Court Opinion

ID: 9566837
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 19:43:49.280804+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:42:22.604385
License: Public Domain

Justice Huskins
dissenting.
I respectfully dissent from that portion of the majority opinion which holds that only one armed robbery was committed.
G.S. 14-87 provides that any person who, (1) having in possession or with the use or threatened use of any firearms or other dangerous weapon, implement or means, (2) whereby the life of a person is endangered or threatened, (3) unlawfully takes or attempts to take personal property from another, (4) at any time either day or night, (5) shall be guilty of a felony.
The gist of the offense is the attempt to commit robbery, whether consummated or not, by the use or threatened use of firearms or other dangerous weapon. The force or intimidation occasioned by the use or threatened use of the weapon is the main element of the offense. In such case it is not necessary or material to describe accurately or prove the particular identity or value of the property, provided the indictment shows that the property was that of the person assaulted or under his care, and that such property is the subject of robbery and had some value. State v. Owens, 277 N.C. 697, 178 S.E. 2d 442 (1971). The offense is complete if there is either a taking or an attempt to take the personal property of another by the use or threatened use of firearms or other dangerous weapon. State v. Evans, 279 N.C. 447, 183 S.E. 2d 540 (1971).
We held in State v. Waddell, 279 N.C. 442, 183 S.E. 2d 644 (1971) that a variance, between the allegation in the indict*255ment that one person was the owner and in charge of the store from which the property was forcibly taken and the evidence which disclosed that another person owned the store, is not fatal to an indictment which contained all essential averments required by the' statute.
In this Court, for the first time, defendant makes the contention that there was but a single robbery and that the verdicts in these cases will support only one judgment for violation of the armed robbery statute, G.S. 14-87. The question was not presented to the Court of Appeals; and since our function is to review decisions of that court for errors of law, the question is not properly before us. Even so, when considered on the merits it is my view that the evidence discloses the commission of two armed robberies on the occasion in question.
Defendant is charged in one indictment with the armed robbery of Dallas Mike Hall and in the other indictment with the armed robbery of Jack Harrell. The evidence discloses that on 29 December 1972 defendant entered a food market in Golds-boro armed with a revolver and by the threatened use of that weapon obtained from Dallas Mike Hall a sum of money in cash register number one which was under Hall’s care. Immediately thereafter, and in like fashion, defendant obtained from Jack Harrell an additional sum of money in register number two which was under Harrell’s care. Each of these men was put in fear by defendant’s threatened use of the revolver. The fact that the cash in both registers belonged to the food market is immaterial. Two robberies were committed, the same as if the money taken had belonged individually to Hall and Harrell, since it is not necessary that ownership of the property be laid in any particular person in order to allege and prove the crime of armed robbery. State v. Rogers, 273 N.C. 208, 159 S.E. 2d 525 (1968). The State need only show that it was the property of the person assaulted, or in his care, and had some value. State v. Mull, 224 N.C. 574, 31 S.E. 2d 764 (1944). The fact that neither victim was injured is immaterial since the gist of the offense is the taking by force or putting in fear with the use or threatened use of a firearm or other dangerous weapon.
Apparently, the majority opinion holds that only one robbery is committed if a robber enters Belk’s Department Store and with the use or threatened use of a firearm endangers the life of each Belk employee in charge of the various cash registers, going from register to register, and from floor to floor, and *256with the threatened use of the gun obtains from each employee the money in the register under his or her care. This is strange law to which I do not subscribe. I therefore respectfully dissent from this aspect of the majority opinion and vote to affirm the decision of the Court of Appeals.
Justice Branch joins in this dissenting opinion.