Criminal Practice – Constitutional – Right to Counsel – Miranda Warnings – Videotaped Interview – Transcript Only

State v. Jordan (Lawyers Weekly No. 11-07-1014, 19 pp.) (Donna S. Stroud, J.) Appealed from Caldwell County Superior Court. (R. Stuart Albright, J.) N.C. App. Click here for the full-text opinion.

Holding: The trial court’s determination that defendant had voluntarily and intelligently waived his Miranda rights was based not only on the transcript of defendant’s police interview, but also on the videotape of the interview. Defendant failed to include the videotape in the appellate record, so we must accept the trial court’s findings of fact as binding. The trial court’s findings of fact support its conclusion that defendant waived his Miranda rights intelligently, voluntarily and knowingly.

We find no error in defendant’s conviction of first-degree murder.

Even if it were error for the trial court to allow the jury to use a transcript prepared from an enhanced version of the audio from the videotape — when the jury had heard only the original audio — we cannot say that it prejudiced defendant in light of the overwhelming evidence against him: witness Barnes’s testimony that defendant told him he was going to kill his cousin, the victim; witness Michaux’s testimony that defendant came to her house the day of the murder looking for the victim; witness Jolly’s testimony that he saw and heard defendant demand money from the victim, saw defendant take a gun from Makiaya Powell, saw defendant begin shooting, and heard four shots; witness Patterson’s testimony that defendant told her he had killed someone; Detective Cornett’s testimony that defendant told him he killed the victim; and the gunshot residue found on defendant’s clothing.