Title: State v. Rollins

State: north-carolina

Issuer: North Carolina Supreme Court

Document:

STATE OF NORTH CAROLINA v. MICKEY VONRICE ROLLINS
No. 138PA08
FILED: 1 MAY 2009
Evidence–marital privilege–spouse visiting prisoner
An inmate had no reasonable expectation of privacy in conversations with his
wife in the public visiting areas of Department of Correction facilities, and the conversations
were not protected by the marital communications privilege set forth in N.C.G.S. § 8-57(c).
Justice TIMMONS-GOODSON dissenting.
Chief Justice PARKER and Justice HUDSON join in this dissenting opinion.
On discretionary review pursuant to N.C.G.S. § 7A-31 of
a unanimous decision of the Court of Appeals, 189 N.C. App. 248,
658 S.E.2d 43 (2008), reversing both an order entered 19 August
2005 by Judge William C. Griffin, Jr. and a judgment entered 6
October  2006 by Judge Jack W. Jenkins, in Superior Court, Martin
County, and remanding the case for a new trial.  Heard in the
Supreme Court 25 February 2009.
Roy Cooper, Attorney General, by Robert C. Montgomery,
Special Deputy Attorney General, for the State-
appellant.
Staples S. Hughes, Appellate Defender, by Barbara S.
Blackman, Assistant Appellate Defender, for defendant-
appellee.
BRADY, Justice.
In this case we consider whether the marital 
communications privilege preserved in N.C.G.S. § 8-57(c) protects
conversations between a husband and wife that occur in the public
visiting areas of state correctional facilities.  After extensive
review of the history of the marital communications privilege in
North Carolina and the rights granted to prisoners in
correctional institutions, we conclude that the privilege does
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1  As a teenager, defendant lived across the street from
Highsmith with his aunt.  Defendant and Highsmith developed a
friendship while defendant lived in the neighborhood.  Highsmith
took an interest in defendant’s high school football career and
would often give him gifts to encourage him before his high
school football games.   
not extend to communications occurring in the public visiting
areas of North Carolina Department of Correction (DOC) facilities
because a reasonable expectation of privacy does not exist in
such areas.
FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND
On 11 June 2002, eighty-eight-year-old Harriett 
“Brownie” Highsmith was found murdered in her Robersonville,
North Carolina residence.  Mickey Vonrice Rollins (defendant) was
seen in the vicinity of Highsmith’s residence on the afternoon of
the murder1 and was identified by law enforcement as a person of
interest.  In September 2002 defendant’s wife, Tolvi Rollins, was
interviewed by Special Agent Walter Brown of the State Bureau of
Investigation (S.B.I.) about the murder.  Mrs. Rollins indicated
that she had no pertinent information concerning the crime.  
Highsmith’s murder remained unsolved and law
enforcement received no new leads in the investigation until fall
of 2003.   At some time following the Highsmith murder defendant
was incarcerated for an unrelated crime.  In September 2003, Mrs.
Rollins was arrested for felony witness intimidation for threats
allegedly made to a witness involved with defendant’s trial in
the unrelated matter.  S.B.I. Agent Brown was present at Mrs.
Rollins’s arrest and again asked if she had any information about
the Highsmith murder.  Mrs. Rollins gave Agent Brown no
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information at that time, but the next month she voluntarily
contacted Robersonville Police Chief Darrell Knox.  Mrs. Rollins
told Chief Knox that in March 2003, defendant confessed to her
that he had killed Highsmith.  Mrs. Rollins told Chief Knox that
her conscience had been bothering her “for some time” and that
she had tried to contact him several times, but could never reach
him.  When Mrs. Rollins communicated this information to Chief
Knox there was a reward being offered for information in the
Highsmith case.
The next day, 14 October 2003, S.B.I. Agent Brown
interviewed Mrs. Rollins.  The details Mrs. Rollins provided
concerning the murder were consistent with evidence found at the
crime scene.  Agent Brown asked Mrs. Rollins if she would wear a
recording device and visit defendant in prison.  Mrs. Rollins
agreed to do so.  
Over the next two months, Mrs. Rollins visited
defendant on five occasions at three different correctional
facilities.  Each meeting took place in public visiting areas of
the facilities.  During each visit, defendant admitted to killing
Highsmith and discussed details of the crime.  On three of the
visits Mrs. Rollins wore a recording device; however, the first
recording was inaudible because of the loud noises surrounding
the couple in the DOC visiting room.  After each visit with
defendant, Mrs. Rollins informed law enforcement as to the
contents of her conversations with defendant.  Consistent with
standard law enforcement procedure, Mrs. Rollins received money
to reimburse her for expenses she incurred during the course of
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2  Defendant also filed a second motion to suppress relating
to an issue that is not before this Court.
her visits with defendant.  She received a total of $840 from the
S.B.I. and the Robersonville Police Department for various
expenses.  
Defendant was arrested for the murder of Highsmith on 5
December 2003.  On 2 February 2004, a Martin County Grand Jury
returned true bills of indictment charging defendant with murder,
first-degree kidnapping, robbery with a dangerous weapon, and
breaking or entering.  On 13 September 2004 defendant filed a
motion to suppress the statements he made to his wife regarding
the Highsmith murder.  The motion to suppress was denied at a 27
June 2005 hearing in Superior Court, Martin County.2  A written
order, consistent with the 27 June 2005 order, was entered on 19
August 2005.  
Defendant pleaded guilty on 6 October 2006 in exchange
for imposition of a sentence of life imprisonment without parole. 
With the plea, defendant reserved the right to appeal from the
order denying his motion to suppress.  The trial court, in
accordance with the plea arrangement, sentenced defendant to life
imprisonment without parole.  
On 10 October 2006, defendant filed notice of appeal to
the Court of Appeals.  In an 18 March 2008 opinion, the Court of
Appeals reversed the denial of defendant’s motion to suppress,
ruling that the marital communications privilege protected
defendant’s statements to his wife made in the public visiting
areas of the DOC.  The Court of Appeals remanded the case for a
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3  The trial court made no ruling whether the March 2003
conversation between defendant and Mrs. Rollins was protected by
the marital privilege, and we decline to address that issue, as
it is not before the Court.  
4  The first written recognition of a marital privilege is
found in the 1580 case of Bent v. Allot, in which a husband was
allowed to suppress adverse testimony by his wife.  Bent v.
Allot, (1579-80) 21 Eng. Rep. 50 (Ch).  Nearly fifty years later,
Lord Coke wrote in his legal commentaries: “[I]t hath been
resolved by the justices, that a wife cannot be produced either
against or for her husband . . . and it might be a cause of
implacable discord and dissention between the husband and the
new trial.  This Court allowed the State’s petition for
discretionary review on 26 August 2008.
ANALYSIS
This case requires us to examine the definition of a
“confidential communication” under North Carolina law.  Defendant
argues that the conversations between his wife and him that
occurred in the DOC facilities are protected as confidential
communications under N.C.G.S. § 8-57(c).  The State contends that
these conversations lack the requisite expectation of privacy
essential to a confidential communication and thus, they are not
protected.  We conclude that the conversations between defendant
and his wife in the public areas of DOC facilities do not qualify
as confidential communications under section 8-57(c).3
History of the Marital Communications Privilege   
Section 8-57 is a product of the continually evolving
common law marital privileges that historically sought to promote
credibility and protect the intimacy of the marital union.  The
traditional common law rule, which can be traced as far back as
1580, disqualified one spouse from testifying for or against the
other spouse in a criminal action on the basis of incompetency.4 
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wife” 1 Edowardo Coke, A Commentary upon Littleton ch. 1, § 1,
subsec. 6.b (Francis Hargrave & Charles Butler eds.,
Philadelphia, Small 19th ed. 1853)(1628) (footnote omitted).  
5  For example, the rule preventing spouses from testifying
on behalf of one another was abandoned in the early 20th century. 
1 Henry Brandis, Jr., Brandis on North Carolina Evidence § 59
(2d. rev. ed. 1982); see also State v. Rice, 222 N.C. 634, 24
S.E.2d 483 (1943). 
6  We recognize that these two privileges have often been
confused and commingled in our jurisprudence.  See State v.
Freeman, 302 N.C. 591, 276 S.E.2d 450 (1981); Adverse Marital
Testimony at 878.  Despite the past confusion, we emphasize that
As the Supreme Court of the United States explained in Trammel v.
United States, 
[The rule] sprang from two canons of medieval
jurisprudence:  first, the rule that an accused
was not permitted to testify in his own behalf
because of his interest in the proceeding;
second, the concept that husband and wife were
one, and that since the woman had no recognized
separate legal existence, the husband was that
one.” 
445 U.S. 40, 44 (1980).  This spousal incompetency rule, and its
underlying justifications, survived well into the nineteenth
century, although statutory modifications and exceptions were
numerous.   See James P. Nehf, Note, State v. Freeman: Adverse
Marital Testimony in North Carolina Criminal Actions—Can Spousal
Testimony Be Compelled?, 60 N.C. L. Rev. 874, 877 n.24
(1982)[hereinafter, Adverse Marital Testimony].5  The exceptions
to the rule made clarification of the privilege necessary, and in
the mid-nineteenth century, the specific marital communications
privilege emerged.  Id. at 878.  This privilege is distinct from
the spousal incompetency rule of the common law, in that it
protects confidential communications between spouses made during
the marriage.6  Unlike the spousal incompetency rule, which seeks
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the two privileges are separate protections, with unique
justifications.  
to promote credible testimony, the marital communications
privilege is premised upon the belief that the marital union is
sacred and that its intimacy and confidences deserves legal
protection.  See Hicks v. Hicks, 271 N.C. 204, 205, 155 S.E.2d
799, 800 (1967) (“‘[W]hatever is known by reason of that intimacy
[marriage] should be regarded as knowledge confidentially
acquired, and that neither [husband nor wife] should be allowed
to divulge it to the danger or disgrace of the other.’” (quoting
State v. Jolly, 20 N.C. 86, 89, 20 N.C. 108, 112 (1838)
(alterations in the original))).
In 1868 the North Carolina General Assembly preserved
both the spousal incompetency rule and the marital communications
privilege of the common law in our statutes.  See Victor C.
Barringer, et al., The Code of Civil Procedure of North Carolina
tit. XIV, ch. VI, § 341 (Raleigh, Paige 1868) (discussing marital
privilege as related to both civil and criminal proceedings). 
However, the Freeman decision in 1981 modified the common law
spousal incompetency rule, prompting the legislature’s enactment
of the current section 8-57.  See State v. Holmes, 330 N.C. 826, 
828-35, 412 S.E.2d 660, 661-64 (1992) (detailing the history of
the enactment of and legislative changes to section 8-57). The
first two subsections of the current section 8-57 reflect the
Freeman holding, establishing that one spouse is competent, but
not compellable, to testify against another in a criminal
proceeding, except in a few specific situations.  N.C.G.S. § 8-
-8-
57(a),(b) (2007).  The codification of the marital communications
privilege remains intact and is preserved in subsection 8-57(c).
Subsection 8-57(c) states:  “No husband or wife shall
be compellable in any event to disclose any confidential
communication made by one to the other during their marriage.” 
This Court has ruled that the privilege is held by both spouses--
meaning that either spouse can prevent the other from testifying
to a confidential communication.  Holmes, 330 N.C. at 834, 412
S.E.2d at 665 (stating that subsection 8-57(c) protects the
defendant’s privilege “to keep the other spouse in any event from
disclosing any confidential communication made by one to the
other during their marriage”).
Confidential Communication
To assess whether the conversations between defendant
and his wife were in fact protected by subsection 8-57(c), our
analysis turns on whether there was a “confidential
communication” between defendant and his wife in the DOC
facilities.  When defining a confidential communication in the
context of the marital communications privilege, this Court has
asked “whether the communication . . . was induced by the marital
relationship and prompted by the affection, confidence, and
loyalty engendered by such relationship.”  State v. Freeman, 302
N.C. 591, 598, 276 S.E.2d 450, 454 (1981) (citations omitted);
see also Holmes, 330 N.C. at 828, 412 S.E.2d at 661 (stating a
confidential communication is “information privately disclosed
between a husband and wife in the confidence of the marital
relationship” (citing Trammel, 445 U.S. 40)).  
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Other considerations have also influenced our previous
determinations of whether certain communications qualify as
“confidential.”  The circumstances in which the communication
takes place, including the physical location and presence of
other individuals, have been relevant when answering the
question: “Has the veil of confidence been removed . . . ?” 
Hicks, 271 N.C. at 206, 155 S.E.2d at 801.  Defendant argues that
the setting and physical circumstances of the communication are
irrelevant in analyzing whether the privilege applies, but we
find that argument unsupported by precedent.
For instance, in Freeman, this Court ruled that a
defendant’s incriminating statement to his wife in a public
parking lot while in the presence of the wife’s brother was not a
confidential communication.  302 N.C. at 598, 276 S.E.2d at 454-
55.  On the other hand, this Court determined a marital
communication to be confidential in Holmes when the defendant
ordered two men out of his home before making a statement to his
wife that he was going to kill one of them.  330 N.C. at 835, 412
S.E.2d at 665.  Likewise, in Hicks, communications between a
husband and wife were confidential when made in the basement of
the couple’s home, even though their eight-year-old daughter was
“‘singing or playing in the area.’”  271 N.C. at 205-07, 155
S.E.2d at 800-02.  This Court in Hicks noted that the factual
circumstances surrounding the wife’s utterances stamped them as
confidential.  Id. at 207, 155 S.E.2d at 802.  These cases
illustrate that actual physical privacy, as well as a desire for
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7  The intention of the person disclosing information that
the communication remain a secret is consistent with privileges
in other confidential relationships outside of marriage.  See,
e.g., State v. McIntosh, 336 N.C. 517, 523, 444 S.E.2d 438, 442
(1994) (“[T]he justification for granting the [attorney-client]
privilege ceases when the client does not appear to have been
desirous of secrecy.”(citations and internal quotation marks
omitted)).
and expectation of confidentiality, are important in establishing
a confidential communication.7
Legal scholars have also noted that physical privacy is
germane to the existence of a confidential communication:
The situs of the communication is a
relevant factor in determining whether there
was the requisite confidentiality at the time
of the communication.  It is possible to have
a confidential conversation in a public
place, but the public nature of the situs
makes it more difficult to find the requisite
privacy.  The layperson must have a
reasonable expectation of confidentiality.
Edward J. Imwinkelried, The New Wigmore: A Treatise on Evidence §
6.8.1, at 674-75 (Richard D. Friedman ed. 2002) (footnotes
omitted); see also Robert P. Mosteller et al., North Carolina
Evidentiary Foundations § 8-2, at 8-6 (2d ed. 2004)(stating that
a confidential communication requires “(1) physical privacy, and
(2) an intent on the holder’s part to maintain secrecy”).
Essential to the question of determining whether the
“veil of confidentially [has] been removed” from a marital
communication are the physical surroundings and intent of the
husband and wife in making the communication.  For purposes of a
confidential marital communication under subsection 8-57(c),
there must be a reasonable expectation of privacy on the part of
the holder and the intent that the communication be kept secret. 
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8  This analysis for determining the existence of a
confidential communication is in line with other jurisdictions
that have specifically defined the term in the context of a
marital communication.  See, e.g., People v. Von Villas, 11 Cal.
App. 4th 175, 220, 15 Cal. Rptr. 2d 112, 138 (Cal. Ct. App. 1992)
(holding that to make a marital communication in confidence, “one
must intend nondisclosure and have a reasonable expectation of
privacy” (citation and internal quotation marks omitted)), cert.
denied, 510 U.S. 838 (1993).
Relevant factors in making this determination necessarily include
the physical location where the communication is made and whether
there are other individuals present at the time of the
communication.8  
Reasonable Expectation of Privacy in Public Visiting Areas of
Department of Correction Facilities
The State contends that defendant had no reasonable
expectation of privacy in any conversation that took place in a
public visiting area of DOC facility, and therefore, the
communications between defendant and Mrs. Rollins were not
protected.  We agree.
There is no question that incarcerated persons have a
diminished expectation of privacy.  “Given the realities of
institutional confinement, any reasonable expectation of privacy
a detainee retains necessarily is of diminished scope.”  State v.
Wiley, 355 N.C. 592, 603, 565 S.E.2d 22, 32 (2002), cert. denied,
537 U.S. 1117 (2003); see also Bell v. Wolfish, 441 U.S. 520, 557
(1979).  For purposes of the Fourth Amendment to the United
States Constitution, the Supreme Court of the United States has
stated that the traditional right to privacy is “fundamentally
incompatible with the close and continual surveillance of inmates
and their cells required to ensure institutional security and
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internal order.”  Hudson v. Palmer, 468 U.S. 517, 527-28 (1984). 
Prisoners in confinement know, or should know, that their
statements may be monitored and even recorded.  See United States
v. Paul, 614 F.2d 115, 116 (6th Cir.) (“[J]ail officials are free
to intercept conversations between a prisoner and a visitor.”),
cert. denied, 446 U.S. 941 (1980); see also Lanza v. New York,
370 U.S. 139, 143 (1962) (“[T]o say that a public jail is the
equivalent of a man’s ‘house’ or that it is a place where he can
claim constitutional immunity from search or seizure . . . is at
best a novel argument. . . .  In prison, official surveillance
has traditionally been the order of the day.” (footnotes
omitted)).
While prisoners have a diminished expectation of
privacy during confinement, this is not to say that their
communications can never be private and completely confidential. 
Certain relationships, such as those between an attorney and
client, are “endowed with particularized confidentiality” and
“must continue to receive unceasing protection” even in prisons. 
Lanza, 370 U.S. at 143-44.  For this reason, prisoners are given
great latitude when speaking with their attorneys.  However, even
in these situations, special actions must be taken to ensure the
confidentiality of these communications.  For instance, letters
between a prisoner and counsel must be identified as legal
correspondence in order to receive protection.  See Wolff v.
McDonnell, 418 U.S. 539, 576 (1974) (holding that a state may
“require any [attorney-client] communications to be specially
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9  For example, we note two California cases in which
confidential marital communications between husband and wife were
also statutorily protected.  In one, a conversation between a
detainee-defendant and his wife that occurred in a police
detective’s office was protected because the couple were lulled
into believing that the conversation was covered by the cloak of
marked as originating from an attorney . . . if they are to
receive special treatment”).
As this Court has stated, the union of husband and wife
is a “sacred institution” and its preservation and protection are
“necessary to every well-ordered civilized society.”  Whitford v.
N. State Life Ins. Co., 163 N.C. 179, 182, 163 N.C. 223, 226, 79
S.E. 501, 502 (1913).  However, as with other confidential
relationships, the protection afforded marital communications is
not absolute and is inapplicable when no reasonable expectation
of privacy exists.  In the instant case, any reasonable
expectation of privacy in the marital communications evaporated
because each conversation took place in the public visiting areas
of DOC facilities.  As McCormick on Evidence states:
The rationale that the spouses may ordinarily
take effective measures to communicate
confidentially tends to break down where one
or both are incarcerated.  However,
communications in the jailhouse are
frequently held not privileged, often on the
theory that no confidentiality was or could
have been expected.
1 Kenneth S. Broun et al., McCormick on Evidence § 82, at 377
(6th ed. 2006) (footnote omitted).  This is not to say that
special precautions cannot be taken in correctional institutions
to protect the privacy of conversations between a husband and
wife, just as precautions can be taken between prisoners and
their attorneys.9  However, communications occurring during
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confidentiality.  North v. Superior Court, 8 Cal. 3d 301, 311,
502 P.2d 1305, 1311 (1972) (en banc).  However, the same
protection was not extended to marital conversations which
occurred in an “ordinary jailhouse visiting area” because there
was “no justifiable expectation of privacy.”  Von Villas, 11 Cal.
App. 4th at 220-21, 15 Cal. Rptr.2d at 139.
10  Mrs. Rollins explained to S.B.I. agents that “pillow
talk” was the time the couple shared in their bed before going to
sleep when they would talk about “everything.”
ordinary DOC visits, in public visiting areas, do not invoke the
protection subsection 8-57(c) affords to confidential
communications because there is no reasonable expectation of
privacy in such communications.
The record clearly shows that the conversations between
defendant and his wife occurred during routine DOC visits and
thereby lacked any reasonable expectation of privacy.  During
each visit defendant and his wife were in public visiting areas
of DOC correctional facilities, in the presence of other people. 
Mrs. Rollins testified that at times other people were in close
proximity and even spoke to defendant and her during the course
of their conversations.  Furthermore, it can be inferred from the
record that defendant doubted the privacy of the couple’s
conversations.  On one occasion defendant physically inspected
Mrs. Rollins to check for the presence of a recording device. 
Mrs. Rollins also told S.B.I. agents that defendant refrained
from telling her particular details of the Highsmith murder
during one meeting, but said he would tell her “something
important” later, after he was released from prison and the two
had “pillow talk.”10   
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CONCLUSION
As defendant had no reasonable expectation of privacy
in the conversations between his wife and him in the public
visiting areas of the DOC facilities, the conversations were not
confidential communications under subsection 8-57(c) and
therefore, are not protected.  We reverse the decision of the
Court of Appeals as to the issue before us on appeal and hold
that the trial court’s denial of defendant’s motion to suppress
under subsection 8-57(c) was appropriate.  This case is remanded
to the Court of Appeals for consideration of defendant’s
assignments of error not previously addressed by that court.
REVERSED AND REMANDED.
Justice TIMMONS-GOODSON dissenting.
Because the majority departs from our established case law
and holds that the confidential marital communications privilege
is defeated simply because the conversation occurred in the
visiting area of a prison, I respectfully dissent.  
While I agree with the majority that the physical
environment in which a marital conversation takes place may be
one factor in determining whether a particular disclosure is
confidential, it is neither the sole nor the determinative
factor.  The circumstances in the present case indicate that the
communication at issue was not overheard by any third party and
was clearly induced by the marital relationship.  I therefore
agree with the Court of Appeals that defendant’s communications
to his wife are protected by marital privilege.  In its analysis,
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the majority overemphasizes the nature of the general prison
setting, instead of focusing on the actual facts presented by
this case.  In so doing, the majority unnecessarily blurs the
line between confidential communications and the “reasonable
expectation of privacy” doctrine prevalent in the Fourth
Amendment arena.
In determining whether a particular statement is privileged
as a marital communication, “the question is whether the
communication, whatever it contains, was induced by the marital
relationship and prompted by the affection, confidence, and
loyalty engendered by such relationship.”  State v. Freeman, 302
N.C. 591, 598, 276 S.E.2d 450, 454 (1981) (citations omitted);
see also State v. Holmes, 330 N.C. 826, 828, 412 S.E.2d 660, 661
(1992) (defining confidential marital communications as
“information privately disclosed between a husband and wife in
the confidence of the marital relationship” (citations omitted)). 
There is no question in the present case that defendant’s
statements to his wife were induced and prompted by the marital
relationship.  Tolvi Rollins, defendant’s wife, testified she
married defendant in 2001.  Mrs. Rollins verified that when she
visited defendant at the Franklin Correctional Center, she was
affectionate, kissed defendant, and brought him food.  Mrs.
Rollins also agreed that defendant trusted her and that she
encouraged him to confide in her and promised to return and visit
regularly.  When Mrs. Rollins visited defendant at the Dan River
facility, she was again affectionate, brought defendant a pecan
pie, told defendant she “would be there when he got out of
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prison” and promised she “would never tell anybody about what
[defendant] confided in [her] about the death of Mrs. Highsmith.” 
While visiting defendant at the Carteret Correctional Center,
Mrs. Rollins again “loved on him” and assured defendant she would
“be there for him” and that they would have children together and
all “move away.”  Mrs. Rollins explicitly agreed that defendant’s
statements to her were confidential.  There is no evidence in the
present case to indicate that defendant’s statements to his wife
were prompted by anything other than the affection and confidence
of the marital relationship between them.     
The only question then becomes whether the communications
between defendant and his wife occurred in a confidential and
private manner.  See Holmes, 330 N.C. at 828, 412 S.E.2d at 661. 
Such determination necessarily encompasses some consideration of
the physical environment at the time of the disclosure, but this
Court has never held that actual physical privacy is necessary
for a confidential communication, the majority’s assertions to
the contrary notwithstanding.  Rather, this Court has repeatedly
emphasized (1) the intent of the parties and (2) whether the
communication was made in the presence of third parties capable
of both hearing and comprehending the conversation.  For example,
in Hicks v. Hicks, 271 N.C. 204, 207, 155 S.E.2d 799, 801-02
(1967), the Court held that the presence of the married couple’s
eight-year-old daughter, who was “‘singing or playing in the
area’” at the time of the marital communications, did not remove
the marital veil of confidence, because the parties intended
their conversations to be private, and because the child was not
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competent “to comprehend the conversation[s].”  The Court did not
mention the situs of the marital communications--the basement of
the couple’s home--in its analysis.  Id.  Likewise, in Holmes,
the Court focused on the fact that the “defendant’s statements
[were] made only in the presence of his wife [and] were induced
by the confidence of the marital relationship.”  330 N.C. at 835,
412 S.E.2d at 665 (citing Hicks).  That the statements occurred
in the home merited no discussion by the Court in Holmes.  See
id; see also State v. Freeman, 197 N.C. 376, 378-79, 148 S.E.
450, 451 (1929) (holding that remarks made by the defendant and
his wife to each other in the presence of police officers were
not confidential communications).  Thus, I disagree with the
majority’s emphasis upon the public versus private nature of the
physical locale in which the communication occurs.
Here, the evidence shows that, although defendant and his
wife met in public visiting areas of the various facilities, they
took steps to ensure the confidential nature of their
communications, and their communications did not occur in the
immediate presence of any third party who overheard or
comprehended them.  Mrs. Rollins repeatedly and explicitly
testified that defendant’s statements were made to her in
confidence, that nobody else was listening, that no one else
could hear them, and that “they were done exclusively so that
only [she] and [defendant] could hear the conversation.”  Thus,
all of the evidence shows that defendant and his wife intended to
keep their conversations private and, indeed, as noted by the
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Court of Appeals, succeeded in keeping their conversations
private.     
The majority states that “the physical surroundings and
intent of the husband and wife in making the communication” are
“essential to the question of determining whether the ‘veil of
confidentiality has been removed from a marital communication.’” 
Instead of analyzing the intent of defendant and his wife and
their physical surroundings, however, the majority inexplicably
shifts its focus to require “a reasonable expectation of privacy
on the part of the holder” in order to assert the privilege. 
However, this “reasonable expectation of privacy” is a Fourth
Amendment concept that need not be applied here and serves only
to muddy the already murky waters of our law of confidential
communications.  See Holmes, 330 N.C. at 833, 412 S.E.2d at 664
(noting that the cases and statutes addressing confidential
marital communications “have not been models of clarity”).  The
majority spends much of its time citing irrelevant Fourth
Amendment cases addressing the reasonable expectation of privacy
in prisons, ultimately determining that, because defendant could
have no reasonable expectation of privacy in any conversation
that took place in the public visiting area of a prison, the
communication was not a confidential one entitled to protection. 
As I have pointed out, however, the evidence in this case shows
that the conversations between defendant and his wife were, in
fact, private, albeit occurring in a public place.  That the
public place was a prison should have no bearing on the
determination of whether the communication was in fact
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confidential, except to the extent that actual circumstances show
the prison setting prevented confidential communications.  
While the majority points to evidence in the record
indicating that other persons were present in the prison visiting
area, the specific testimony by defendant’s wife irrefutably
shows that she and defendant intended and succeeded in keeping
their conversations private.  Under the majority’s analysis, even
a whispered conversation between husband and wife occurring in a
DOC public visiting area would not be considered confidential.
As the actual circumstances here indicate that the
communications at issue were both induced by the marital
relationship and spoken in a confidential manner, and were
neither overheard nor comprehended by any third party, the
communications are privileged and entitled to protection as
confidential marital communications.  I would, therefore, affirm
the Court of Appeals. 
Chief Justice PARKER and Justice HUDSON join in this
dissenting opinion.