Court Opinion

ID: 9584242
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 22:45:50.875883+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:07:15.254828
License: Public Domain

*333Judge Parker
dissenting:
The unlawful detention of a human being against his will is false imprisonment, not kidnapping; “in order to constitute kidnapping there must be not only an unlawful detention by force or fraud but also a carrying away of the victim.” State v. Ingland, 278 N.C. 42, 178 S.E. 2d 577. True, “[i]t is the fact, not the distance of forcible removal of the victim that constitutes kidnapping,” State v. Lowry, 263 N.C. 536, 139 S.E. 2d 870, but some carrying away must occur nevertheless, and I have found no decision of our Supreme Court which dispenses with this requirement.
In my view, the evidence in the present record fails to show such a carrying away of the victim as to make the offense kidnapping. Quite to the contrary, the evidence establishes that the victim was not carried away at all but was securely locked up on his own premises. State v. Reid, 5 N.C. App. 424, 168 S.E. 2d 511, relied on by the majority opinion, is distinguishable. In Reid, the victim was forcibly removed from his home premises and was dragged away against his will onto an adjoining lot. That case, in my opinion, represents the outer limits to which the courts should go in finding sufficient evidence of a carrying away to constitute the crime of kidnapping.
Should the opinion of the majority in the present case prevail, it seems to me that the crime of kidnapping would necessarily be involved in every case of robbery or rape in which the evidence shows that the defendant, incidental to accomplishing his major purpose, may have forced his victim to move a few steps and forcibly detained him a few moments, even though all events occurred on the victim’s own premises. Some courts, interpreting statutes of their jurisdictions, may have gone so far. Annot.: Seizure or Detention for Purpose of Committing Rape, Robbery, or Similar Offense as Constituting Separte Crime of Kidnapping, 43 A.L.R. 3rd 699. Such a holding does not conform with the common law concept of kidnapping which prevails in North Carolina.
Evidence in the present case would support defendant’s conviction of a number of crimes. (Assault under G.S. 14-32 (c); assault under G.S. 14-34.2; aiding and abetting prisoners to escape from lawful custody; false imprisonment.) Because it fails to show a carrying away of the victim, I find it insufficient to support defendant’s conviction of kidnapping and vote to reverse.