Court Opinion

ID: 9588581
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 23:35:54.90153+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:43:22.576813
License: Public Domain

Chief Justice BILLINGS
concurring.
When the identical definition of a term appears in two places in our General Statutes and a question arises as to the interpretation of the term, I find it instructive to consider the context and history of both definitions in determining the meaning which the General Assembly intended.
The term “nontestimonial identification” first appeared in North Carolina statutes in 1973 as part of Article 14 of the Criminal Procedure Act, Chapter 15A. A review of that Article and of case law regarding identification procedures known as *573showups makes it obvious that showups were not intended to be covered by the definition of nontestimonial identification contained in N.C.G.S. § 15A-271.
“Showup” is a term used for an identification procedure that involves a one-on-one confrontation between a suspect and a witness. Because no person is exhibited to the witness other than the one selected by the law enforcement agent as the likely perpetrator of the crime, the procedure is inherently suggestive. However, that suggestiveness is not alone sufficient to require suppression of the identification; the United States Supreme Court has applied a “totality of the circumstances” test for the courts to apply in considering whether the procedure used was likely to have resulted in mistaken identification, considering its suggestiveness. Manson v. Brathwaite, 432 U.S. 98, 53 L.Ed. 2d 140 (1977).
When the United States Supreme Court addressed in Stovall v. Denno, 388 U.S. 293, 18 L.Ed. 2d 1199 (1967), the constitutionality of using evidence derived from showups, it emphasized the urgent necessity for utilizing that procedure in the particular case as a reason for the Court’s approval. Necessity in that case resulted from the fear that the victim/witness might die from the wounds inflicted and be unavailable for a later, more informal, identification. Although later cases make it clear that urgent necessity is not an absolute requirement in support of the constitutionality of suggestive identification procedures, Manson v. Brathwaite, 432 U.S. 98, 53 L.Ed. 2d 140, nevertheless the showup is generally considered to be a tool to be used only in situations which justify immediate action. See Kirby v. Illinois, 406 U.S. 682, 32 L.Ed. 2d 411 (1972). When in 1973 the General Assembly enacted N.C.G.S. § 15A-271 defining “nontestimonial identification,” the list of identification procedures did not specifically include showups, for a very good reason: showups as normally conducted by their very nature could not be subjected to the 72-hour notice requirement of N.C.G.S. § 15A-277. Thus, it is my view that the statutory definition of nontestimonial identification was not intended to include the exhibition of a suspect to a witness at or near the scene of a crime shortly after the crime occurred and shortly after the suspect’s apprehension.
When N.C.G.S. § 7A-596 was enacted in 1979, prohibiting the use of certain procedures against a juvenile without a court *574order, the statutory definition of “nontestimonial identification” in the earlier statute, N.C.G.S. § 15A-271, was carried forward without change into § 7A-596. Because I believe that the same definition was not intended to mean one thing in one place within the General Statutes and something else in another place, I concur in the majority view that the juvenile statute was not intended to prohibit showups and that a reasonably conducted showup wherein a suspected juvenile is exhibited for identification to a witness shortly after an offense and the juvenile’s lawful apprehension does not violate N.C.G.S. § 7A-596.
Justice Mitchell joins in this concurring opinion.