Criminal Practice – Motion to Sever – Unpreserved – Motion to Dismiss – Attempted First Degree Kidnapping

Defendant waived his severance argument by failing to renew it at trial, and the trial court did not err by declining to dismiss defendant’s attempted first-degree kidnapping charge.

We discerned no error.

Defendant appealed from judgment after a jury convicted him of one count of attempted first-degree kidnapping, one count of statutory sex offense with a child fifteen years of age or younger, three counts of indecent liberties with a child, and three counts of statutory rape of a child fifteen years of age or younger. On appeal, defendant argued the trial court erred by joining his charges for one trial; and denying his motion to dismiss his attempted first-degree kidnapping charge.

Defendant first argued that the court erred by joining his charges for one trial. We concluded that defendant waived this argument. Defendant moved pretrial to sever his charges, but he failed to renew his severance argument at trial. Therefore, defendant waived his severance argument, and we declined to review the court’s decision to join defendant’s charges.

Next, defendant argued that the court erred by denying his motion to dismiss his attempted first-degree kidnapping charge. We disagreed. The evidence is substantial concerning each element of attempted first-degree kidnapping because a reasonable jury could accept it as “adequate to support a conclusion” that defendant attempted to kidnap the victim. Accordingly, the court did not err by denying defendant’s motion to dismiss his attempted first-degree kidnapping charge.

No error.

State v. Kenneth David Groat (Lawyers’ Weekly No. 011-102-24, 9 pp.) (Jeff Carpenter, J.) Appealed from Jackson County Superior Court (William H. Coward, J.) Attorney General Joshua H. Stein, by Assistant Attorney General Caden W. Hayes, for the State; New Hanover County Public Defender, by Assistant Public Defender Max E. Ashworth, III, for defendant-appellant. North Carolina Court of Appeals