. Courts, sheriffs, counties, defendants, families, hospitals, and taxpayers absorb much of the remaining burden.

The General Assembly Cut Mental-Health Funding and Sent the Consequences Back to Court

The mental-health provisions of Iryna’s Law cannot be separated from what the General Assembly had done to treatment funding earlier that same summer. Section 2B.5(a) of S.L. 2025-89 reduced recurring single-stream funding by $18,562,645. Those funds support community behavioral health services administered through regional LME/MCOs, including services for people without insurance. Section 2B.4 reduced recurring funding for three-way bed contracts by $15,675,205. Those contracts pay for inpatient psychiatric treatment at local community hospitals. Section 2B.3(c) reduced recurring funding for the Mental Health and Substance Use Task Force Reserve Fund by $10 million.

The next provision makes the policy choice even harder to defend. Section 2B.5(b) instructed each LME/MCO to offer at least the same level of service utilization it provided during the prior fiscal year, despite the recurring funding reduction. That is the pressure-pot problem written into law. The State reduced the money, demanded the same service level, and left local providers and regional organizations to absorb the strain.

When treatment is unavailable, the underlying illness does not disappear. The predictable destinations include a 911 call, an emergency department visit, an involuntary commitment transport, a jail booking, a capacity evaluation, a bond hearing, and a crowded criminal docket. The human burden falls first on people in crisis and their families. The operational burden then lands on police officers, deputies, detention officers, doctors, nurses, clerks, prosecutors, defense lawyers, magistrates, and judges.

The political appeal of a court-centered response is obvious. Lawmakers can add a detention presumption to a pending bill in two days and announce that they acted. Building and staffing a treatment system requires recurring appropriations, workforce planning, contract oversight, and sustained attention after the press conference ends. One produces an immediate headline. The other requires government to govern.

The 350 vacant state psychiatric beds described by Governor Stein put the legal mandates in perspective. A judicial official can order an examination. A judge can continue a case. A sheriff can transport a defendant. None of those acts creates the examiner, hospital staff, community placement, or long-term bed needed to carry out the order. When lawmakers impose a courtroom procedure without funding the treatment capacity behind it, they have not solved the mental-health problem. They have relocated its paperwork and cost.

Later appropriations deserve acknowledgment. The 2026 Appropriations Act transferred $200 million in nonrecurring money from the Medicaid Contingency Reserve to support the State share of Medicaid costs for FY 2026-27. It also directed $14 million in recurring money from the Opioid Abatement Reserve to single-stream funding. Those later actions matter. They do not erase the 2025 reductions or the sequence in which lawmakers reduced treatment lines, left a Medicaid funding gap, and then placed new demands on the criminal courts.

NCDHHS restored the temporary provider-rate reductions in December 2025 after court rulings required it. The irony should not be lost. Courts were required to stop health-care payment reductions while political leaders continued to direct public anger toward the courts for the consequences of inadequate treatment capacity.

This is not an argument that every release decision was correct or that courthouse actors bear no responsibility for their work. It is an argument about control. The General Assembly controls criminal statutes and state appropriations. Charlotte controls CATS procurement and transit operations. The courts apply the laws and work with the services that government has made available. Treating the criminal courts as a substitute mental-health system does not treat illness. It shifts the cost into jails, hospitals, sheriff’s offices, families, and the public.

North Carolina Legislated Before Completing Its Own Study

S.L. 2025-93 directed the North Carolina Collaboratory to study mental health in the justice system, availability of electronic house arrest across the state, and alternative methods of execution. The final report was not due until March 1, 2027.

The General Assembly therefore changed pretrial-release law before receiving the study it ordered concerning two central components of the legislation. It legislated first and directed research afterward.

The law’s separate mental-health examination procedure also received a later effective date. By spring 2026, a House select committee was receiving implementation concerns from emergency physicians, hospitals, behavioral-health organizations, and Mecklenburg County. The committee’s public-comment materials describe concerns involving emergency-department capacity, transportation by law enforcement, access to prior commitment records, availability of certified examiners, jail operations, and the absence of sufficient long-term treatment capacity.

Those are not abstract objections. They identify the agencies and public services expected to absorb a policy enacted before the State developed the infrastructure needed to administer it.

Government Accountability Cannot Stop at the Courthouse Door

The pretrial release decision involving the accused warrants scrutiny. His criminal history, mental-health history, pending charge, conduct, and available records were proper subjects for examination. Recognizing that fact does not require accepting the claim that statewide bail law was the primary government failure exposed by the killing.

The City should account for how it selected and supervised security contractors. It should disclose whether invoices reflected filled posts and actual hours. It should explain why armed coverage declined while total contract value and funded staffing grew. It should identify what financial remedies it pursued after a contractor failed and why the armed work was added to another contract without clear evidence of renewed competition.

CATS should explain why only two CMPD officers staffed the Metro Transit Unit, why the camera network lacked a direct connection to the Real Time Crime Center, how its exclusion list was supposed to operate, why a later stabbing suspect remained able to ride despite appearing on that list, and why most FY 2025 safety-equipment funding remained unspent.

The State should measure what Iryna’s Law has done to detention, first appearances, bond hearings, county-jail populations, electronic-monitoring payments, release delays, hospital use, law-enforcement transportation, and outcomes for defendants unable to pay. It should publish that information before claiming the legislation made North Carolina safer.

Public safety does not improve when one government system transfers its failures and expenses to another. Nor does accountability exist when officials point to larger budgets and stricter laws without establishing that either response addresses the failures documented in the record.

North Carolina Public Safety Policy Should Follow the Full Record

The killing of Iryna Zarutska called for an honest examination of every institution that failed her. That includes the criminal courts. It also includes the Charlotte city government, CATS leadership, private security procurement, contract administration, CMPD coordination, mental health services, and the General Assembly.

The public should reject any account that isolates one magistrate while treating the City’s contracting decisions as background noise. It should also reject the assumption that an unpaid fare establishes why a homicide occurred or that quadrupling authorized security-services contracting proves that earlier failures have been corrected.

Iryna’s Law distributed the consequences of a Charlotte tragedy across all 100 North Carolina counties. It restricted release, increased required findings, expanded secured financial conditions, mandated access to private monitoring, and placed additional demands upon courts and public agencies before the State had completed its own study or received the major transit reports.

That is more than a public-safety response. It is institutional cost shifting.

Bill Powers has practiced in North Carolina criminal courts since 1992. He is a former president of the North Carolina Advocates for Justice and a recipient of the North Carolina State Bar John B. McMillan Distinguished Service Award.

Powers Law Firm represents clients in serious criminal cases and bond proceedings in Charlotte and surrounding North Carolina communities. If Iryna’s Law affects a pending case, the firm may be available to help evaluate the charge, the statutory presumption, and the evidence relevant to pretrial release.

Frequently Asked Questions | CATS Security Failures and Iryna’s Law

The Charlotte Light Rail Murder Exposed a Crisis the General Assembly Helped Create

A legislator may respond that the General Assembly had to act before someone else was needlessly killed. That concern deserves acknowledgment. It does not justify selecting a politically convenient explanation, imposing a statewide remedy before the surrounding failures had been investigated, and leaving the underlying problems largely untouched.

The question was never whether lawmakers should act. The question was whether their action addressed what caused the danger.

Long before Iryna Zarutska was killed, North Carolina’s mental-health system lacked the treatment beds, staffing, community services, and funding needed to manage people suffering from severe psychiatric disorders. Sixteen days before her murder, the General Assembly enacted recurring reductions in behavioral-health funding while directing regional organizations to maintain prior service levels. Lawmakers demanded the same work with less money and then acted surprised when the pressure appeared somewhere else.

The result was entirely predictable. People suffering from untreated mental illness did not cease to exist because treatment became unavailable. They remained in their communities until a crisis brought them into contact with police. They entered county jails, appeared before magistrates and judges, and became the responsibility of prosecutors, defense lawyers, sheriffs, and court personnel. The General Assembly transferred a public-health failure to a legal system that lacks the staff, facilities, and medical authority to treat it.

Iryna’s Law does not repair that failure. It keeps more defendants in custody through presumptions against release, secured bonds, and electronic house arrest. Some defendants should be detained. But the law reaches far beyond defendants suffering from severe mental illness or presenting the circumstances involved in Zarutska’s killing. It imposes statewide restrictions while leaving the underlying treatment shortage in place.

The State is now paying county jails to confine more defendants, including defendants who cannot afford secured bonds, without providing treatment for the psychiatric disorders lawmakers invoked to defend the legislation. Many of those defendants have no meaningful connection to transit security, psychosis, or the circumstances surrounding the Charlotte light rail murder. Taxpayers pay for the additional confinement while the mental-health system remains unable to provide adequate treatment.

Meanwhile, the General Assembly acted before the public received the State Auditor’s preliminary findings concerning CATS. The later record documented reduced armed staffing, unfilled security positions, weak police coordination, disconnected camera systems, questionable enforcement of transit exclusions, procurement concerns, and substantial safety money that had not been spent. Those failures did not fit the politically useful account that one magistrate and the courts caused the problem.

After more than three decades in North Carolina courtrooms, I have no difficulty acknowledging that magistrates, judges, prosecutors, defense lawyers, sheriffs, and police officers make mistakes. The courts should be examined when a release decision ends in tragedy. But honest accountability must follow responsibility upstream. Politicians write the laws, control the appropriations, fund the treatment system, and decide whether county jails and criminal courts will become North Carolina’s default psychiatric institutions.

Iryna Zarutska deserved better security before she was murdered. The public deserved an honest investigation afterward. Instead, the General Assembly imposed broader detention rules on all 100 counties while mental-health capacity, Charlotte’s security decisions, CATS contracting, and private-vendor performance remained outside the political explanation.

The courthouse cannot create psychiatric beds, staff state hospitals, operate transit security, connect CATS cameras to CMPD, or supervise private security contractors. Blaming the legal system for failing to perform those functions is not merely incomplete. It allows the officials who controlled the money and made the underlying policy choices to escape responsibility for a crisis they helped create.

Powers Law Firm represents people facing serious criminal charges and complex pretrial release issues in Charlotte and select matters involving Felony Death by Vehicle and Misdemeanor Death by Vehicle charges in North Carolina. If you or a family member is being held under Iryna’s Law or needs help understanding how North Carolina’s new bond provisions apply, Bill Powers and the legal team at Powers Law Firm may be available to help.

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The first type of day-in-the-life-of-a-lawyer video comes from the newly minted law student who has attended six classes and already mastered the influencer version of legal education. The video begins before sunrise. There is a workout, a carefully prepared chai latte, an immaculate apartment, color-coded notes, an expensive outfit, a walk across a beautiful campus, and some false modesty about how demanding the day will be. Somewhere along the way, there is usually a little virtue signaling and a fair amount of bragging disguised as vulnerability.

The message is that law school is glamorous, manageable, important, and aesthetically pleasing. The student appears to have time for exercise, skin care, meal preparation, perfect notes, social media production, and eight hours of sleep. Apparently, law school is just another lifestyle brand.

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State v. Howze is interesting in that the DNA evidence involved did not begin with a cheek swab, a discarded cup, an arrest-related DNA collection, or a search warrant directed toward the homicide being prosecuted.

It began with a bloody shirt.

In December 2016, J’Marius Howze went to a hospital after suffering a gunshot wound. A High Point police officer responded to investigate the shooting. The officer saw blood on Howze’s clothing and directed a crime-scene technician to collect the clothing as evidence. The investigation was never solved, and the shirt remained sealed in police evidence storage.

Several years later, High Point police were investigating the May 2019 shooting death of Cameron Owens. Investigators recovered a HiPoint nine-millimeter carbine rifle near the murder scene. Detective Buben located the shirt from Howze’s earlier shooting and submitted both the old clothing and swabs from the firearm to the State Crime Lab for DNA analysis. According to the opinion, the testing found Howze’s DNA on almost every sample submitted from the gun. That evidence became part of the probable-cause showing used to obtain a warrant for his arrest for first-degree murder.

Howze later moved to suppress the DNA evidence. His argument presented two distinct constitutional questions.

First, could police lawfully seize his clothing at the hospital in 2016?

Second, even if the shirt had been lawfully seized, could police years later analyze the biological material on it and use that DNA in an unrelated homicide investigation without obtaining another warrant?

The Court of Appeals answered both questions in favor of the State.

That second issue is what makes Howze somewhat interesting, at least from a factual basis.

Lawful Seizure of Evidence

Howze does not begin with the proposition that police can test whatever DNA happens to come into their possession. The Court must first determine whether law enforcement has lawfully obtained evidence from the outset.

In so doing, the State may rely on the longstanding plain-view doctrine.

A warrantless seizure may be permissible when an officer is lawfully situated to observe the evidence, the item’s evidentiary or incriminating character is immediately apparent, and the officer has lawful access to the object. North Carolina cases also recognize an inadvertence component to the plain-view analysis.

The phrase “immediately apparent” can, to some extent, be misleading. Police do not have to know with certainty precisely what later testing might reveal. Our appellate courts generally treat such issues as questions of probable cause.

It requires probable cause to believe that the item is evidence of criminal activity. That determination must be tied to the circumstances known at the time the item is seized, not to evidence discovered through later testing.

Officers responded to the hospital in 2016 after a reported shooting in which Mr. Howze and another man had been wounded. An officer observed Mr. Howze’s gunshot wound and bloodstained clothing while gathering information about that shooting. The Court of Appeals concluded that police had probable cause to treat the clothing as evidence of the firearm incident then being investigated. The clothing could contain blood or DNA from someone else, gunshot residue, hair, fibers, or other trace evidence bearing upon what had occurred.

The later 2019 murder presented a separate issue. DNA testing of biological material found on the lawfully seized shirt eventually connected Mr. Howze to an unrelated homicide. The court did not hold that police anticipated that connection when they seized the shirt. It held that the original seizure was lawful because the shirt had apparent evidentiary value in the shooting investigation, and that later forensic testing of lawfully obtained biological material did not constitute another search of Mr. Howze.

There is an interesting point buried in that analysis. The evidentiary justification supporting the original seizure and the investigative purpose of the later DNA testing were not the same. According to the Court of Appeals, however, the lawful seizure of the biological material eliminated Mr. Howze’s reasonable expectation of privacy in its subsequent forensic analysis.

That is the important legal issue. The State did not need probable cause in 2016 to believe the shirt connected Howze to the later murder in 2019. It needed probable cause to believe the shirt was evidence of the shooting police were investigating at the hospital. The court then treated the later DNA analysis as permissible secondary use of biological evidence already lawfully possessed.

Police Do Not Have Unlimited Access to Hospital Patients

If you are taken to a hospital after a shooting, a serious wreck, an assault, or a fight, there is a reasonable chance an officer will show up while you are still being treated. Most people assume that a treatment room is private space and that anything happening there stays between the patient and the medical staff. That assumption does not hold up in a criminal investigation. Hospital privacy rules govern what your doctors and nurses may disclose about your care. They do not turn a treatment area into a place officers can never enter, and they do not stop an officer from seeing what is in front of him.

That distinction is where the Howze case landed. Police responded to a report that two people had been shot. Officers went to the hospital to find out what happened and to speak with the wounded. While there, an officer saw blood on the patient’s clothing and had a crime scene technician collect it. The Court of Appeals held that the officer was somewhere he had a right to be, relying in part on an earlier decision approving an officer’s presence in an emergency room while gathering evidence about a shooting. What the officer could plainly see, he could act on.

Two practical points follow for anyone in that position.

The first is that being the victim does not protect your property. The clothing in Howze was collected while he was the one who had been shot, years before anyone suspected him of anything. Bloodstained clothing can hold evidence of a violent event no matter who the wearer turns out to be, and once officers take it as evidence, they can keep it while the case remains unsolved. In that case, the clothing sat sealed in an evidence locker for years and resurfaced in a completely different investigation.

The second is that police presence in a hospital is not unlimited. Howze does not say officers may walk into any treatment room whenever they want evidence. The ruling rested on why officers were there, what they were investigating, where the officer was standing, and what was visible from that lawful position. Change those facts and the analysis can change with them. Whether officers had a lawful right to be where they were, and lawful access to the thing they took, remains part of the constitutional question in every case.

There is also something worth understanding about the conversation itself. Officers commonly arrive at the hospital to take a statement, and people who believe they are the victim usually talk freely. You are not required to give a statement, and anything you say during that conversation can be used later. If you have been injured under circumstances that police are investigating, the safer course is to get medical care first and speak with a lawyer before giving a detailed account.

Once Police Lawfully Have Your DNA, They Can Test It Later

The part of this area of law that surprises most people is not the seizure. It is what happens afterward.

There is a common assumption that DNA is different from other evidence. It feels personal in a way a gun or a phone does not. It carries information about your health, your family, your ancestry. Many people believe that even if police lawfully took something of theirs, the government still needs fresh permission before running genetic testing on it, and certainly before using the result in some unrelated case years down the road.

North Carolina law does not work that way right now.

The controlling idea comes from a 2001 decision called State v. Barkley. A man voluntarily gave police a blood sample during a murder investigation, expecting it would clear him. It did. Police later used DNA from that same sample to link him to a different crime entirely, and he argued that the second use violated his constitutional rights. The Court of Appeals disagreed.

Drawing blood is a search, and the government must comply with the Constitution to conduct a search. But once the sample has lawfully left the body, the privacy interest that made the draw a search is gone. Testing what the government already lawfully holds is not a new search. A lawfully obtained blood sample gets treated much like any other piece of physical evidence that can be sent to a laboratory.

Howze extends that reasoning to a situation with no consent at all. He never volunteered anything. Police simply seized bloodstained clothing during an investigation into a shooting where he was the wounded person. The Court of Appeals held that the difference did not matter because the analysis turns on whether the evidence was lawfully obtained, not on how cooperative the person was when it was obtained. The clothing was lawfully seized, so testing the blood on it years later added no further intrusion.

Two things flow from that, and both are worth knowing before you find yourself on the wrong side of the law.

Your genetic material can outlive the investigation it came from. Evidence collected in one case can sit in storage for years and then be pulled, tested, and compared against something in an entirely different case, in a different city, involving people you have never met. Nothing in this decision requires police to go back to a judge before making that comparison.

And the moment that decides everything happens early. Whether the government can use a DNA result usually turns on whether it lawfully got the item in the first place. If the original seizure was unlawful, the later test result may be challengeable no matter how sophisticated the laboratory work. If the original seizure was lawful, arguing about the test itself is a much harder road. That is why an experienced defense lawyer starts with how the evidence came into police hands, not with the crime lab report.

None of that means a DNA result is unbeatable. A constitutional ruling in the State’s favor says nothing about whether the sample was contaminated, whether the chain of custody holds, whether a mixed sample was interpreted correctly, whether the laboratory followed its own protocols, or what the statistical numbers actually mean. It also says nothing about when your DNA got somewhere or how it got there. Those remain fair fights.

Getting Property and Samples Back From Police

People who have been the victim of a crime commonly assume their belongings will be returned once they are released from the hospital. That is not how evidence storage works. Property collected as part of an open investigation stays in police custody, and an unsolved case is treated as still open even after years of inactivity. The witnesses in this case testified that a stalled investigation is not a closed one and that evidence is held precisely because new information may surface later. Whether property can be released, and what happens to biological material on it, depends on the status of the case, the agency’s retention policy, and the statutes governing preservation of biological evidence. Those are worth asking about early rather than assuming that time alone clears the shelf.

Can You Challenge DNA Evidence?

Everything in this decision rests on one condition. Police had the evidence lawfully. Remove that condition and the analysis changes.

If the original seizure violates the Fourth Amendment or Article I, Sections 19 or 20 of the North Carolina Constitution, a later DNA result presents a very different problem for the State.

Sometimes that is why the first questions a defense lawyer asks have nothing to do with genetics.

• Where did the item come from?
• Why did police have it?
• Was the officer lawfully present?
• Did he have lawful access to the seized evidence?
• Was its evidentiary value actually apparent at the time, or is the State reasoning backward from what testing later revealed?

The Howze decision also does not treat all genetic testing as the same.

A related overstatement is worth heading off. It would be easy to read Howze as a case that holds DNA lasts forever and that police may keep and test whatever they have for as long as they want. How long law enforcement may retain each category of biological material, what the statutes require for preservation, and when samples must be destroyed or expunged are separate questions potentially worthy of consideration.

Motions to Suppress DNA Evidence

Howze may, in fact, change the focus of criminal defense lawyers in cases involving previously collected biological evidence.

A motion that merely argues, “My client never consented to this later DNA test,” could face a substantial obstacle when the State can establish that police already lawfully possessed the biological evidence. Howze and Barkley give prosecutors some level of cover for that general theory.

The factual and legal analysis might need to focus on other issues, such as:

• Why did law enforcement possess the evidence?
• Was there a warrant? Consent? Abandonment? Plain view? A statutory collection procedure?
• Was the officer lawfully present when the evidence was observed?
• Did police have a lawful right of access?
• Was the evidentiary significance actually apparent at the time, or is the State using later developments to justify an earlier seizure?

Those questions would address the constitutional foundation of the evidence itself.

To be clear, a constitutional ruling does not establish that a DNA result is scientifically reliable, that the sample was uncontaminated, that chain of custody is satisfactory, that a mixture was interpreted properly, or that the statistical testimony offered by the State accurately describes the significance of the result.

Nor does a DNA association necessarily establish when biological material was deposited, how it arrived at a particular location, or what activity produced it.

Howze answers an interesting, if not a somewhat factually odd/unique, search-and-seizure question. It does not decide every evidentiary question that may accompany DNA testimony at trial.

Discarded DNA Evidence in North Carolina

Police sometimes recover biological material from a cup, straw, cigarette, food container, bottle, napkin, or other property discarded in a public place. Those cases tend to focus on abandonment, reasonable expectations of privacy, curtilage, where police obtained the item, and whether officers physically intruded into a constitutionally protected area.

Howze presents a different route to the DNA crime lab.

The State did not argue that Howze abandoned the shirt. Police affirmatively seized it as evidence during a shooting investigation and retained it. The constitutional question, therefore, began with the plain-view doctrine and lawful police possession rather than with abandonment.

Frequently Asked Questions | Warrantless DNA Testing in North Carolina

DNA Evidence | Criminal Defense in North Carolina

DNA evidence can be powerful, but the laboratory result is only one part of the case. Defense lawyers may examine how police obtained the biological material, whether they had lawful authority to possess it, what testing was performed, how the sample was handled, and what the resulting association actually proves. A DNA match or inclusion does not necessarily establish when biological material was deposited, how it reached a particular location, or whether it proves the conduct alleged. In a serious criminal case, those questions can be just as consequential as the genetic comparison itself.

Bill Powers has practiced criminal law in North Carolina courtrooms since 1992. He is a former President of the North Carolina Advocates for Justice and a recipient of the North Carolina State Bar’s John B. McMillan Distinguished Service Award. He also enjoys teaching continuing legal education programs on criminal law, evidence, and trial advocacy. Powers Law Firm represents clients in criminal cases in Charlotte and surrounding communities and may be available to help with select serious felony matters elsewhere in North Carolina. If DNA evidence is part of your case, the office can be reached at 704-342-4357.

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An August 17, 2026 article in US News and World Report discusses staying mentally strong during a long job search. Fair enough. Rejection is difficult. Silence is frustrating. Watching classmates announce new positions on social media while you are still sending résumés can make you question every decision that brought you to law school.

Mental resilience helps, but newly licensed lawyers might also benefit from a friendly, well-intentioned dose of reality from a lawyer who has been practicing for a while.  You are entering a demanding profession. A law degree gives you an opportunity to begin proving yourself. It does not establish that you can manage a client, prepare a witness, try a case, bring business into a firm, or exercise sound judgment when the answer is not printed in a casebook.

The post Secrets to Finding a Job as a New Lawyer | You Should Do This appeared first on Carolina Criminal Defense & DUI Lawyer Updates.

Is Funeral Restitution Mandatory in North Carolina Death Cases?

N.C.G.S. § 15A-1340.35(a)(4) sets forth restitution protocols relative to a judgment and commitment. When an offense results in bodily injury that causes the victim’s death, the sentencing court (the Judge) is called to consider the cost of the victim’s necessary funeral and related services.

The wording matters. The General Assembly does not authorize reimbursement for every expense associated in some way with death, grief, remembrance, or the family’s response to a tragedy.

The statute specifically refers to necessary funeral and related services, which is somewhat nebulous in nature in that N.C.G.S. § 15A-1340.35 does not define with specificity the terms “funeral,” “related services,” or “necessary.” It also does not separately identify funeral-home services, caskets, urns, burial vaults, cemetery plots, headstones, flowers, receptions, or memorial benches.

That statutory uncertainty can create a recurring sentencing issue in prosecutions involving Felony Death by Vehicle, Misdemeanor Death by Vehicle, murder, manslaughter, and other offenses resulting in death. Some expenses are directly connected to preparing, transporting, burying, or cremating the deceased. Other expenses concern memorialization after disposition of the remains. As the connection between the claimed expense and the funeral or disposition becomes more remote, the statutory basis for restitution may become more difficult to establish.

Restitution also depends upon the offense and the statutory framework that applies. N.C.G.S. § 15A-1340.34(c) permits the sentencing court to order restitution when the mandatory provisions of subsection (b) do not apply. N.C.G.S. § 15A-1340.34(b), however, requires restitution when the defendant is being sentenced for an offense for which the victim is entitled to restitution pursuant to Article 46 of Chapter 15A, the North Carolina Crime Victims’ Rights Act.

That distinction has particular significance in Chapter 20 cases. N.C.G.S. § 15A-830(a)(6a)d. defines an “offense against the person” to include an offense pursuant to Chapter 20 when an element of the offense involves impairment of the defendant, or injury or death to the victim. Felony Death by Vehicle and Misdemeanor Death by Vehicle fall within that definition because death is an element of each offense. Felony Serious Injury by Vehicle also falls within the Article 46 definition because the offense involves injury and impaired driving, although funeral restitution pursuant to N.C.G.S. § 15A-1340.35(a)(4) concerns an offense resulting in death.

For death cases, the consequence is significant. When N.C.G.S. § 15A-1340.34(b) applies, whether restitution will be ordered is not simply a matter of judicial discretion. The more difficult questions may instead concern the proper amount, whether claimed expenses qualify as necessary funeral and related services, whether the amount is supported by competent evidence, and who is legally entitled to receive restitution.

Who Receives Restitution When the Victim Has Died?

Death cases present an issue that does not exist in the ordinary property-damage or assault case. The victim cannot personally receive restitution.

N.C.G.S. § 15A-1340.34 expressly provides for restitution to the victim or the victim’s estate. When N.C.G.S. § 15A-1340.34(b) applies, the court shall require restitution to the victim or the victim’s estate for injuries or damages arising directly and proximately out of the offense.

Chapter 15A – Article 46 of the North Carolina Crime Victims’ Rights Act adds a layer of complexity. When the victim has died, certain family members may assert many of the rights that otherwise belong to the victim. Restitution is treated differently.

Consistent with N.C.G.S. § 15A-830, the right to restitution provided by N.C.G.S. § 15A-834 may only be exercised by the personal representative of the victim’s estate.

That does not mean the personal representative must personally provide the evidence supporting every funeral expense claimed at sentencing.

The North Carolina Court of Appeals addressed that distinction in State v. McPhail, No. COA15-965 (N.C. Ct. App. Mar. 1, 2016) (unpublished). Because McPhail is an unpublished opinion, it does not constitute controlling legal authority. The decision is nevertheless instructive on the specific issue presented.

In McPhail, the murder victim’s widow testified that she had incurred expenses for medical treatment before her husband’s death and for his funeral. Documentary evidence establishing the amount of those bills was admitted without objection. The defendant did not challenge the amount of restitution or the sufficiency of the evidence supporting it. Instead, he argued that the restitution order should be vacated because the State had not established that the widow was the personal representative of the victim’s estate.

The Court of Appeals rejected that argument.

The Court noted that the defendant did not dispute that the widow was competent to testify and offer evidence regarding the expenses resulting from the murder. It rejected the contention that the State was required to present the testimony of the estate’s personal representative before the trial court could determine the amount of restitution and enter the restitution order.

McPhail went somewhat further. The Court concluded that entry of an order establishing the amount of restitution and creating a lien against the defendant did not itself constitute an “exercise” of the right to obtain restitution within the meaning of N.C.G.S. § 15A-830. The Court reasoned that if restitution were later paid, the personal representative could qualify at that time and exercise the powers associated with receiving assets belonging to the estate.

The practical distinction is important.

The person who proves a funeral expense and the person legally authorized to exercise the deceased victim’s restitution right are not necessarily the same.

A spouse may pay the funeral home. A parent may arrange the service. A sibling may possess an invoice or receipt. A witness with personal knowledge may be able to establish the nature and amount of the expense. When the Crime Victims’ Rights Act applies, however, N.C.G.S. § 15A-830(b)(2) provides that the right to restitution contained in N.C.G.S. § 15A-834 may only be exercised by the personal representative of the victim’s estate.

What Happens When Family Members Personally Pay Funeral Bills?

Funeral arrangements normally cannot wait for an estate proceeding.

Someone must contact the funeral home, authorize services, select burial or cremation arrangements, sign documents, and frequently pay deposits or other charges within days of the death. An executor or administrator may not yet have qualified.

North Carolina estate law recognizes that reality.

N.C.G.S. § 28A-19-8 addresses funeral expenses incurred before the appointment of a personal representative and recognizes circumstances in which those expenses remain obligations associated with the estate.

That probate statute does not itself determine the amount recoverable as criminal restitution. It does explain why identifying who actually incurred or paid an expense can become important at sentencing.

The North Carolina Court of Appeals addressed that evidentiary problem in State v. Clifton, 125 N.C. App. 471, 481 S.E.2d 393 (1997). The trial court ordered the defendant to pay $3,000 in funeral restitution to the victim’s father. The Court of Appeals found the record insufficient because there was no evidence establishing either the amount of the funeral expenses or who had paid them.

Relationship alone therefore does not establish entitlement to a particular restitution amount.

A parent is not automatically entitled to the entire funeral bill merely because the deceased was the parent’s child. A surviving spouse is not necessarily the proper direct recipient of every claimed expense merely because the spouse arranged the funeral. The evidence should establish the nature of the expense, its amount, who incurred it, who paid it, and whether another source has already reimbursed some or all of the loss.

North Carolina law also contemplates restitution to certain third parties.

N.C.G.S. § 15A-1340.37(b) permits restitution in qualifying circumstances to a person, organization, corporation, or other legal entity that provided assistance and became subrogated to the victim’s rights. The statute specifically contemplates entities such as the Crime Victims Compensation Fund.

This can produce several separate questions in a death case:

• What expense qualifies as restitution?
• Who incurred the expense?
• Who actually paid it?
• Was the expense reimbursed by insurance or a government program?
• Does the estate retain the claim?
• Has another entity (insurance company) obtained subrogation rights?
• Who should be identified as the restitution recipient in the judgment?

Funeral, Cremation, and Burial Expenses | What Qualifies for Restitution?

The difficult issue is frequently not whether funeral restitution is legally available. It is what belongs in the restitution amount.

For several categories, the statutory argument is relatively strong.

Funeral-Home Services

Charges for preparation of the deceased, embalming when performed, staff services, use of funeral-home facilities, visitation, the funeral service, transportation and handling of the remains, and comparable funeral-home charges fit naturally within the language of N.C.G.S. § 15A-1340.35(a)(4).

The amount claimed still must be established by competent evidence. N.C.G.S. § 15A-1340.35(b) permits the court to require the victim or the victim’s estate to provide admissible evidence documenting the claimed costs. The statute then contains an important disclosure requirement: “Any such documentation shall be shared with the defendant before the sentencing hearing.” N.C.G.S. § 15A-1340.36 separately provides that the amount of restitution must be limited to the amount supported by the record.

As a practical matter, the statutory requirement that documentation be provided “before” sentencing does not necessarily mean defense counsel receives it far enough in advance to undertake a meaningful review. Funeral-home invoices, receipts, proof of payment, and related materials are sometimes provided immediately before the sentencing hearing.

That does not necessarily reflect gamesmanship by the State. In death cases, prosecutors themselves may not receive complete documentation until shortly before the hearing. Bereaved family members may understandably focus on matters other than assembling receipts, identifying who paid particular expenses, separating funeral costs from memorial expenses, or determining whether insurance or another source reimbursed some portion of the bill. The result, however understandable, can create a genuine problem when restitution is part of a negotiated plea.

Defense counsel may then face a difficult practical choice. The parties may have negotiated a favorable resolution of the criminal charges based upon the evidence, sentencing exposure, and other considerations, only for the precise restitution documentation to arrive as the plea is about to be entered. Counsel may have little meaningful opportunity to investigate individual charges, determine who paid them, identify collateral payments, or research whether a disputed item falls within “necessary funeral and related services.”

At that point, the legal issue does not exist in a vacuum. Rejecting an otherwise favorable plea because of a restitution dispute may expose the client to consequences far exceeding the disputed amount. Asking to postpone sentencing may not preserve the negotiated disposition and may not be welcomed where the parties have represented that the case is ready for resolution. Depending on the charge, the evidence, the plea terms, and the amount genuinely in dispute, accepting some uncertainty regarding restitution may therefore be in the client’s interest.

Experienced criminal defense lawyers recognize the uncomfortable reality. In North Carolina, restitution documentation is frequently handed to defense counsel only minutes before the plea is entered. By that point, the agreement has been negotiated, the client has made the decision to plead guilty, and neither the lawyer nor the client wants to blow up an otherwise favorable resolution over a disputed funeral expense.

A defendant may have legitimate objections to the amount claimed, the legal basis for particular expenses, the identity of the proper recipient, or the sufficiency of the supporting documentation. Even so, objecting at the last minute is not always a realistic or strategically sound proposition. Defense counsel may have very little practical leverage, particularly when the restitution issue surfaces only after the material terms of the plea have been resolved.

That reality can leave counsel with an uncomfortable choice. Press the restitution issue and risk destabilizing the negotiated disposition, or accept the documentation as presented and preserve the broader benefit of the plea. In many cases, the sensible decision is to protect the agreement rather than allow a collateral restitution dispute to derail the resolution of the criminal charges.

Caskets and Burial Containers

A casket or burial container has a direct relationship to the disposition of the deceased and fits naturally within the concept of necessary funeral and related services contemplated by N.C.G.S. § 15A-1340.35(a)(4).

North Carolina appellate courts do not appear to have published a decision specifically addressing whether a particular casket expense qualifies for restitution. Even so, where the casket is part of the ordinary funeral and burial arrangements, and the amount is supported by competent evidence, the expense presents a strong basis for inclusion in a restitution award.

The inquiry may become more complicated when the amount claimed includes unusually expensive upgrades, commemorative features, or other charges that extend beyond what is reasonably connected to the funeral and burial itself.

In those circumstances, the issue is not necessarily whether a casket may qualify, but whether the particular amount claimed falls within the statutory language of necessary funeral and related services.

Cremation and Urns

Cremation directly concerns disposition of the remains and presents a strong argument for inclusion.

North Carolina provides additional statutory context in N.C.G.S. § 15B-2, part of the Crime Victims Compensation Act. That statute expressly identifies expenses associated with funeral, cremation, and burial as allowable expenses within the limitations of that program.

An urn reasonably associated with cremation likewise has a direct relationship to disposition, although N.C.G.S. § 15A-1340.35(a)(4) does not separately identify urns.

Transportation of the Body

Necessary transportation and transfer expenses likewise have a direct relationship to funeral services and disposition.

N.C.G.S. § 15B-2 expressly includes transportation of the body among the funeral, cremation, and burial expenses compensable through the Crime Victims Compensation Program.

The compensation statute does not control criminal restitution. It nevertheless provides useful statutory context when interpreting how North Carolina law classifies death-related expenses.

Grave Opening, Closing, and Burial Charges

Charges directly necessary to accomplish burial present a stronger statutory claim than expenses associated solely with later commemoration.

Opening and closing a grave and comparable cemetery charges relate directly to disposition of the deceased. Again, however, N.C.G.S. § 15A-1340.35(a)(4) does not provide an itemized list.

Cemetery Plots

A cemetery plot presents a closer question because burial itself is directly connected to the disposition of the deceased, while North Carolina law does not always classify the cost of the burial place as a funeral expense.

N.C.G.S. § 28A-19-6, which establishes priorities for claims against an estate, treats funeral expenses separately from the cost of a suitable place of burial and a gravestone. That distinction suggests that the General Assembly does not necessarily regard the purchase of a cemetery plot as part of the funeral expense itself.

Criminal restitution, however, is governed by different statutory language. N.C.G.S. § 15A-1340.35(a)(4) permits restitution for the victim’s “necessary funeral and related services.” The phrase “related services” is broader than funeral expenses standing alone and provides a reasonable basis for including costs that are necessary to accomplish the burial even if another statute classifies them separately for probate purposes.

A cemetery plot therefore occupies a different position from a headstone, memorial bench, flowers, or other commemorative expenses. The plot provides the place where the burial occurs and may be necessary to complete the disposition of the remains. Whether the full cost qualifies for restitution will depend on the evidence, the nature of the charge, and whether the expense can fairly be characterized as necessary to the funeral and burial rather than primarily memorial in nature.

Headstones, Flowers, and Memorial Benches | Criminal Restitution?

N.C.G.S. § 15B-2 provides useful statutory context because it expressly identifies qualifying expenses associated with funeral, cremation, and burial, including transportation of the body. At the same time, it excludes flowers, gravestones, and other items not directly related to the funeral service.

Chapter 15B does not govern criminal restitution pursuant to N.C.G.S. § 15A-1340.35(a)(4). The statutes serve different purposes and operate within different legal frameworks. Even so, N.C.G.S. § 15B-2 reflects a distinction drawn by the General Assembly between expenses connected to the funeral and disposition of the remains and expenses associated more closely with remembrance or memorialization.

North Carolina probate law provides similar context. N.C.G.S. § 28A-19-9 separately addresses the provision of a suitable gravestone for a decedent. That separate treatment reinforces the proposition that a gravestone is not necessarily synonymous with the funeral expense itself.

Legislative history points in the same general direction, although it does not resolve the issue. In 2005, House Bill 788 proposed changes to North Carolina restitution law that would have expressly included funeral and burial expenses and the cost of a headstone. The proposal did not become law. A failed bill does not establish the meaning of the existing statute, but it does show that the General Assembly considered express language concerning headstones without adding that language to N.C.G.S. § 15A-1340.35(a)(4).

A headstone therefore presents a different question from expenses directly necessary to prepare, transport, cremate, or bury the deceased. The same is true, to an even greater degree, of a memorial bench. A bench serves a commemorative purpose rather than accomplishing the funeral or disposition of the remains, which makes its connection to “necessary funeral and related services” considerably more remote.

Flowers present a similar issue. N.C.G.S. § 15B-2 expressly excludes them from the funeral-expense category used by the Crime Victims Compensation Program. Although that exclusion does not control Article 81C restitution, it provides meaningful guidance when evaluating whether flowers fall within the narrower concept of necessary funeral and related services.

Reception expenses, catered meals, travel by family members, memorial jewelry, keepsakes, commemorative purchases, and similar costs may be entirely understandable and personally meaningful following a death. The restitution inquiry, however, is not whether an expense is meaningful or customary. The question is whether the particular charge can fairly be characterized as part of the victim’s necessary funeral and related services within the meaning of N.C.G.S. § 15A-1340.35(a)(4).

Funeral Expense Restitution | Proof in Court

North Carolina criminal restitution for funeral expenses rests on the evidence. A sentencing court cannot select an amount merely because the amount appears reasonable.

The North Carolina Supreme Court addressed that issue directly in State v. Wilson, 340 N.C. 720, 459 S.E.2d 192 (1995). The trial court recommended $4,000 in funeral restitution based upon the prosecutor’s unsworn statement concerning the amount of the expenses. The Supreme Court vacated that portion of the judgment, holding that the amount of restitution must be supported by evidence presented at trial or sentencing.

State v. Daye, 78 N.C. App. 753, 338 S.E.2d 557 (1986), aff’d per curiam, 318 N.C. 502, 349 S.E.2d 576 (1986), provides the related principle that restitution cannot rest upon guesswork or conjecture. Restitution compensates for a proven loss. It is not a predetermined fine or presumed measure of damages.

State v. Clifton, 125 N.C. App. 471, 481 S.E.2d 393 (1997), applied the evidentiary requirement specifically to funeral expenses. The trial court ordered $3,000 in restitution for funeral expenses payable to the victim’s father. The Court of Appeals found no evidence in the record establishing either the cost of the funeral or who had paid for it and concluded that the restitution order was erroneous.

The statutory framework reinforces those decisions.

N.C.G.S. § 15A-1340.35(b) permits the sentencing court to require the victim or the victim’s estate to provide admissible evidence documenting the claimed costs. When such documentation is provided, the statute expressly requires that it “shall be shared with the defendant before the sentencing hearing.”

N.C.G.S. § 15A-1340.36 further provides that the amount of restitution must be limited to the amount supported by the record. In determining that amount, the sentencing court considers the defendant’s resources, property, ability to earn, obligations to dependents, and other matters bearing upon the ability to make restitution. When the loss caused by the offense exceeds what the defendant is able to pay, the court may order partial restitution and must state its reasons on the record.

An itemized funeral-home invoice, cemetery statement, receipt, proof of payment, financing document, testimony from a witness with personal knowledge, or a definite stipulation may provide evidentiary support, depending upon the circumstances and the record developed at sentencing.

A restitution worksheet serves a different function. It may organize and identify the amount being requested, but it does not, standing alone, establish that amount through competent evidence.

State v. Mauer, 202 N.C. App. 546, 688 S.E.2d 774 (2010), is frequently cited for that proposition. The Court held that a restitution worksheet unsupported by testimony, documentation, or stipulation is insufficient to support an order of restitution. A defendant’s silence concerning the amount does not itself constitute a stipulation.

The evidentiary requirement matters because restitution ultimately becomes part of the criminal judgment. Even when funeral documentation is produced shortly before sentencing, the amount ordered must have support in the record.

Does the $10,000 Crime Victims Compensation Limit Apply to Criminal Restitution?

The $10,000 funeral-expense limitation contained in the North Carolina Crime Victims Compensation Act is not a $10,000 ceiling on criminal restitution.

The distinction is important because the Crime Victims Compensation Program and criminal restitution operate pursuant to separate statutory frameworks.

N.C.G.S. § 15B-2 permits a total charge of up to $10,000 for qualifying expenses related to funeral, cremation, and burial, including transportation of the body. The statute excludes flowers, gravestones, and other items not directly related to the funeral service.

That $10,000 limitation governs compensation available through the Crime Victims Compensation Program.

Criminal restitution is governed separately by Article 81C of Chapter 15A, including N.C.G.S. §§ 15A-1340.34 through 15A-1340.38. Article 81C contains no corresponding $10,000 ceiling for funeral restitution. Instead, the amount is determined by the compensable loss supported by the record together with the considerations set forth in N.C.G.S. § 15A-1340.36.

The two systems may nevertheless interact when the Crime Victims Compensation Fund has paid some or all of an otherwise compensable expense.

N.C.G.S. § 15B-18 provides that, when compensation is awarded, the Crime Victims Compensation Fund is subrogated to the claimant’s rights to recover economic loss from qualifying collateral sources to the extent of the compensation awarded. The Fund is also expressly recognized as an eligible recipient of restitution.

N.C.G.S. § 15A-1340.37(b) similarly permits restitution to a person or entity that provided assistance to the victim and is subrogated to the victim’s rights. The statute establishes an order of priority, providing that restitution must be made to the victim or the victim’s estate before restitution is made to a qualifying subrogated third party.

The $10,000 Crime Victims Compensation limit and the amount of criminal restitution therefore answer different questions. One determines the amount potentially payable through the State compensation program. The other determines the restitution obligation that may be imposed as part of the criminal judgment.

Insurance Settlements | Funeral Restitution

Funeral expenses may be paid from several sources before a criminal case reaches sentencing.

A family member may pay the funeral home directly. A policy specifically covering burial or funeral expenses may satisfy some or all of the bill. The Crime Victims Compensation Fund may pay qualifying expenses. An insurer or another entity may acquire subrogation rights after making a payment.

Those circumstances can affect who is legally entitled to receive restitution, even when there is no dispute about the underlying funeral expense.

N.C.G.S. § 15A-1340.37(b) permits restitution to a person or entity other than the victim when that party provided assistance to the victim and is subrogated to the victim’s rights. That may include an insurer or the Crime Victims Compensation Fund when the statutory requirements are satisfied. Restitution to the victim or the victim’s estate receives priority over restitution to another qualifying recipient.

The Crime Victims Compensation Fund has separate subrogation rights pursuant to N.C.G.S. § 15B-18. To the extent compensation has been awarded, the Fund acquires the claimant’s rights to recover qualifying economic loss as provided by that statute.

Not every payment associated with a death should be treated as though it paid the same loss.

A burial policy or other insurance benefit that directly pays a particular funeral expense raises a different restitution issue from an ordinary life insurance benefit payable to a named beneficiary because the insured died. The existence of life insurance proceeds does not, by itself, establish that the funeral bill was paid by the insurer or that someone else acquired a right to restitution for that expense.

The analysis therefore may require more than looking at the gross amount of the funeral-home invoice. Relevant questions can include what expense was incurred, who initially became responsible for it, who actually paid it, whether the payment generated subrogation rights, whether the Crime Victims Compensation Fund has paid any portion, and which recipient has the statutory right to receive restitution.

That inquiry becomes particularly important when several sources contributed toward funeral and burial expenses. The issue is not simply whether money changed hands after the death. The nature of the payment and the legal rights associated with it determine how it relates to restitution.

Does Funeral Restitution Affect a North Carolina Wrongful Death Claim?

Criminal restitution does not replace a North Carolina wrongful death action.

N.C.G.S. § 15A-1340.37(a) expressly provides that an order of restitution does not abridge the right of the victim or the victim’s estate to bring a civil action against the defendant for damages resulting from the offense.

The statute also establishes how payments made pursuant to the criminal restitution order affect a related civil judgment. Any amount paid by the defendant pursuant to the restitution order is credited against a judgment entered against the defendant in favor of the same victim in a civil action arising from the criminal offense.

Criminal restitution and wrongful death damages nevertheless remain different remedies governed by different statutes.

Restitution is part of the criminal sentencing process and is governed by Article 81C of Chapter 15A. Its focus is the compensable loss authorized by the restitution statutes and supported by the record before the sentencing court.

A North Carolina wrongful death action is a separate civil action governed principally by N.C.G.S. § 28A-18-2. Depending upon the facts, recoverable wrongful death damages may include categories of loss that extend well beyond funeral expenses or the restitution available in the criminal proceeding.

The criminal sentencing hearing therefore does not resolve every financial consequence associated with the death. Restitution addresses the obligation imposed as part of the criminal judgment. A wrongful death action addresses the separate civil rights and damages available to the decedent’s estate.

North Carolina Funeral Restitution Requires More Than a Number on a Worksheet

A death changes the character of a criminal prosecution, but it does not eliminate the statutory and evidentiary requirements governing restitution.

N.C.G.S. § 15A-1340.35(a)(4) recognizes the financial consequences of a death by permitting restitution for necessary funeral and related services. It does not authorize unlimited reimbursement for every expense incurred after someone dies.

The sentencing court may need to determine what was purchased, whether the expense falls within the restitution statute, how much it cost, who incurred it, who paid it, whether insurance or another source has already reimbursed some portion, whether subrogation rights exist, and who is legally entitled to receive restitution.

Those issues can become particularly significant in prosecutions involving murder, manslaughter, felony death by vehicle, misdemeanor death by vehicle, and impaired driving resulting in death.

Careful representation requires more than accepting or rejecting a restitution worksheet at face value. The claimed losses, supporting evidence, statutory recipient, prior payments, subrogation rights, ability to pay, and relationship between the criminal judgment and any related civil action all deserve examination before the restitution amount becomes part of the sentence.

Powers Law Firm represents clients in serious North Carolina criminal cases, including impaired-driving and death-related prosecutions. Bill Powers has practiced law since 1992, served as President of the North Carolina Advocates for Justice, authored the North Carolina DWI Quick Reference Guide, and regularly teaches criminal law, impaired-driving law, evidence, and trial practice. His professional service includes work on North Carolina impaired-driving policy and recognition by the North Carolina State Bar with its Distinguished Service Award. When criminal charges involve substantial funeral expenses and restitution, the financial provisions of sentencing warrant the same careful statutory and evidentiary analysis as the criminal charges themselves.

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