The trial court erred when sentencing defendant under the Fair Sentencing Act for embezzlement by finding as an aggravating factor that defendant violated a position of trust.
Embezzlement necessarily involves a position of trust.
Appeal by defendant from judgment entered 13 January 1997 by Judge Robert H. Hobgood in Orange County Superior Court. Heard in the Court of Appeals 24 February 1998. Attorney General Michael F. Easley, by Assistant Attorney General J. Mark Payne, for the State. Tharrington Smith, L.L.P., by E. Hardy Lewis, for defendant- appellant. During this time period, while serving as financial secretary for the church, the defendant wrote some 141 checks to himself, forged the name of an associate priest of the church to the checks and deposited the money in his personal account.