Case Title: State v. Smith

Citation: 352 N.C. 531

Docket Number: 279A99

State: north-carolina

Court: North Carolina Supreme Court

Date: 2000-08-25T00:00:00Z

Document:
STATE OF NORTH CAROLINA v. JAMIE LAMONT SMITH
No. 279A99
(Filed 25 August 2000)
1.
Homicide--first-degree murder-- short-form indictment
The short-form bill of indictment for first-degree murder complies with both the North Carolina and
United States Constitutions.  N.C.G.S. § 15-144.
2.
Jury--selection--criminal record checks of prospective jurors--equal access
There was no error in a capital sentencing proceeding where defendant contended that he did not have
equal access to the criminal records of prospective jurors following the prosecutor’s challenge to a juror whose
questionnaire falsely indicated that she had never been charged with a crime.  The court suggested that
defendant attempt to get such information through the public defender and the prosecutor suggested that the
same information was attainable from the clerk’s office.  Defendant contends that  the public defender does not
have access to PIN, which is available to the State, and that other mechanisms for obtaining such information
are unreasonably onerous and not universally accessible; however, defendant did not ask for discovery of
information in the State’s possession and the court’s action did not constitute error.
3.
Jury--selection--criminal record check--Batson challenge
The prosecutor’s challenge to an  African-American prospective juror for a capital sentencing
proceeding does not appear to have been  motivated by purposeful discrimination where a prospective juror
stated on her questionnaire that she had no criminal history but a criminal history check by the State revealed
that she had been charged and convicted of writing a check on a closed account. Defendant’s desire to plumb
whether this juror had been treated disparately by being singled out for a criminal record check must be
addressed through a Batson challenge because defendant did not request disclosure of whether checks were run
on other prospective jurors under the statutes governing discovery.  
4.
Jury--selection--capital trial--bias against death penalty--further inquiry--court’s discretion
The trial court did not err during jury selection for a capital sentencing proceeding by excusing for cause
jurors who answered affirmatively when asked whether they had beliefs or opinions against the death penalty
which would prevent them from imposing a death sentence under any facts or circumstances.  When a
prospective juror has unequivocally indicated an unyielding bias against capital punishment, the goal of
assembling an impartial jury is not jeopardized by voir dire that does not plumb further whether the prospective
juror could follow the law, as in this case.  When the bias is less patent and the operative question is whether
that bias is surmountable, the court’s discretion is due deference from the reviewing court.
5.
Jury--selection--capital trial--opposition to death penalty--no rehabilitation
The trial court did not err during jury selection for a capital sentencing proceeding by refusing to permit
rehabilitation of a juror who had expressed unequivocal opposition to the death penalty.
6.
Jury--selection--capital trial--manner in which death penalty executed--irrelevant
The trial court did not err during jury selection for a capital sentencing proceeding by not informing a
prospective juror about the manner in which executions are carried out in North Carolina and excusing that
juror for cause when he stated that he could not vote for the death penalty without knowing how it was to be
carried out.  The manner of execution is in no way relevant to the deliberations of the jury or to the ability of a
prospective juror to serve.
7.
Jury--selection--questions and answers in Spanish
The trial court did not err by denying a motion for a mistrial during jury selection for a capital
sentencing proceeding where the prosecutor asked a prospective juror two questions in Spanish, the juror
responded in Spanish, and subsequent responses in English revealed that the juror’s inability to understand
English made him unqualified to serve as a juror under N.C.G.S. § 9-3.  Any arguable error in not ordering the
minimal dialogue in Spanish to be translated for the record was without prejudicial effect, given the wholly
proper excusal.
8.
Jury--selection--excusal of juror with limited English
The dismissal of a prospective juror was not impermissibly based upon national origin where it was
clear from the transcript that the court’s determination was based on the juror’s limited ability to communicate
in English rather than on his origin.  The legislature’s purpose in prescribing the mandatory qualifications for
citizens who might serve as jurors was to assure that defendants be judged fairly and impartially; in order to do
this a juror must have sufficient proficiency in English to enable full comprehension of the testimony and
instructions and to fully and effectively participate in the jury’s deliberations.  Defendant could have challenged
the excusal through the Batson procedure to determine whether the prosecutor acted with discriminatory intent.
9.
Jury--selection--randomness--use of old noncomputer method
There was no error in the jury selection procedure for a capital sentencing proceeding where the
prosecutor informed the court shortly before jury selection began that there was some question as to the 
statutory compliance of a new computerized system of summoning prospective jurors and the court ordered the
clerk to call jurors by the old method, which satisfied the random selection requirement of N.C.G.S. § 15A-
1214(a).  
10.
Criminal Law--guilty pleas--required inquiry
There was no plain error in a capital prosecution for first-degree murder and other crimes in the
acceptance of defendant’s guilty pleas where the court examined defendant strictly in accordance with  statutory
requirements;  the direct sentencing consequences of defendant’s guilty plea to first-degree murder cannot be
definitely or immediately gauged by the judge beyond predicting a minimum sentence of life imprisonment
without parole and a maximum sentence of death, as this judge did, and the court had no duty to expound on the
direct consequences further absent an indication by defendant that he required such instruction or to do more
than inquire into whether defendant was satisfied with his attorneys and their explanation of the charges and
possible defenses.  Finally, contrary to prior practice, provisions governing capital punishment specifically
permit any person indicted for a capital offense to plead guilty.  N.C.G.S. § 15A-2001.
11.
  Evidence--victim impact statement--motion in limine
The trial court did not abuse its discretion in a capital sentencing proceeding by denying defendant’s
motion in limine to prohibit victim impact statements.  Deciding the motion pretrial was well within the court’s
discretion and the only statement introduced did no more than describe the emotional or psychological effect of
the victim’s death on her brother, which was well within the parameters of N.C.G.S. § 15A-833.
12.
  Evidence--photographs--prior crime scene and victim--capital sentencing
The trial court did not err in a capital sentencing proceeding by allowing the introduction of photographs
of the victims and the scene of a prior murder and arson where the photographs were used to illustrate the
testimony of a fire department member who had investigated the prior crimes and whose testimony was offered 
in support of the previous violent felony aggravating circumstance.  The court may admit any evidence it deems
relevant to sentencing and these photographs were not so numerous or egregious as to render the hearing
fundamentally unfair.
13.
  Sentencing--capital--mitigating circumstances--remorse
Any error in excluding a psychologist’s direct testimony from a capital sentencing hearing was harmless
beyond a reasonable doubt where defendant contended that mitigating evidence of remorse was excluded but
failed to make an offer of proof, other evidence of defendant’s remorse was before the jury, and defendant did
not request and the jury thus did not find this circumstance under the catchall mitigating circumstance.
14.
  Evidence--cross-examination--statements underlying psychological diagnosis
There was no error in a capital sentencing proceeding where the prosecutor asked defendant’s
psychological expert a number of questions about a prior robbery that occurred a year before the murder to
which defendant pled guilty where the questioning was apparently directed at discrediting the diagnosis by
showing that statements from defendant which formed a partial basis for the diagnosis were untruthful and
unreliable.  In addition to the contention being baseless, the trial court has considerable leeway and discretion in
governing a sentencing proceeding, and defendant did not assert constitutional error at the sentencing
proceeding or raise constitutional error on appeal.
15.
Criminal Law--prosecutor’s argument--incivility
There was no prejudicial error in a capital sentencing hearing in  the prosecutor’s treatment of a
prospective juror, defense counsel, and defendant’s psychological expert where the prosecutor tested the line
between zealous advocacy and incivility but her manner and the interjection of arguably irrelevant matters were
benign, if overblown.  There was ample evidence that would support the jury’s judgment as to the nonstatutory
mitigating circumstances allegedly affected by the prosecutor’s behavior.
16.
Criminal Law--prosecutor’s argument--personal invective--scatological references
There was no prejudicial error in a capital sentencing proceeding from the prosecutor’s argument, which
contained unnecessary personal invective but was not so egregious as to compel the court to intervene and did
not jeopardize the fairness of defendant’s sentencing hearing.  Scatological references to a witness’s testimony
are not to be condoned; however, counsel must be allowed wide latitude in hotly contested cases and the
evidence was so overwhelming in this case that the remarks were harmless.
17.
Criminal Law--instructions--character of victim
The trial court did not err in a capital sentencing proceeding by refusing a requested instruction
regarding the character of the victim where the instruction was requested to foreclose excessive use of a
brother’s victim-impact statement in the prosecutor’s closing argument.  The court stated that it would
reconsider the request if such excessive argument occurred and defendant did not object nor repeat the request
for the instruction.
18.
Sentencing--capital--mitigating circumstance--codefendant in another killing receiving life
The trial court did not err  in a capital sentencing proceeding by refusing to submit the mitigating
circumstance that a codefendant in another killing did not receive a sentence of death or by excluding copies of
the codefendant’s judgment and commitments.  The information was elicited from a witness on cross-
examination, and this case is within the rule that an accomplice receiving a lesser sentence is not an extenuating
circumstance.
19.
Sentencing--capital--aggravating circumstances--not the same evidence
There was no error in a capital sentencing proceeding where defendant advanced arguments concerning
aggravating circumstances which allegedly relied upon the same evidence.  Although some evidence
overlapped by virtue of how and where the crimes occurred, the first three aggravating circumstances involve
separate, distinct victims and the fourth is course of conduct, which is a separate circumstance from the crimes
that comprise the series.
20.
Sentencing--capital--International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights
A defendant’s treatment in a capital prosecution did not violate provisions of the International Covenant
on Civil and Political Rights concerning cruel or degrading treatment or punishment, or arbitrary deprivation of
life.
21.
Sentencing--capital--death sentence proportionate
A sentence of death was not disproportionate where defendant raped his victim, stabbed her more than
sixty times, and set fire to her apartment.  The evidence amply supported the aggravating circumstances found
by the jury, and the case was more similar to cases in which the death penalty was found proportionate than to
those where it was found disproportionate.  
22.
Sentencing--capital--death sentence--passion or prejudice
A death sentence was not imposed under the influence of passion or prejudice where defendant
contended that the jury’s deliberations must have been permeated by emotion from the testimony of the victim’s
brother, the subtle effect of black on white crime, the parade of victims, photographs of the victim, and the
presence at the hearing of maimed victims of another crime for which defendant was convicted.  Defendant
offered no evidence that the jury was affected by passion or prejudice other than the brother’s victim-impact
statement, which was singularly restrained under the circumstances.
Appeal as of right pursuant to N.C.G.S. § 7A-27(a) from a judgment
imposing a sentence of death entered by Downs, J., on 23 April 1998 in
Superior Court, Buncombe County, upon defendant’s plea of guilty of
first-degree murder and a jury’s recommendation of a sentence of death.  On
26 October 1999, the Supreme Court allowed defendant’s motion to bypass the
Court of Appeals as to his appeal of additional judgments.  Heard in the
Supreme Court 17 May 2000.
Michael F. Easley, Attorney General, by William P. Hart, Special
Deputy Attorney General, for the State.
William F.W. Massengale and Marilyn G. Ozer for defendant-appellant.
FREEMAN, Justice.
On 1 May 1995 the Buncombe County grand jury indicted defendant in
true bills for murder in the first degree, first-degree burglary, robbery
with a dangerous weapon, first-degree forcible rape, and first-degree
arson.  Defendant pled guilty to all charges.  A jury recommended a
sentence of death for the murder.  The judge imposed sentences within the
presumptive range authorized by N.C.G.S. §§ 15A-1340.17(c) for each of the
lesser felonies, to run consecutively, and imposed a sentence of death for
the murder.
The offenses for which defendant was sentenced in this case were
committed on 16 January 1995.  The victim, Kelli Froemke, a nineteen-year-
old college student, lived with her brother and his girlfriend in their
apartment in Asheville.  In a statement later given to law enforcement
officers, defendant said he gained entry to the apartment by asking Kelli,
who was alone at the time, if he could use the telephone.  Once in the
apartment, defendant demanded money at knifepoint, then forced Kelli into
her bedroom and raped her.  He then stabbed her more than sixty times. 
Before leaving, defendant set a fire in the bedroom closet to cover up what
he had done.  He walked away from the apartment, carrying the cordless
phone and Kelli’s car keys with him.  Kelli’s brother and his girlfriend
returned to the apartment shortly after 10:00 p.m. and found it full of
smoke.  After alerting a neighbor to call 911, Kelli’s brother made his way
through the smoke to Kelli’s bedroom where he found her body.  He pulled
her onto a landing where he administered CPR until the fire department
arrived.
Defendant was identified by a neighbor as having been seen around the
apartment complex where Kelli lived on the night of the crime.  He
ultimately gave more than one statement to the police, first implicating a
friend, then confessing it was his own intention to rob Kelli, whom he saw
getting out of her car, for money for cocaine.
When asked about other recent crimes, defendant told officers he had
pled guilty to larceny at the Mountain Trace apartment complex.  He also
implicated himself in a fire at the Grace Apartments.  In subsequent
statements defendant elaborated:  on 11 December 1994 he and a friend went
to the Grace Apartments, knocking on doors to see which apartments were
occupied, intending to break in.  They eventually stole the mail from the
apartment mailboxes.  Later that night they broke into a Mountain Trace
apartment, stole a computer and other items, and attempted to cover up that
theft by starting a fire.  About a week later they returned to the Grace
Apartments and started a second fire with kerosene to cover up their mail
theft.  This fire resulted in serious injuries and one death:  Phillip
Cotton, an eighteen-year-old, died of carbon monoxide poisoning.  Another
resident of the apartments hung out her window until her hands burned, then
fell three stories, breaking her neck.  A third resident suffered burns so
severe her legs had to be amputated.  Defendant was subsequently convicted
of the crimes committed in these incidents and sentenced to death for the
murder of Phillip Cotton.
Physical evidence corroborated defendant’s statements, including a
videotape of defendant and his companion buying kerosene the morning of the
Grace Apartments fire and DNA evidence matching defendant to the
spermatozoa found on Kelli’s body.
Defendant offered evidence in mitigation, including the testimony of a
clinical and forensic psychologist about defendant’s mental illness. 
Others testified about his close relationship with his mother and other
family members and how at sixteen or seventeen he had lost interest in
school and turned to alcohol and hard drugs.
[1] Defendant first takes issue with the “short-form” bill of
indictment, authorized by N.C.G.S. § 15-144, which states the crime charged
as “first degree murder.”  Defendant argues the Due Process Clause of the
Fifth Amendment and the notice and jury trial guarantees of the Sixth
Amendment are violated by the indictment’s failure to charge in the
indictment the elements of the crime or aggravating circumstances as
“fact[s](other than prior conviction) that increase[] the maximum penalty
for [the] crime.”  Jones v. United States, 526 U.S. 227, 243 n.6, 143 L.
Ed. 2d 311, 326 n.6 (1999), quoted in Apprendi v. New Jersey, ___ U.S. ___,
___, 147 L. Ed. 2d 435, ___ (2000).  We have recently decided this issue in
State v. Braxton, 352 N.C. 158, ___, ___ S.E.2d ___, ___ (July 13, 2000)
(No. 2A98).  There we noted not only that this Court has consistently held
murder indictments based upon N.C.G.S. § 15-144 comply with both the North
Carolina and United States Constitutions, id., slip op. at 7, but that the
short-form indictment is sufficient to charge murder in the first degree
based on any theory set forth in N.C.G.S. § 14-17 and referenced on the
indictment, id.  Moreover, we held that because “[t]he crime of first-
degree murder and the accompanying maximum penalty of death, as set forth
in N.C.G.S. § 14-17 and North Carolina’s capital sentencing statute, are
encompassed within the language of the short-form indictment. . . . [N]o
additional facts need[] . . . be charged in the indictment” where the
defendant, like defendant here, was sentenced to the prescribed maximum
punishment for that crime.  Id., slip op. at 8.
We reiterate here that indictments based on N.C.G.S. § 15-144, like
those charging defendant in this case, comply with both the North Carolina
and the United States Constitutions.  See State v. Wallace, 351 N.C. 481,
528 S.E.2d 326 (2000); State v. Williams, 304 N.C. 394, 422, 284 S.E.2d
437, 454 (1981), cert. denied, 456 U.S. 932, 72 L. Ed. 2d 450 (1982). 
Defendant’s assignments of error as to this issue are thus without merit.
[2] Defendant next cites numerous instances in which he contends the
jury selection process was flawed.  First, he complains that he did not
have equal access to the criminal records of prospective jurors.  This was
prompted by the prosecutor’s challenging a juror whose questionnaire
falsely indicated she had never been charged with a crime.  When defense
counsel asked for access to the same resources, the court suggested
defendant attempt to get such information through the office of the public
defender.  Defendant notes that the public defender does not have access to
the Police Information Network (PIN), which is available to the State, and
that other mechanisms for obtaining such information through other
databases are unreasonably onerous and not universally accessible. 
Although one authorized to do so may pay to run PIN checks, those who are
indigent cannot.  Defendant contends denying equal access in this way
violates an indigent defendant’s due process rights and his right to a fair
and impartial jury under the Sixth and Fourteenth Amendments to the United
States Constitution and Article I, Sections 19, 24, and 35 of the North
Carolina Constitution.
Defendant did not ask for discovery of information or documents in the
State’s possession, but rather requested that the same resources from which
such information was derived be accessible to him.  Thus, categories of
information discoverable under N.C.G.S. §§ 15A-903 and -904 and the trial
court’s discretion to order the disclosure of information not otherwise
prohibited, see, e.g., State v. Warren, 347 N.C. 309, 492 S.E.2d 609
(1997), cert. denied, 523 U.S. 1109, 140 L. Ed. 2d 818 (1998), are not
implicated here.  Rather, the trial court simply suggested an alternative
means to the same end.  The record reveals the prosecutor suggested the
same information was attainable from the clerk’s office upstairs in the
same building, and defense counsel agreed to check those resources. 
Counsel did not subsequently object to the trial court’s action or move for
funds with which the defense could run its own criminal record checks.  See
N.C.G.S. § 7A-450(b) (1999) (State must provide indigent defendant with
necessary expenses of representation); State v. Parks, 331 N.C. 649, 656,
417 S.E.2d 467, 471 (1992) (to receive state-funded expert assistance,
indigent defendant must make “particularized showing that . . . there is a
reasonable likelihood that it would materially assist him in the
preparation of his case”).  The court’s action here constitutes neither
error of procedure nor error of law from which defendant might seek relief
on appeal.  See N.C.G.S. § 15A-1442 (1999).
[3] The State’s exercise of a peremptory challenge to excuse this same
juror, an African-American, also prompted defendant’s next several
assignments of error.  Defendant objected to the challenge, and the court
excused the jury and asked the prosecutor her reason, the second step in
the procedure outlined in Batson v. Kentucky, 476 U.S. 79, 90 L. Ed. 2d 69
(1986), for evaluating whether a prosecutor has used peremptory challenges
in violation of the Equal Protection Clause.  Briefly, the process requires
the defendant to make a prima facie showing that the prosecutor has
exercised a peremptory challenge on the basis of race.  The burden then
shifts to the prosecutor to articulate a race-neutral reason for excusing
the juror in question.  Finally, the court must determine whether the
defendant has carried his burden of showing purposeful discrimination.  Id.
at 96-98, 90 L. Ed. 2d at 87-88.  Although in this case defendant never
actually stated a prima facie case of discrimination, the absence of this
step was moot once the prosecutor’s stated reason and the court’s
determination had been made.  Hernandez v. New York, 500 U.S. 352, 359, 114
L. Ed. 2d 395, 405 (1991).
Here, the prosecutor’s articulated reason for excusing the juror was
that she questioned the juror’s veracity:  the juror had stated on her
questionnaire that she had no criminal history, yet a criminal history
check revealed she had been charged and convicted of writing a check on a
closed account.  The court accepted this reason as race-neutral and
overruled defendant’s objection.
The court did not err in doing so.  The prosecutor’s challenge does
not appear to have been motivated by purposeful discrimination, but appears
both race-neutral and otherwise beyond reproach.  Even if, as defendant
contends, few people who bounce checks regard doing so as criminal
behavior, people who are criminally charged with and convicted of doing so
are surely more enlightened.  And those who take oaths as jurors must know
what an oath means.
Defendant subsequently asked the trial court to inquire whether the
State had run criminal record checks on any other prospective jurors.  The
court, seeing no obligation to do so and not being presented with a motion
based in law, refused.  (Although the court arguably had the inherent
authority in the interest of justice to order disclosure by the State of
such criminal record checks, see generally State v. Warren, 347 N.C. 309,
492 S.E.2d 609, defendant did not request such disclosure under the
auspices of statutes governing discovery in criminal cases, N.C.G.S. §§
15A-903, -904 (1999).)  Defendant’s desire to plumb whether this juror had
been treated disparately in relation to the rest of the pool by being
singled out for a criminal record check must be -- and was -- addressed
through the Batson analysis.  That is, if the prosecutor can articulate a
race-neutral reason for challenging the prospective juror and if this
reason does not appear to the court to be mere pretext, then that is the
end of the inquiry.  It should be remembered that the Batson analysis
“permits prompt rulings on objections to peremptory challenges without
substantial disruption of the jury selection process.”  Hernandez, 500 U.S.
at 358, 114 L. Ed. 2d at 405.  Further delay to pursue an argument for
which a basis in fact has not been established or, as in this case,
effectively sought is neither in defendant’s interest nor in that of the
State.  We thus overrule defendant’s assignments of error on this point.
[4] Defendant also assigns error to the excusal of eleven prospective
jurors who were challenged for cause after their affirmative responses to
two questions concerning the death penalty.  The prosecutor asked each of
these prospective jurors, first, whether he or she had “any religious,
moral, or philosophical beliefs or opinions against the death penalty.” 
Each answered “yes.”  The prosecutor then asked:  “If the defendant was
found guilty of first-degree murder, would your feelings or beliefs about
the death penalty prevent you from voting at the sentencing hearing to
impose a death sentence under any facts or circumstances and no matter what
evidence or aggravating circumstances were shown?”  Again, each prospective
juror answered definitively, “yes,” and was challenged for cause. 
Defendant now contends that, despite these responses, the inquiry was
inadequate to determine whether the prospective juror met the critical
standard for challenge for cause under Wainwright v. Witt, 469 U.S. 412, 83
L. Ed. 2d 841 (1985).  That standard is characterized as beliefs that
impede the juror’s ability to follow the law -- beliefs that “‘prevent or
substantially impair the performance of his duties as a juror in accordance
with this instruction and his oath.’”  Id. at 420, 83 L. Ed. 2d at 849
(quoting Adams v. Texas, 448 U.S. 38, 45, 65 L. Ed. 2d 581, 589 (1980));
see also, e.g., State v. Gregory, 340 N.C. 365, 394, 459 S.E.2d 638, 654
(1995), cert. denied, 517 U.S. 1108, 134 L. Ed. 2d 478 (1996).
Challenge for cause must rest on more than a prospective juror’s
“‘general objections to the death penalty or expressed conscientious or
religious scruples against its infliction.’”  Gregory, 340 N.C. at 394, 459
S.E.2d at 654 (quoting Witherspoon v. Illinois, 391 U.S. 510, 522, 20 L.
Ed. 2d 776, 785 (1968)).  Beyond this rule, however, is the question of
precisely what kinds of responses on voir dire justify a prospective
juror’s excusal for opposition to the death penalty.  In Witherspoon and in
Wainwright v. Witt, the United States Supreme Court drew and refined two
profiles of venirepersons excusable for cause -- one distinctive and
readily identifiable, the other so much less so that the sentencing court’s
own discernment is accorded substantial deference.  The first kind of
prospective juror is one whose opposition to the death penalty is absolute
and invariable, regardless of the character of the defendant or the
circumstances of the crime.  Such candidates “could be excused for cause if
they expressed an unmistakable commitment to automatically vote against the
death penalty, regardless of the facts and circumstances which might be
presented.”  State v. Brogden, 334 N.C. 39, 42, 430 S.E.2d 905, 907-08
(1993) (citing Witherspoon, 391 U.S. at 522 n.21, 20 L. Ed. 2d at 785
n.21); see also Gregory, 340 N.C. at 388, 459 S.E.2d at 651 (citing Morgan
v. Illinois, 504 U.S. 719, 119 L. Ed. 2d 492 (1992)).  This description
mirrors the prosecutor’s inquiry here.  We stress that prospective jurors
who fit this profile are not those for which the “standards” described in
Witherspoon and Wainwright were drawn.  See Witherspoon, 391 U.S. at
513-14, 20 L. Ed. 2d at 780 (“The issue before us is a narrow one.  It does
not involve . . . the State’s assertion of a right to exclude from the jury
in a capital case those who say that they could never vote to impose the
death penalty or that they would refuse even to consider its imposition in
the case before them.”).
The second kind of prospective juror is one whose opposition is not
blinding, who can put aside bias and exercise judgment informed by the law. 
The Court in Witherspoon recognized that such people are suitable as
jurors:  “A man who opposes the death penalty, no less than one who favors
it, can make the discretionary judgment entrusted to him by the State and
can thus obey the oath he takes as a juror.”  Id. at 519, 20 L. Ed. 2d at
783, quoted in Brogden, 334 N.C. at 42, 430 S.E.2d at 907.  In Adams v.
Texas the Court articulated the rule, reaffirmed in Wainwright, that such a
prospective juror cannot properly be excused for his views on capital
punishment unless those views “would prevent or substantially impair the
performance of his duties as a juror in accordance with his instructions
and his oath.”  448 U.S. at 45, 65 L. Ed. 2d at 589, quoted in Wainwright,
469 U.S. at 424, 83 L. Ed. 2d at 851-52; see also Brogden, 334 N.C. at 42,
430 S.E.2d at 907.  It is in fact one objective of jury voir dire to
determine whether those who oppose the death penalty would nonetheless be
suitable as jurors by being capable of and willing to “conscientiously
apply the law to the facts adduced at trial.”  Wainwright, 469 U.S. at 421,
83 L. Ed. 2d at 850.  “[T]he quest is for jurors who will conscientiously
apply the law and find the facts.  That is what an ‘impartial’ jury
consists of . . . .”  Id. at 423, 83 L. Ed. 2d at 851, quoted in Brogden,
334 N.C. at 42, 430 S.E.2d at 907.
Determining whether a prospective juror is intractably biased or
whether such bias is surmountable through “discretionary judgment” may not
always be “unmistakably clear” from the printed record.  Wainwright, 469
U.S. at 424-26, 83 L. Ed. 2d at 852.  “[T]here will be situations where the
trial judge is left with the definite impression that a prospective juror
would be unable to faithfully and impartially apply the law.”  Id. at 426,
83 L. Ed. 2d at 853, quoted in Brogden, 334 N.C. at 43, 430 S.E.2d at 908. 
“[T]his is why deference must be paid to the trial judge who sees and hears
the juror.”  Wainwright, 469 U.S. at 426, 83 L. Ed. 2d at 853.  “In such
cases, reviewing courts must defer to the trial court’s judgment concerning
the prospective juror’s ability to follow the law impartially.”  State v.
Davis, 325 N.C. 607, 624, 386 S.E.2d 418, 426 (1989), cert. denied, 496
U.S. 905, 110 L. Ed. 2d 268 (1990), quoted in Brogden, 334 N.C. at 43, 430
S.E.2d at 908; see also State v. Moses, 350 N.C. 741, 752-53, 517 S.E.2d
853, 861 (1999), cert. denied, ___ U.S. ___, 145 L. Ed. 2d 826 (2000);
State v. Hill, 347 N.C. 275, 288, 493 S.E.2d 264, 271 (1997), cert. denied,
523 U.S. 1142, 140 L. Ed. 2d 1099 (1998).
In this case, all eleven prospective jurors answered the prosecutor’s
two questions in the affirmative.  When prospective jurors’ bias against
capital punishment is unwavering and unequivocally clear to the sentencing
court, then the court may properly conclude that they fit the profile of
the first type of venireperson, whose “opposition to capital punishment
will not allow them to apply the law or view the facts impartially.” 
Wainwright, 469 U.S. at 421, 83 L. Ed. 2d at 850.  Thus, for such
prospective jurors, it does not matter if the question whether he or she
would oppose the death penalty “under any facts or circumstances” is
answered “yes,” or if the question whether, despite that bias, he or she
would be able to follow the court’s instructions and the oath, is answered,
“no.”  When the response to either question is unequivocal, the juror must
be excused for cause.
Nevertheless, for prospective jurors whose answers on voir dire
indicate a willingness to put aside such bias and “follow the statutory
sentencing scheme and truthfully answer the questions put by the trial
judge,” id. at 422, 83 L. Ed. 2d at 850, “the “proper standard” is one that
focuses on the juror’s ability to be responsible, reflective, and fair-
minded -- to follow the law and the juror’s oath.  It is the better
practice, once bias against the death penalty has been identified, to test
that bias not merely against unspecified “facts and circumstances,” but
against the gauge of the juror’s willingness to follow the court’s
instructions on the law and to obey his or her oath.  We reiterate,
however, the observation of the Court in Wainwright that, for this second
class of veniremen, “determinations of juror bias cannot be reduced to
question-and-answer sessions which obtain results in the manner of a
catechism.”  Id. at 424, 83 L. Ed. 2d at 852.
What common sense should have realized experience has proved: 
many veniremen simply cannot be asked enough questions to reach
the point where their bias has been made “unmistakably clear”;
these veniremen may not know how they will react when faced with
imposing the death sentence, or may be unable to articulate, or
may wish to hide their true feelings.
Id. at 424-25, 83 L. Ed. 2d at 852.  In such situations the sentencing
court’s firsthand impression is owed deference.  Id. at 426, 83 L. Ed. 2d
at 852-53.
When a prospective juror has in fact unequivocally indicated an
unyielding bias against capital punishment, the goal of assembling an
impartial jury is not jeopardized by voir dire that does not plumb further
whether, despite those scruples, the prospective juror could follow the
law.  But such limited inquiry is appropriate only when the prospective
juror’s bias is “unmistakably clear,” as was the case with these eleven
members of the venire.  When, however, bias is less patent and the
operative question is not whether the prospective juror is biased but
whether that bias is surmountable with discernment and an obedience to the
law, the court’s decision, in the exercise of its sound discretion and
judgment, that such prospective jurors are excusable for cause is due the
reviewing court’s deference.
[5] Defendant also assigns error to the court’s refusal to permit
rehabilitation of one of these eleven jurors.  We held in State v.
Cummings, 326 N.C. 298, 307, 389 S.E.2d 66, 71 (1990), that, in order to
prevent possible harassment of the prospective juror based on his or her
personal views, a defendant may not “rehabilitate a juror who has expressed
unequivocal opposition to the death penalty in response to questions
propounded by the prosecutor and the [sentencing] court.”  This rule
remains as sound as its reasoning; we overrule this assignment of error.
[6] Defendant next contends the court erred in allowing excusal for
cause of a prospective juror because the court refused to inform him how
executions are carried out in North Carolina, an issue upon which his
opposition to the death penalty appeared to hinge.  After considerable
colloquy, the prospective juror concluded, “Without knowing, in good
conscience[,] I could not vote for the death penalty without knowing how it
was going to be executed.”  Defendant contends that, without establishing
that the juror would feel the death penalty to be inhumane if he actually
knew the manner of its execution, the tenets of Wainwright and Adams are
violated.  E.g., Adams, 448 U.S. at 50, 65 L. Ed. 2d at 593 (“to exclude
all jurors who would be in the slightest way affected by the prospect of
the death penalty or by their views about such a penalty would be to
deprive the defendant of the impartial jury to which he or she is entitled
under the law”).
The deliberations and sentencing recommendation of a jury in a capital
sentencing proceeding must be based upon the absence or existence and
relative weight of aggravating and mitigating circumstances “after hearing
the evidence, argument of counsel, and instructions of the court.” 
N.C.G.S. § 15A-2000(b) (1999).  The manner of execution is in no way
relevant to these deliberations, nor is it in any way relevant to the
ability of a prospective juror to serve.  Generally speaking, the court is
duty-bound only “'to explain . . . each essential element of the offense
and to apply the law with respect to each element to the evidence bearing
thereon.'”  E.g., State v. Avery, 315 N.C. 1, 36, 337 S.E.2d 786, 803
(1985) (quoting State v. Mundy, 265 N.C. 528, 529, 144 S.E.2d 572, 573
(1965).  More specifically, it is the court’s positive responsibility to
eradicate irrelevant matters from the consideration of the jury.  “It is
the knowledge that irrelevant considerations of a prejudicial nature have
entered into the deliberations of the jury, rather than the source of such
considerations, that calls the judge to duty.”   State v. Conner, 241 N.C.
468, 472, 85 S.E.2d 584, 587 (1955).  Here the court did its duty and did
not err.
[7] Defendant next contends that the court erred in not allowing his
motion for a mistrial after a prospective juror was asked by the prosecutor
and responded to two questions in Spanish.  The court thereafter told the
prosecutor that she would have to ask in English and that responses in any
other language would have to be interpreted for the reporter.  After a few
more questions (in English), the prosecutor challenged the prospective
juror for cause.  Defendant says this exchange (in Spanish) was ex parte
communication between the State and a venireperson in violation of North
Carolina rules of court, statutes, and his rights under the North Carolina
and United States Constitutions.  Absent a translation of what was said, he
contends the State cannot show this error was harmless beyond a reasonable
doubt.
Untranslated dialogue in a language other than English could be as
inaccessible and one-sided as the resulting blank pages of the court
record.  But under the facts of this case, it is impossible to see how
defendant was prejudiced.  This prospective juror’s subsequent responses
reveal that his own inability to understand English made him unqualified to
serve as a juror under N.C.G.S. § 9-3 (those qualified to serve as jurors
must be able to “hear and understand the English language”):
[PROSECUTOR:]  Mr. Adams, I asked you before in English, and I’m
going to try one more time in English.  Do you understand enough
English to pay attention and understand all the witnesses that
may come before you in this trial?
MR. ADAMS:  Say one more time.
[PROSECUTOR:]  Do you understand enough English to pay attention
and understand all the witnesses that may come before you in this
trial?
MR. ADAMS:  I don’t know.
[PROSECUTOR:]  Do you not understand the question?
MR. ADAMS:  Understand what?
[PROSECUTOR:]  The question I just asked.  Do you understand the
question I just asked you?
MR. ADAMS:  A little bit; a little bit.  I understand a
little bit, but I don’t -- I don’t know.
[PROSECUTOR:]  No?
MR. ADAMS:  I don’t know how to speak too much and speak a
little bit.
. . . .
[PROSECUTOR:]  Is that true; you can’t understand a lot of
English?
MR. ADAMS:  I understand a little bit.
The court unquestionably acted well within its discretion in allowing the
prosecutor’s motion to challenge Mr. Adams for cause, and any arguable
error in not ordering the minimal dialogue in Spanish to be translated for
the record was, given the wholly proper excusal, without prejudicial
effect.  See N.C.G.S. §§ 15A-1442, -1443(a) (1999).
[8] Defendant also questions the excusal of Mr. Adams as being
impermissibly based on Mr. Adams’ national origin and argues that the
requirement of N.C.G.S. § 9-3 that jurors must be able to “hear and
understand the English language” violates Article I, Section 26 of the
North Carolina Constitution (none shall be excluded from jury service on
account of national origin); Article I, Section 19 of the North Carolina
Constitution (law of the land, equal protection); and similar protections
under the Fifth, Sixth, and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States
Constitution.
Defendant’s position here is untenable on its face.  To assume that
people native to countries where English is not the mother tongue cannot
understand English is as presumptuous and offensive as it is irrational to
propose that an inability to understand English is not an insuperable
impediment for a juror.  A similar argument was raised in Hernandez v. New
York, “that Spanish-language ability bears a close relation to ethnicity,
and that, as a consequence, it violates the Equal Protection Clause to
exercise a peremptory challenge on the ground that a Latino potential juror
speaks Spanish.”  500 U.S. at 360, 114 L. Ed. 2d at 406.  The Court in
Hernandez found it unnecessary to address this argument because the
prosecutor stated a race-neutral explanation for the excusal of three
bilingual Latinos:  their responses and demeanor raised doubts as to their
ability to defer to the official translation of Spanish-language testimony. 
As in Hernandez, defendant here should have challenged this excusal through
the three-step Batson procedure to determine whether the prosecutor acted
with discriminatory intent.  Even though defendant failed to do so, it is
utterly plain from our reading of the transcript in this case that the
court’s determination that Mr. Adams was not suitable as a juror was not
based on where he came from, but on his limited ability to communicate in
English.  The legislature’s purpose in prescribing the mandatory
qualifications for citizens who might serve as jurors was to assure that
defendants be judged fairly and impartially.  See, e.g., State v. Bryant,
282 N.C. 92, 191 S.E.2d 745 (1972), cert. denied, 410 U.S. 958, 35 L. Ed.
2d 691, and 410 U.S. 987, 36 L. Ed. 2d 184 (1973).  Clearly, in order to do
this, a juror must, at the very least, have sufficient proficiency in the
English language as to enable him or her to fully comprehend the testimony
and the court’s instructions and to fully and effectively participate in
the jury's deliberations.  It is apparent from the record of voir dire that
Mr. Adams did not demonstrate this critical level of skill.
[9] Defendant next asserts that a new, computer-generated system of
summoning prospective jurors was so questionable that selection of jurors
should have been suspended until the system was examined for compliance
with the law.  N.C.G.S. § 15A-1214(a) requires the clerk to “call jurors
from the panel by a system of random selection which precludes advance
knowledge of the identity of the next juror to be called.”  Shortly before
jury selection began, the prosecutor commendably informed the court that
the system had previously set up two lists -- one random, and one
alphabetical -- about which there was some question as to compliance with
the statute.  Because of its concerns with this possibility, the court
ordered the clerk to call jurors by the old method of shuffling cards
upside down, drawing one at a time and calling each prospective juror at
random, thus precluding the clerk’s advance knowledge of the identities of
those called.
As the old system of calling jurors was utilized here -- one which
obviously satisfied the random-selection requirement of N.C.G.S. §
15A-1214(a) -- we see neither error on the part of the court, although this
is what defendant alleges, nor prejudice to defendant.  We thus overrule
this assignment of error.
[10] Defendant pled guilty to all offenses charged, and he now asserts
on appeal that the court committed plain error in accepting those pleas
without examining defendant’s knowledge of the effect of those pleas on
sentencing and on appellate review.  Defendant says his responses to the
court’s inquiry indicated he did not have any idea of the possible
consequences of his pleas and that N.C.G.S. § 15A-1022(b), which requires
that the judge accept a guilty plea only after determining it to be the
product of informed choice, was thus violated.  Pertinent parts of their
colloquy include the following:
COURT:  The charges that you’re facing and indicating that
you’re pleading “guilty” to, have they been explained to you by
your lawyer?
DEFENDANT:  Yes, sir, they have.
COURT:  Have they -- do you understand the nature of the
charges?
DEFENDANT:  Yes, sir, I do.
COURT:  Do you understand the elements of the charges?
DEFENDANT:  Yes, sir.
COURT:  Have you and your lawyers discussed any possible
defenses that you might have had to any or all of these charges?
DEFENDANT:  Yes, sir, we have.
COURT:  Are you fully satisfied with your lawyers’ legal
services?
DEFENDANT:  Yes, sir, I am.
. . . . 
[The trial court here established defendant's understanding of
the possible maximum sentences for the other offenses to which he
had pled guilty -- first degree burglary, first-degree rape,
robbery with a deadly weapon, and first-degree arson.]
COURT:  And then first-degree murder is a Class A felony and
has a possible -- has a maximum punishment of either death by
execution or life imprisonment without parole.  Do you understand
that?
DEFENDANT:  Yes, sir.
COURT:  Now, do you personally plead guilty to all these
offenses?
DEFENDANT:  Yes, sir, your Honor, I do.
COURT:  Are you in fact guilty of them?
DEFENDANT:  Yes, sir, your Honor, I am.
. . . .
COURT:  Has anybody made any promises to you or threatened
you in any way to cause you to enter this plea against your
wishes?
DEFENDANT:  No, sir.
COURT:  Do you enter the pleas of your own free will, fully
understanding what you’re doing?
DEFENDANT:  Yes, sir.
COURT:  Do you have any questions of me about anything I’ve
just said to you or about anything else connected with your cases
up to this point in time?
DEFENDANT:  No, sir.
The court examined defendant strictly in accordance with statutory
requirements that a defendant be apprised not only of the constitutional
and statutory rights he waives as a consequence of pleading guilty, but
also, as the quoted portions of the dialogue shows, of “the nature of the
charge,” N.C.G.S. § 15A-1022(a)(2) (1999), and of such direct consequences
of the plea as “the maximum possible sentence on the charge for the class
of offense for which the defendant is being sentenced, including that
possible from consecutive sentences, and . . . the mandatory minimum
sentence, if any, on the charge,” N.C.G.S. § 15A-1022(a)(6).  This latter
part of the statute addresses a defendant’s due process right that the plea
be “'entered by one fully aware of the direct consequences, including the
actual value of any commitments made to him by the court.'”  Brady v.
United States, 397 U.S. 742, 755, 25 L. Ed. 2d 747, 760 (1970) (quoting
Shelton v. United States, 246 F.2d 571, 572 n.2 (5th Cir. 1957) (en banc),
rev’d on other grounds, 356 U.S. 26, 2 L. Ed. 2d 579 (1958)).
Defendant contends, however, that the statutory formula for informing
a defendant pleading guilty of the maximum and minimum sentences for the
offenses of which that defendant is accused, falls short of constitutional
requirements for an informed plea to the murder charge.  Defendant was not
told in particular that, as he was pleading guilty to murder in the first
degree based on theories of premeditation and deliberation and of felony
murder, his pleas to the felonies other than the murder would establish
four aggravating circumstances and foreclose the argument of certain issues
on appeal.
“Direct consequences” are those that have a “definite, immediate and
largely automatic effect on the range of the defendant’s punishment.” 
Cuthrell v. Director, Patuxent Inst., 475 F.2d 1364, 1366 (4th Cir.), cert.
denied, 414 U.S. 1005, 38 L. Ed. 2d 241 (1973), quoted in Bryant v. Cherry,
687 F.2d 48, 50 (4th Cir.), cert. denied, 459 U.S. 1073, 74 L. Ed. 2d 637
(1982).  Nothing is automatic or predictable about how a sentencing jury
may weigh these aggravating circumstances or whether countervailing
mitigating circumstances will be offered or how they will be weighed. 
Unlike the sentencing provisions of the Structured Sentencing Act, N.C.G.S.
ch. 15A, art. 81B, (1999), the “direct [sentencing] consequences” of
defendant’s guilty plea to the murder, even on both theories, cannot be
definitely or immediately gauged by the judge, beyond predicting a minimum
sentence of life imprisonment without parole and a maximum sentence of
death, as the court here did.
Defendant relies upon State v. Barts, 321 N.C. 170, 176, 362 S.E.2d
235, 238 (1987), in which this Court concluded the defendant adequately
understood “the nature of the plea and the possible consequences” after the
judge explained to him the theories of (1) premeditation and deliberation
and (2) felony murder, upon which the charge of murder in the first degree
also rested in that case.  In Barts further explanation was called for by
the defendant’s initial response that he did not understand he was pleading
guilty based upon both theories.  In this case, by contrast, defendant
answered positively that he understood the nature of the charges against
him and their elements and that he had discussed this and possible defenses
he might have with his lawyers.  Unlike the defendant’s response in Barts,
defendant here gave no signal to the court of a need to further explain the
nature of the charges against him.  Defendant was informed of the
punishment for each offense to which he was pleading guilty, including the
punishment of death for the murder.  His responses indicated he was
pleading as he did voluntarily, knowingly, and intelligently.  Boykin v.
Alabama, 395 U.S. 238, 23 L. Ed. 2d 274 (1969).  The court had no duty to
expound on direct consequences further, absent an indication by the
defendant that he required such instruction.
Defendant also argues the court failed to ascertain whether defense
counsel had in fact instructed defendant as to the particular, direct
consequences of his pleas.  Again, beyond inquiring whether defendant was
satisfied with his attorneys and their explanation of the charges and
possible defenses and receiving a positive response; and beyond informing
defendant of the mandatory sentences for each charge, as required under the
Structured Sentencing provisions, the court was required by neither statute
nor Constitution to say more.
On this issue of defendant’s plea, defendant also argues that this
state should return to the practice before State v. Watkins, 283 N.C. 17,
194 S.E.2d 800, cert. denied, 414 U.S. 1000, 38 L. Ed. 2d 235 (1973), of
not accepting a plea of guilty for an offense that could result in capital
punishment.  At times prior to our decision in Watkins, “[t]he idea that a
person should be allowed to decree his own death has been unacceptable, not
only to the judiciary, but to the citizens at large.”  Id. at 30, 194
S.E.2d at 809-10.  Nevertheless, conflicting policy existed then, as now:
[A] judge cannot compel a defendant against his will to plead not
guilty and submit to a trial; for undoubtedly a prisoner of
competent understanding, duly enlightened, has the right to plead
guilty instead of denying the charge.  Yet, in proportion to the
gravity of the offense, the court should exercise caution in
receiving this plea, and should see that he is properly advised
as to the nature of his act and its consequences. This is a
matter which is left largely to the good judgment and discretion
of the court, which should be exercised so as to protect a
defendant from an improvident plea and to prevent injustice.
State v. Branner, 149 N.C. 559, 563, 63 S.E. 169, 171 (1908).  Thus, the
citizens of this state, through the legislature, have elected a shift in
both public policy and the law.  Provisions governing capital punishment
specifically permit “any person who has been indicted for an offense
punishable by death [to] enter a plea of guilty at any time after his
indictment,” and the judge is authorized therein to sentence that person to
life imprisonment or to death, depending upon the recommendation of a jury
convened for that express and limited purpose.  N.C.G.S. § 15A-2001 (1999). 
Unless such provisions are determined to violate the Constitution of this
state or of the United States, it is not within this Court’s constitutional
powers to disregard them and to legislate others.  “The courts have
absolutely no authority to control or supervise the power vested by the
Constitution in the General Assembly as a coordinate branch of the
government.”  Person v. Board of State Tax Comm’rs, 184 N.C. 499, 503, 115
S.E. 336, 339 (1922), quoted in In re Alamance County Court Facils., 329
N.C. 84, 95, 405 S.E.2d 125, 130 (1991).
[11] Defendant next argues the court erred in denying his pretrial
motion in limine to prohibit the introduction of victim impact statements
rather than deferring its ruling on the motion until the issue arose or
giving the State a limiting instruction.  As a consequence, he says, the
jury heard inflammatory and prejudicial material.
The fact that the court decided pretrial to permit such statements
rather than defer that decision until the State introduced them was well
within the court’s discretion, and because that decision was interlocutory,
it is not appealable.  “A ruling on a motion in limine is a preliminary or
interlocutory decision which the trial court can change if circumstances
develop which make it necessary.”  State v. Lamb, 321 N.C. 633, 649, 365
S.E.2d 600, 608 (1988).  “[T]hus an objection to an order granting or
denying the motion ‘is insufficient to preserve for appeal the question of
the admissibility of the evidence.’”  T&T Dev. Co. v. Southern Nat'l Bank
of S.C., 125 N.C. App. 600, 602, 481 S.E.2d 347, 348-49 (quoting State v.
Conaway, 339 N.C. 487, 521, 453 S.E.2d. 824, 845, cert. denied, 516 U.S.
884, 133 L. Ed. 2d 153 (1995)), disc. rev. denied, 346 N.C. 185, 486 S.E.2d
219 (1997), quoted in State v. Hayes, 350 N.C. 79, 80, 511 S.E.2d 302, 303
(1999) (per curiam).  Nevertheless, because defendant renewed his objection
to the victim impact evidence when it was introduced in his sentencing
hearing, we proceed to address that specific objection here.
The introduction of victim-impact statements in criminal sentencing
hearings in North Carolina is authorized by statute.  “A victim has the
right to offer admissible evidence of the impact of the crime, which shall
be considered by the court or jury in sentencing the defendant.  The
evidence may include . . . [a] description of the nature and extent of any
physical, psychological, or emotional injury suffered by the victim as a
result of the offense committed by the defendant.”  N.C.G.S. § 15A-833
(1999).  So long as victim-impact statements are not so prejudicial as to
“render[ ] the hearing fundamentally unfair,” no constitutional impediment
exists to their use in capital sentencing hearings.  Payne v. Tennessee,
501 U.S. 808, 825, 115 L. Ed. 2d 720, 735 (1991).
The only victim-impact statement introduced at defendant’s sentencing
hearing was the testimony of the victim’s brother.  The brother, who found
his sister’s body, stated:  “The impact has been, No. 1, that I’ve lost a
confidant[e].  No. 2, that I feel like she was taken from me at a stage in
our lives where we needed each other and we were still learning about life,
as if a predator had come and taken one of two sibling birds out of the
nest.”  Defendant argues this remark was unduly prejudicial and that the
trial court erred in denying his motion to strike.
We disagree.  The victim’s brother’s restrained testimony did no more
than describe the emotional or psychological effect of his sister’s death
on him, well within the parameters of the statute.  His statement also
followed the guidance by the United States Supreme Court that it address
the “specific harm caused by the defendant,” Id. at 825, 115 L. Ed. 2d at
735, and “‘remind[] the sentencer  that . . . the victim is an individual
whose death represents a unique loss to society and in particular to his
family,’” id. (quoting Booth v. Maryland, 482 U.S. 496, 517, 96 L. Ed. 2d
440, 457 (1987) (White, J., dissenting), overruled by Payne).  Nor was this
statement so affecting as to sway the sentencing jury to improper
considerations in determining defendant’s sentence, i.e., to considerations
not relevant to the circumstances of the crime or the character of the
defendant.  See, e.g., State v. Brown, 315 N.C. 40, 337 S.E.2d 808 (1985),
cert. denied, 476 U.S. 1164, 90 L. Ed. 2d 733 (1986), overruled on other
grounds by State v. Vandiver, 321 N.C. 570, 364 S.E.2d 373 (1988).  In
addition, such “[o]ral testimony . . . relating to punishment” was properly
heard in defendant’s presence.  State v. Pope, 257 N.C. 326, 334, 126
S.E.2d 126, 133 (1962).  He was “given full opportunity to rebut defamatory
and condemnatory matters urged against him, and to give his version of the
offense charged, and to introduce any relevant facts in mitigation.”  Id. 
We hold that the court’s decision to allow this statement was well within
the wide latitude allowed trial judges in North Carolina in conducting
sentencing hearings.  See, e.g., State v. Smith, 300 N.C. 71, 81, 265
S.E.2d 164, 171 (1980).
[12] Defendant also argues publication to the jury of photographs
taken of the premises after the Grace Apartments fire and of some of its
victims before and after the fire were more prejudicial than probative, and
that some, akin to a statement of victim impact, were so prejudicial as to
render the sentencing hearing fundamentally unfair.  See Payne, 501 U.S.
808, 115 L. Ed. 2d 720.
These photographs were introduced to illustrate the testimony of a
member of the Asheville Fire Department and Arson Task Force who had been
involved in the investigation of the Grace Apartments fire and whose
testimony was offered in support of the aggravating circumstance that
defendant had been previously convicted of a felony involving the use of
violence to a person, N.C.G.S. § 15A-2000(e)(3).
We recently addressed this issue regarding postmortem photographs of
the victim of an earlier murder in State v. Warren, 347 N.C. 309, 492
S.E.2d 609.  We noted that the State may present evidence of the
circumstances surrounding a defendant’s prior felony, notwithstanding the
defendant’s stipulation to the record of conviction, to support the
existence of aggravating circumstances.  Id. at 316, 492 S.E.2d at 612; see
also Brown, 315 N.C. at 61, 337 S.E.2d at 824 (the prosecution “must be
permitted to present any competent, relevant evidence relating to the
defendant’s character or record which will substantially support the
imposition of the death penalty so as to avoid an arbitrary or erratic
imposition of the death penalty”) (emphasis added).  Further, “[i]f the
felony of which defendant has previously been convicted was a particularly
shocking or heinous crime, the jury should be so informed.”  Warren, 347
N.C. at 316, 492 S.E.2d at 612 (citing State v. Heatwole, 344 N.C. 1, 19,
473 S.E.2d 310, 319 (1996)).  The court may admit any evidence it deems
relevant to sentencing, including photographs of the victim to illustrate
the testimony of a witness regarding the manner of a killing.  See id.;
State v. Kandies, 342 N.C. 419, 444, 467 S.E.2d 67, 80, cert. denied, 519
U.S. 894, 136 L. Ed. 2d 167 (1996).  “Photographs [depicting] the
circumstances of the murder, the condition of the body, or the location of
the body when found are relevant and admissible at sentencing, even when
the victim’s identity and the cause of death are not in dispute at trial. 
This is true even if the photographs are gory or gruesome.”  State v.
Williams, 350 N.C. 1, 34, 510 S.E.2d 626, 648, cert. denied, ___ U.S. ___,
145 L. Ed. 2d 162 (1999); accord State v. Conaway, 339 N.C. 487, 525, 453
S.E.2d 824, 848, cert. denied, 516 U.S. 884, 133 L. Ed. 2d 153 (1995).
We conclude that the photographs published to the sentencing jury here
were not so numerous or egregious as to render the hearing fundamentally
unfair.  Cf. State v. Hennis, 323 N.C. 279, 287, 372 S.E.2d 523, 528 (1988)
(in guilt phase of trial, repetitive showing of macabre slides projected on
a screen above defendant’s head more prejudicial than probative). 
Introduced for illustrative purposes, the photographs were the visible
consequences of defendant’s prior criminal act, relevant to the aggravating
circumstance of defendant’s prior violent felony.  To whatever extent they
were heinous or shocking, the jury, whose duty it was to consider the
character of the defendant and the circumstances of the crime, was entitled
to be informed.
[13] During the testimony of defendant’s psychological expert, the
court sustained the prosecutor’s hearsay objections to two questions
regarding any expression of defendant’s remorse.  Defendant now asserts
that by doing so the court violated his rights under the Eighth and
Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution to place all
mitigating evidence before the jury.  See Lockett v. Ohio, 438 U.S. 586, 57
L. Ed. 2d 973 (1978).
“[R]elevant mitigating evidence cannot be excluded at a sentencing
hearing based on evidentiary rules.”  State v. Adams, 347 N.C. 48, 63, 490
S.E.2d 220, 227 (1997), cert. denied, 522 U.S. 1096, 139 L. Ed. 2d 878
(1998).  As in Adams, however, defendant here failed to except to the
court’s ruling and to make an offer of proof.  “An exception to the
exclusion of evidence cannot be sustained when the record fails to show
what the witness would have testified had he been permitted to answer.” 
State v. Fletcher, 279 N.C. 85, 99, 181 S.E.2d 405, 414 (1971), quoted in
Adams, 347 N.C. at 63, 490 S.E.2d at 227.  Moreover, any arguable
constitutional violation was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt, for other
evidence of defendant’s remorse was before the jury.  This was in the form
of the psychologist’s actual written report, which defense counsel moved to
introduce and the court allowed into evidence immediately after the
psychologist testified.  In that report the psychologist had noted:
During discussions when Jamie’s mental status was more stable, he
admitted significant conflict over his situation despite his
grandiose beliefs.  He indicated he could not understand his
behavior, why or how he did the things that caused his
imprisonment.  He stated, “I failed my family and the community.”
The jury heard this other evidence of defendant’s remorse, but the
defendant failed to request and the jury thus did not find this
circumstance under the catchall mitigating circumstance, N.C.G.S. § 15A-
2000(f)(9) (1999).  Under such circumstances, similar to those in State v.
Daughtry, 340 N.C. 488, 459 S.E.2d 747 (1995), cert. denied, 516 U.S. 1079, 
133 L. Ed. 2d 739 (1996), we consider any error in excluding the
psychologist’s direct testimony to have been harmless beyond a reasonable
doubt.
[14] In her cross-examination of defendant’s psychological expert, the
prosecutor asked a number of questions about a robbery that occurred in the
restaurant where defendant was working the year before the murder in this
case and to which defendant subsequently pled guilty as an accessory before
the fact.  Defendant claimed and hospital records show he suffered a mild
concussion in a fall during the robbery.  The psychologist opined that
defendant’s mental faculties were impaired by a psychotic disorder and by
cognitive deficits resulting from a concussion occurring about the same
time as the fall during the robbery.  The prosecutor’s examination, which
included asking the psychologist whether she was aware defendant had filed
a worker’s compensation claim for this injury and that he had sued a prison
nurse for failing to give him medication for AIDS, which disease he did not
have, was apparently directed at discrediting the psychologist’s diagnosis
by showing that those of defendant’s statements upon which it had been
based in part were untruthful and unreliable.
Defendant contends on appeal that this examination was so incompetent
and grossly prejudicial as to have rendered the sentencing proceeding
fundamentally unfair in violation of his due process rights.  See Payne,
501 U.S. 808, 115 L. Ed. 2d 720.  We find this contention baseless in fact. 
Nevertheless, for the guidance of other criminal appeals to this Court, we
point out the following additional reasons we overrule defendant’s
underlying assignments of error:  We reiterate that the court has
considerable leeway and discretion in governing the conduct of a sentencing
proceeding, to which the North Carolina Rules of Evidence do not apply. 
See, e.g., Daughtry, 340 N.C. at 517, 459 S.E.2d at 762 (any evidence the
court “'deems relevant to sentence'” may be introduced) (quoting N.C.G.S. §
8C-1, Rule 1101(b)(3) (1992)).  More fundamentally, however, defendant
waived his right to appellate review of this issue because he failed to
raise it as constitutional error before the court and to allege the same in
his assignments of error.  To preserve a question for appellate review, a
party
must have presented to the trial court a timely request,
objection or motion, stating the specific grounds for the ruling
the party desired the court to make if the specific grounds were
not apparent from the context.  It is also necessary for the
complaining party to obtain a ruling upon the party’s request,
objection or motion.
N.C. R. App. P. 10(b)(1).  The North Carolina Rules of Appellate Procedure
also provide:  “Except as otherwise provided herein, the scope of review on
appeal is confined to a consideration of those assignments of error set out
in the record on appeal in accordance with this Rule 10.”  N.C. R. App. P.
10(a); see also, e.g., State v. Elliott, 344 N.C. 242, 277, 475 S.E.2d 202,
218 (1996) (defendant failed to preserve issue for appellate review where
he failed to object to the court’s action, made no motion and thus received
no ruling from the court with respect to the constitutionality of the
contested issue, and did not assign error to that issue), cert. denied, 520
U.S. 1106, 137 L. Ed. 2d 312 (1997).
Defendant neither asserted constitutional error to the court at the
sentencing proceeding nor raised constitutional error as an assignment of
error addressing this issue before this Court.  Such putative error is thus
waived as well as being substantively without merit.
[15] Defendant next quotes copiously from the record, detailing
numerous instances of the prosecutor’s allegedly rude and curt treatment of
a prospective juror, defense counsel, and, most particularly, of
defendant’s psychological expert.
Defendant failed to object to most of the prosecutor’s allegedly
improper remarks; but even absent objection, it is incumbent upon the trial
court to take corrective action when necessary to prevent unfair prejudice. 
See State v. Sanderson, 336 N.C. 1, 12, 442 S.E.2d 33, 40 (1994).  This
Court has rarely found prosecutorial misconduct in a sentencing hearing to
be so egregious as to require a new hearing.  In Sanderson, however, the
prosecutor “insulted, maligned, continually interrupted and bullied” a
defense witness and distorted her testimony “on several occasions without
provoking curative instructions.”  336 N.C. at 15, 442 S.E.2d at 41. 
Because “[t]he net result may . . . have been a less than complete, or less
than accurate, statement of her opinion[,]” we could not in that case
“conclude that the prosecutor’s improper conduct toward this witness caused
no prejudice to defendant.”  Id.
Our scrutiny of dialogue flagged by defendant where the prosecutor
tested the line between zealous advocacy and incivility leads us to caution
the bar that it remain vigilant, even sensitive, to that line.  A
prosecutor’s first responsibility is not to win at any cost, but as the
government’s defender of the truth, to be a just advocate.
“The [prosecuting attorney] is the representative not of an
ordinary party to a controversy, but of a sovereignty whose
obligation to govern impartially is as compelling as its
obligation to govern at all; and whose interest, therefore, in a
criminal prosecution is not that it shall win a case, but that
justice shall be done.  As such, he is in a peculiar and very
definite sense the servant of the law, the twofold aim of which
is that guilt shall not escape or innocence suffer.  He may
prosecute with earnestness and vigor -- indeed, he should do so. 
But, while he may strike hard blows, he is not at liberty to
strike foul ones.  It is as much his duty to refrain from
improper methods calculated to produce a wrongful conviction as
it is to use every legitimate means to bring about a just one.”
Id. at 8, 442 S.E.2d at 38 (quoting Berger v. United States, 295 U.S. 78,
88, 79 L. Ed. 2d 1314, 1321 (1935)) (alteration in original).
Nevertheless, the prosecutor’s manner and the interjection of arguably
irrelevant matters into her cross-examination in this case were benign, if
at times overblown, compared to the gross excesses that characterized the
prosecutor’s misconduct in Sanderson.  Defendant argues that the
prosecutor’s behavior here had the prejudicial effect of the jury’s failing
to find the nonstatutory mitigating circumstances that defendant was under
the influence of a mental disturbance, that he was unable to conform his
conduct to the requirements of the law, that he had suffered a closed head
injury which likely had an impact on his psychological condition, and that
he had been diagnosed with psychosis and had a family history of paranoid
schizophrenia.  But the record contains ample other countervailing evidence
that would support the jury’s judgment as to these circumstances, other
than that elicited by the prosecutor, including many instances of the
defendant’s inconsistent statements.  Because we conclude the prosecutor's
manner and remarks were not so egregious as to “provok[e] curative
instructions” from the trial court, Sanderson, 336 N.C. at 15, 442 S.E.2d
at 41, defendant's argument as to their deleterious effect on the jury is
meritless.
We find other examples raised in this appeal of the prosecutor’s
exhibited comments toward a juror, defense counsel, and even the judge, to
which defendant failed to object, to be so testy as to approach disrespect,
but likewise harmless.  Further, as for those instances when the court
sustained defendant’s objection, “it is not error for the trial court to
fail to give a curative jury instruction after sustaining an objection,
when defendant does not request such an instruction.”  Williams, 350 N.C.
at 24, 510 S.E.2d at 642.
[16] Defendant also claims similar uncivil excesses mar the
prosecutor’s closing argument.  In the sentencing hearing for a capital
trial, counsel is permitted wide latitude in arguments to the jury.  See,
e.g., State v. Johnson, 298 N.C. 355, 368, 259 S.E.2d  752, 761 (1979). 
Counsel may argue the facts in evidence and all reasonable inferences
therefrom as well as the relevant law.  See Sanderson, 336 N.C. at 15, 442
S.E.2d at 42.  But they “may not become abusive, inject . . . personal
experiences, [or] express . . . personal belief as to the truth or falsity
of the evidence.”  N.C.G.S. § 15A-1230(a) (1999).  “The trial court has a
duty, upon objection, to censor remarks not warranted by either the
evidence or the law, or remarks calculated to mislead or prejudice the
jury.  If the impropriety is gross it is proper for the court even in the
absence of objection to correct the abuse ex mero motu.”  State v. Monk,
286 N.C. 509, 516, 212 S.E.2d 125, 131 (1975).  Argument calling for such
intervention is that which “strays so far from the bounds of propriety as
to impede defendant’s right to a fair trial.”  State v. Atkins, 349 N.C.
62, 84, 505 S.E.2d 97, 111 (1998), cert. denied, 526 U.S. 1147, 143 L. Ed.
2d 1036 (1999).
Our review of the prosecutor’s argument discloses a number of remarks
abusing these rules, remarks to which defendant again did not object.  But
these were neither so gross nor so excessive that we can say the court
erred in failing to intervene ex mero motu.  In her closing argument the
prosecutor again drew a bead on defendant’s psychologist, analogizing the
field of psychology generally and psychologists that testify as experts in
particular to animals and their habits.
The psychologized language of moral evasion is like gold in a
mountain waiting to be mined by these people flocking to what
they perceive to be the public trough of the criminal justice
system.  Claudia Coleman reminds you of a little boy in a barn. 
“With all this manure in here, there must be a pony someplace.” 
There’s no pony; just manure.
Later, the prosecutor disdainfully disparaged the psychologist’s personal
motives for testifying, as well as her expertise:
Why did she diagnose him like that?  She doesn’t want to be out
of work.  Dr. Sansbury didn’t do such a great job, and now a
woman.  The only person hallucinating in this room was that
psychologist.
Offensiveness of the imagery aside, maligning the expert’s profession
rather than arguing the law, the evidence, and its inferences is not the
proper function of closing argument.  See Monk, 286 N.C. 509, 212 S.E.2d
125 (counsel may argue the facts in evidence and all reasonable inferences
therefrom as well as the relevant law).  Nor are scatological references to
a witness’ testimony to be condoned, as “[c]ounsel are at all times to
conduct themselves with dignity and propriety”.  Gen. R. Pract. Super. and
Dist. Ct. 12, para. 2, 2000 Ann. R. (N.C.) 10.  Nevertheless, we have
stated many times that in hotly contested cases counsel must be allowed
wide latitude, see, e.g., id. at 515, 212 S.E.2d at 131, and we have noted
in similar cases that it is not improper to highlight reasons for an expert
witness’ bias, including his or her fee.  See, e.g., State v. Atkins, 349
N.C. at 82-83, 505 S.E.2d at 110.  Further, in this case the evidence is so
overwhelming that such scatological references were harmless.
During cross-examination, the psychologist indicated that she had
originally believed defendant had faked the head injury he had allegedly
sustained either at his own doing, at the hands of his accomplice in the
robbery, or by accident.  When she saw the hospital records that noted
nurses’ observations of unequal pupil reactivity and an actual contusion,
the psychologist changed her opinion.  The prosecutor challenged her
repeatedly about this on cross-examination and in closing characterized the
psychologist’s testimony as dissembling:
She said, “Yes, I knew he had done that part, too.”  Why did she
do that?  How honest is that?  There’s a saying:  False in one,
false in all.  You can’t believe anything she said in her report
because she didn’t mention to this jury about knowing that he
didn’t have a head injury and he pled “guilty” to accessory
before the fact to robbing Backyard Burgers, and she didn’t put
that in her report, either.
When vigor in unearthing bias becomes personal insult, all bounds of
civility, if not of propriety, have been exceeded.  See State v. Miller,
271 N.C. 646, 659, 157 S.E.2d 335, 346 (1967) (counsel “should refrain from
abusive, vituperative, and opprobrious language, or from indulging in
invectives” directed at opposing counsel).  But in evaluating comments
alleged to be such, “‘remarks are to be viewed in the context in which they
are made and the overall factual circumstances to which they referred.’”
State v. Bowman, 349 N.C. 459, 473, 509 S.E.2d 428, 437 (1998) (quoting
State v. Robinson, 346 N.C. 586, 606, 488 S.E.2d 174, 187 (1997)), cert.
denied, ___ U.S. ___, 144 L. Ed. 2d 802 (1999).  The record contained
evidence supporting both the prosecutor’s and the psychologist’s
understanding of the actuality of defendant’s head injury, and the many
past instances of defendant’s prevarication confounded that evidence
further.  In this context, and in view of the occasional nature of the
prosecutor’s excesses, we find their effect to have been innocuous.  That
the jury failed to find mitigating circumstances that might arguably
otherwise have been supported by the psychologist’s testimony, if found
credible, was likely not because the balance was tipped unfairly by the
prosecutor’s rhetoric, but because of the unconvincing nature of the
evidence supporting those circumstances.  We hold that these remarks, while
unnecessary personal invective, were not so egregious as to compel the
court to intervene and did not jeopardize the fairness of defendant’s
sentencing hearing.
[17] Defendant argues that the court violated his constitutional
rights in refusing to include this instruction in its charge to the jury: 
“Certain evidence has been introduced in this case regarding the character
of Kell[i] Fro[e]mke.  You are not to impose or refrain from imposing the
death penalty on the basis of any good or bad character of Kell[i]
Fro[e]mke that you may find.”  The proffered instruction was culled from
the following language in State v. Reeves regarding victim-impact
statements:
While evidence of a victim’s character may not by the strictest
interpretation be relevant to any given issue, the State should
be given some latitude in fleshing out the humanity of the victim
so long as it does not go too far.  The State should not be
permitted to ask for the death sentence because the victim is a
“good person,” any more than a defendant should be entitled to
seek life imprisonment because the victim was someone of “bad
character.”
337 N.C. 700, 723, 448 S.E.2d 802, 812 (1994), cert. denied, 514 U.S. 1114,
131 L. Ed. 2d 860 (1995).  “‘[W]hen a request is made for a specific
instruction that is supported by the evidence and is a correct statement of
the law, the court, although not required to give the requested instruction
verbatim, must charge the jury in substantial conformity therewith.’” 
State v. Wilkinson, 344 N.C. 198, 231, 474 S.E.2d 375, 393 (1996) (quoting
State v. Holder, 331 N.C. 462, 474, 418 S.E.2d 197, 203 (1992)).
The record reveals that at the time it was requested, the instruction,
while amply supported by evidence of the victim’s good character, was
offered in order to foreclose excessive use of the victim’s brother’s
victim-impact statement in the prosecutor’s closing argument.  The court
specifically stated that if any such excessive argument did occur, it might
reconsider defendant’s request.  Defendant excepted to this decision. 
During the prosecutor’s closing argument, defense counsel neither objected
again on this basis nor repeated its request that the court give the
instruction.  No evidence of the victim’s bad character appears in the
record, and from the standpoint of its absence, the court did not err in
refusing to give the instruction. 
[18] Defendant next assigns error to the trial court’s refusal to
submit the following proposed mitigating circumstance:  “Jamie Smith’s
co-defendant in the Grace Apartment case did not receive a sentence of
death.”  Defendant notes in another assignment of error that this
information was elicited by defense counsel in examining a witness.  The
trial court had overruled the State's objection, and defendant argues the
court erred in not permitting certified copies of the co-defendant's
judgment and commitments to be admitted into evidence.  Defendant
acknowledges the rule that the fact an accomplice received a lesser
sentence in the case for which defendant is on trial is not an extenuating
circumstance.
It does not reduce the moral culpability of the killing nor make
it less deserving of the penalty of death than other first-degree
murders.  The accomplices’ punishment is not an aspect of the
defendant’s character or record nor a mitigating circumstance of
the particular offense.  It bears no relevance to these factors
. . . .
State v. Williams, 305 N.C. 656, 687, 292 S.E.2d 243, 261-62 (citations
omitted), cert. denied, 459 U.S. 1056, 74 L. Ed. 2d 622 (1982); see also
State v. Ward, 338 N.C. 64, 114, 449 S.E.2d 709, 737 (1994), cert. denied,
514 U.S. 1134, 131 L. Ed. 2d 1013 (1995).  Defendant argues this situation
is different because the evidence was already before the jury and
codefendant was not a participant in the crime for which defendant was not
being sentenced.  These points are indeed differences, but differences that
make the relevance of such information even more remote, as we have said
earlier.  That the court, in its discretion, allowed this evidence to come
before the jury was arguably to defendant's benefit; that the court
disallowed introduction of documents supporting that evidence was both
within its discretion and well within the rationale of the rule stated in
Williams.  Barring the jury's consideration of the admitted evidence as
mitigating was also wholly proper.  Defendant’s assignment of error on this
point is therefore overruled.
[19] Defendant also advances arguments regarding the nine aggravating
circumstances requested by the State, to which he repeatedly objected on
grounds that they improperly relied on the same evidence.  See State v.
Goodman, 298 N.C. 1, 29, 257 S.E.2d 569, 587 (1979).  Defendant did not ask
the court to instruct the jury that the same evidence cannot be used as a
basis for finding more than one aggravating circumstance.  See
N.C.P.I.--Crim. 150.10 (optional instruction).  In State v. Hutchins, we
elucidated this rule, holding it is permissible to use the same evidence to
support aggravating circumstances when “the inquiry prompted by their
submission is directed at distinct aspects of the defendant’s character or
the crime for which he is to be punished.”  303 N.C. 321, 354, 279 S.E.2d
788, 808 (1981).  Further, “[a]ggravating circumstances are not considered
redundant absent a complete overlap in the evidence supporting them.” 
State v. Moseley, 338 N.C. 1, 54, 449 S.E.2d 412, 444 (1994), cert. denied,
514 U.S. 1091, 131 L. Ed. 2d 738 (1995).
The aggravating circumstances submitted with which defendant takes
issue concerned the Grace Apartments and Mountain Trace arsons.  These were
stated to the jury as the following, separate circumstances:
(1)  Had the Defendant been previously convicted of another
capital felony, to-wit:  the First Degree Murder of David
Lawrence Phillip Cotton?
. . . .
(2)  Had the Defendant been previously convicted of a felony
involving the use or threat of violence to the person, to-wit the
Attempted First Degree Murder of Erin Conklin?
. . . .
(3)  Had the Defendant been previously convicted of a felony
involving the use or threat of violence to the person, to-wit the
Attempted First Degree Murder of  Allison Kafer?
. . . .
(9)  Was this murder part of a course of conduct in which
the Defendant engaged, and did that course of conduct include the
commission by the Defendant of other crimes of violence against
other persons, to-wit:  First Degree Arson at Mountain Trace
Apartments and First Degree Arson at Grace Apartments?
It is readily apparent that although some evidence necessarily overlaps by
virtue of how and where the crimes occurred, the first three aggravating
circumstances, which name separate, unique victims, depend on distinct
evidence.  As for the ninth circumstance submitted, course of conduct is a
separate circumstance from the individual crimes that comprise the series
because of what it indicates about the character of the perpetrator -- not
only was he oblivious to the value of every human life affected by each act
of arson, but he engaged in a pattern of robbery and arson that showed a
particular callousness of character:  Knowing the consequences, he did it
again.
We addressed a similar argument in State v. Smith, 347 N.C. 453, 496
S.E.2d 357, cert. denied, 525 U.S. 845, 142 L. Ed. 2d 91 (1998)--
defendant’s appeal from his convictions for the Grace Apartments arson and
murder.  In that case we noted that although the (e)(5) aggravating
circumstance, which addressed the defendant’s having committed the murder
while engaged in another felony (arson) relied on the same evidence as
(e)(10) -- that defendant knowingly created a great risk of death to more
than one person by means of a weapon that would normally be hazardous to
the lives of more than one person -- the latter circumstance
speaks to a distinct aspect of defendant’s character [--] that he
not only intended to kill a particular person when he set fire to
the apartment building, but that he disregarded the value of
every human life in the building by using an accelerant to set
the fire in the middle of the night.
Id. at 468, 496 S.E.2d at 366.
When the court perceives a possible overlap of evidence supporting
more than one aggravating circumstance and when the court is requested to
instruct the jury that the same evidence cannot be used as a basis for
finding more than one aggravating circumstance, it should do so.  But
because the evidence for each circumstance here was distinct as to the
crimes or as to an aspect of defendant’s character, the court did not err
either in submitting the above circumstances or in choosing not to instruct
the jury that it could not rely on the same evidence to find more than one
circumstance.
[20] Defendant next argues that his treatment in this case violated
provisions of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights,
which this country ratified on 8 September 1992.  Specifically, defendant
says the long delay between sentencing and execution and the conditions in
which death row inmates are kept constitute “cruel or degrading treatment
or punishment” in violation of article VII of the covenant, and, because of
errors briefed on appeal, the death penalty imposed constitutes the
arbitrary deprivation of life in violation of article VI, section 1.
We do not dispute that “state law must yield when it is inconsistent
with or impairs the policy of [such treaties].”  United States v. Pink, 315
U.S. 203, 231, 86 L. Ed. 2d 796, 818 (1942).  But we cannot see how any
defendant’s right to appeal errors alleged in his capital case, which
necessarily delays his execution, or our own mandate to ascertain on appeal
that the death penalty rests firmly on the law and is in no way arbitrary
or in any other way “cruel or degrading” violates this treaty’s provisions. 
We overrule this assignment of error.
PRESERVATION ISSUES
Defendant also raises six additional issues that he concedes this
Court has previously considered and decided contrary to his position: 
(1) the unconstitutionality of the death penalty as arbitrary and in
conflict with the constitutional requirement of individualized sentencing,
held constitutional in, e.g., State v. McKoy, 327 N.C. 31, 394 S.E.2d 426
(1990); (2) the aggravating circumstance that the murder was especially
heinous, atrocious, or cruel, N.C.G.S. § 15A-2000(e)(9), as
unconstitutionally broad, held constitutional in, e.g., State v. Stroud,
345 N.C. 106, 478 S.E.2d 476 (1996), cert. denied, 522 U.S. 826, 139 L. Ed.
2d 43 (1997); (3) the court’s refusal to allow defendant’s motions for
individual voir dire of prospective jurors, held to be within the
discretion of the court in, e.g., State v. Wilson, 313 N.C. 516, 330 S.E.2d
450 (1985); (4) the court’s refusal to allow voir dire of prospective
jurors about the concept of life without parole, held to be in compliance
with N.C.G.S. § 15A-2002 in, e.g., State v. Skipper, 337 N.C. 1, 446 S.E.2d
252 (1994), cert. denied, 513 U.S. 1134, 130 L. Ed. 2d 895 (1995), and with
the Constitution in, e.g., State v. Neal, 346 N.C. 608, 487 S.E.2d 734
(1997), cert. denied, 522 U.S. 1125, 140 L. Ed. 2d 131 (1998); (5) the
trial court’s refusal to strike the word “recommend” from the jury
instructions, held neither improper nor misleading in, e.g., State v.
Brown, 315 N.C. 40, 337 S.E.2d 808; and, finally, (6) the trial court’s
refusal to grant defendant’s motion for a bill of particulars detailing the
aggravating circumstances that would be supported by the evidence, held in
State v. Roper, 328 N.C. 337, 402 S.E.2d 600, cert. denied, 502 U.S. 902,
116 L. Ed. 2d 232 (1991), not to be within those entitlements guaranteed a
criminal defendant by the United States Constitution.
Defendant urges this Court to reexamine these holdings.  We have
considered defendant’s arguments on these issues, and, finding no
compelling reason to depart from our prior holdings, we overrule these
assignments of error.
PROPORTIONALITY REVIEW
[21] Defendant asserts the death sentence imposed in this case “is
excessive or disproportionate to the penalty imposed in similar cases,
considering both the crime and the defendant.”  Quoting N.C.G.S. §
15A-2000(d)(2).  We disagree.
We note at the outset that this Court determined the death sentence
imposed for defendant’s conviction of murdering  Phillip Cotton at the
Grace Apartments was neither excessive nor disproportionate.  Smith, 347
N.C. 453, 496 S.E.2d 357.  In this case, the same defendant committed
murder under even more awful circumstances, first raping, then stabbing his
victim more than sixty times before setting fire to her apartment.  The
jury found nine aggravating circumstances.  It found that defendant had
been previously convicted of a felony involving the threat of violence to a
person, with regard to (i) the attempted murder of Erin Conklin and
(ii) the attempted murder of Allison Kafer, N.C.G.S. § 15A-2000(e)(3); that
the murder was committed while defendant was engaged in (i) first-degree
rape, (ii) first-degree burglary, (iii) armed robbery, and (iv) first-
degree arson, N.C.G.S. § 15A-2000(e)(5); and that the murder was part of a
course of conduct in which defendant committed crimes of violence against
other persons, N.C.G.S. § 15A-2000(e)(11).  In addition, and most
significantly, the jury found that the defendant had been previously
convicted of a capital felony, the murder of David Lawrence Phillip Cotton,
N.C.G.S. § 15A-2000(e)(2); and that the murder was especially heinous,
atrocious, or cruel, N.C.G.S. § 15A-2000(e)(9).  As the record discloses,
the evidence before the jury amply supported its finding these
circumstances.  One or more jurors found only one of the four statutory
mitigating circumstances submitted by the defendant to exist and have
mitigating value, that defendant had aided in the apprehension of another
capital felon, N.C.G.S. § 15A-2000(f)(8); one or more jurors found six of
sixteen submitted nonstatutory mitigating circumstances to exist and have
mitigating value; and the jurors declined to find any other mitigating
circumstances under the catchall, N.C.G.S. § 15A-2000(f)(9).
We have compared this case to others in the pool defined for
proportionality review in State v. Williams, 308 N.C. 47, 79-80, 301 S.E.2d
335, 355, cert. denied, 464 U.S. 865, 78 L. Ed. 2d 177 (1983), and State v.
Bacon, 337 N.C. 66, 106-07, 446 S.E.2d 542, 563-64 (1994), cert. denied,
513 U.S. 1159, 130 L. Ed. 2d 1083 (1995), and in particular to cases in the
pool that “are roughly similar with regard to the crime and the defendant,”
State v. Lawson, 310 N.C. 632, 648, 314 S.E.2d 493, 503 (1984), cert.
denied, 471 U.S. 1120, 86 L. Ed. 2d 267 (1985).  None, however, is more
similar or illuminating for purposes of proportionality review than State
v. Smith, 347 N.C. 453, 496 S.E.2d 357.  In that case we concluded, after
comparing it to similar cases in the pool, that it bore no affinity with
the seven cases this Court has found to be disproportionate, id. at 472,
496 S.E.2d at 368.  We concluded as well that it was “more similar to cases
in which we have found the sentence of death proportionate than to those in
which we have found the sentence of death disproportionate or those in
which juries have consistently returned recommendations of life
imprisonment.”  Id. at 473, 496 S.E.2d at 369.
Because the murder in this case, committed by the same defendant, is
by its facts and by the jury’s findings underlying its recommendation of
punishment, even more appalling than that for which defendant was convicted
and condemned in Smith, it necessarily bears even less similarity to the
cases we have found disproportionate and even more to those in which we
have found the sentence of death to be proportionate.  In Smith the jury
found all five aggravating circumstances submitted:
(1) that defendant had been previously convicted of a felony
involving the threat of violence to the person, N.C.G.S. §
15A-2000(e)(3); (2) that defendant committed this murder for the
purpose of avoiding lawful arrest, N.C.G.S. § 15A-2000(e)(4);
(3) that defendant committed this murder while engaged in
first-degree arson, N.C.G.S. § 15A-2000(e)(5); (4) that defendant
knowingly created a great risk of death to more than one person
by means of a weapon which would normally be hazardous to the
lives of more than one person, N.C.G.S. § 15A-2000(e)(10); and
(5) that the murder was part of a course of conduct in which
defendant committed crimes of violence against other persons,
N.C.G.S. § 15A-2000(e)(11).
347 N.C. at 472, 496 S.E.2d at 368.  In this case the jury found many of
the same aggravating circumstances, some more than once, and several in
addition, including that this murder was especially heinous, atrocious, or
cruel, and defendant’s prior conviction of a capital felony.
With all other cases in the proportionality pool in mind, including
State v. Smith, we hold that the jury recommending punishment for defendant
for the crimes committed here was not “aberrant,” see, e.g., State v.
Holden, 321 N.C. 125, 164-65, 362 S.E.2d 513, 537 (1987), cert. denied, 486
U.S. 1061, 100 L. Ed. 2d 935 (1988), nor was its recommendation
“capricious, or random,” see, e.g., State v. Barfield, 298 N.C. 306, 354,
259 S.E.2d 510, 544 (1979), cert. denied, 448 U.S. 907, 65 L. Ed. 2d 1137
(1980).
We repeat, as we did in State v. Smith, “[s]imilarity 'merely serves
as an initial point of inquiry'” in proportionality review, Smith, 347 N.C.
at 473, 496 S.E.2d at 369 (quoting State v. Daniels, 337 N.C. 243, 287, 446
S.E.2d 298, 325 (1994), cert. denied, 513 U.S. 1135, 130 L. Ed. 2d 895
(1995)).  Whether the death penalty in a particular case is proportionate
ultimately rests “‘on the experienced judgment of the members of this
Court, not simply on a mere numerical comparison of aggravators,
mitigators, and other circumstances.’”  Id. (quoting Daniels, 337 N.C. at
287, 446 S.E.2d at 325).  In light of that judgment we conclude as a matter
of law that the sentence of death in this case was neither excessive nor
disproportionate.
[22] Defendant raises as a separate assignment of error the contention
that the sentence of death in this case was imposed under the influence of
passion and prejudice and that it is this Court’s statutory duty to so find
and to overturn that sentence and impose the sentence of life imprisonment. 
See N.C.G.S. § 15A-2000(d)(2).  The jury’s deliberations, he charges, “must
have been permeated” with emotion from the “impassioned” testimony of the
victim’s brother, as well as from the subtle effect of “black on white”
crime and the “parade” of victims, from photographs of Kelli Froemke to the
presence at his sentencing hearing of the maimed victims of the Grace
Apartments fire.
Apart from the “victim-impact statement” made by the victim’s brother,
which we find singularly restrained, given the blows this young man felt,
first in discovering his murdered sister, then in grieving for her loss,
defendant offers no evidence that the jury was affected by passion or
prejudice in rendering its sentencing recommendation, or that any aspect of
the sentencing hearing itself was so infected.  Our review of the record
also reveals no such excesses.  We thus overrule this assignment of error.
We conclude that defendant received a fair capital
sentencing proceeding, free of prejudicial error, and that the judgment of
death recommended by the jury and entered by the court for defendant’s plea
of guilty to murder in the first degree, as well as the sentences imposed
for first-degree burglary, robbery with a dangerous weapon, first-degree
forcible rape, and first-degree arson, should be left undisturbed.
NO ERROR.