{
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  "name": "STATE OF NORTH CAROLINA v. MICHAEL DAVID BONNER",
  "name_abbreviation": "State v. Bonner",
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    "judges": [
      "Judges Arnold and Orr concur."
    ],
    "parties": [
      "STATE OF NORTH CAROLINA v. MICHAEL DAVID BONNER"
    ],
    "opinions": [
      {
        "text": "GREENE, Judge.\nDefendant was convicted on thirty-six counts of embezzlement by a state employee under N.C.G.S. Sec. 14-91 (1984) which provides that \u201cif any . . . person . . . having or holding in trust . . . property and effects of the [State] . . . shall embezzle or knowingly and willfully misapply or convert the same to his own use, or otherwise willfully or corruptly abuse such trust, such offender . . . shall be punished as a Class F felon.\u201d (Emphasis added.) The State\u2019s evidence tended to show defendant was the Director of Continuing Education for Cape Fear Technical Institute (\u201cCFTI\u201d) between 1980 and 1986. Pursuant to that position, defendant had the authority (subject to his superiors\u2019 approval) to hire instructors for CFTI. The State sought to prove that defendant executed contracts with twenty-eight \u201cbogus\u201d instructors to teach nonexistent adult education classes to fictional students. The bogus instructors then allegedly turned over to defendant a portion of their pay from CFTI. While defendant\u2019s employment also required him to collect and turn over certain student fees to CFTI, there was no evidence that defendant ever misdirected any of those fees.\nDefendant moved to dismiss the charges for failure to establish defendant held any state funds in trust as required under Section 14-91. The trial court denied the motion and subsequently instructed the jury over defendant\u2019s objection that they could find defendant received state funds in trust if they found that he: 1) \u201cwas authorized to hire and direct payment to certain instructors up to the limit of the budget established for that purpose\u201d; and 2) \u201cthat on the date in question [he] had available to him state funds within his teacher hiring budget sufficient to pay a newly hired continuing education instructor.\u201d Defendant appeals his conviction and assigns error to, among other things, the trial court\u2019s failure to grant his motion to dismiss the embezzlement charges under Section 14-91.\nThe dispositive issue presented is whether the trial court should have dismissed the embezzlement charges under Section 14-91 for lack of evidence that defendant ever held any state funds in trust as required under that statute. Although there are relatively few decisions applying this particular embezzlement statute, the requirement that defendant misapply funds which he \u201cholds in trust\u201d expresses the requirement distinctive to embezzlement that the defendant \u201creceived the property he embezzled in the course of his employment and by virtue of his fiduciary relationship with his principal.\u201d State v. Kornegay, 313 N.C. 1, 22, 326 S.E. 2d 881, 897 (1985); cf. Black\u2019s Law Dictionary at 658 (5th ed. 1979) (relevant definitions of \u201chold\" all connote possession). Although defendant\u2019s possession of the entrusted property may be actual or constructive, even constructive possession of property requires \u201can intent and capability to maintain control and dominion\u201d over it. State v. Jackson, 57 N.C. App. 71, 76, 291 S.E. 2d 190, 194, disc. rev. denied, 306 N.C. 389, 294 S.E. 2d 216 (1982) (quoting State v. Spencer, 281 N.C. 121, 129, 187 S.E. 2d 779, 784 (1972) (emphasis added)).\nThe State\u2019s theory at trial as embodied in the court\u2019s instructions was that defendant\u2019s authority to hire as many instructors as the budget set by CFTI would allow constituted holding state property in trust by virtue of defendant\u2019s alleged \u201ccontrol\u201d of funds allocated by the CFTI education budget. Defendant\u2019s position as Continuing Director of CFTI may have enabled him to deceive CFTI into paying bogus instructors he hired; however, the State introduced no evidence to suggest defendant\u2019s position ever gave him the capability \u2014 either personally or in conjunction with others \u2014 to \u201cmaintain control and dominion\u201d over any state funds at issue.\nWe note defendant required his superiors\u2019 ultimate approval to hire instructors. More important, the power entrusted to defendant to hire instructors did not in any event constitute the necessary power to possess or maintain control of the state funds CFTI eventually paid those instructors. The State\u2019s expansive theory of \u201cconstructive possession\u201d fails to distinguish between being entrusted with constructive possession of property and gaining the necessary possession by deception: only the former constitutes holding state property in trust necessary for embezzlement under Section 14-91. Cf. N.C.G.S. Sec. 14-100 (1986) (setting forth requirements for crime of obtaining property by false pretenses).\nAs proven by the State, defendant\u2019s alleged scheme thus did not misapply state funds he already possessed or could otherwise control but instead deceived those with such control into paying those funds to his co-participants in the scheme. The cases cited by the State to support defendant\u2019s possession are all distinguishable since in each the defendant\u2019s employment gave him either actual possession of his principal\u2019s property or the capability to maintain control and dominion over it. E.g., State v. Agnew, 294 N.C. 382, 385, 241 S.E. 2d 684, 686, cert. denied, 439 U.S. 830 (1978) (defendant embezzled funds from state checking account over which she had \u201csole control\u201d to make advances); State v. Ward, 222 N.C. 316, 320, 22 S.E. 2d 922, 923-24 (1942) (state auditor and subordinate misapplied revenues they collected for state); Jackson, 57 N.C. App. at 77, 291 S.E. 2d at 194 (defendant took delivery of hospital supplies and then misdirected them).\nEmbezzlement under Section 14-91 is a statutory offense which is strictly construed. See State v. Ross, 272 N.C. 67, 69, 157 S.E. 2d 712, 713 (1967). Even when we consider all the evidence in the light most favorable to the State and grant the State every reasonable inference from that evidence, we conclude the State failed to introduce substantial evidence that defendant misapplied any state funds he held in trust under Section 14-91. We thus hold the trial court erroneously failed to grant defendant\u2019s motion to dismiss these embezzlement charges.\nAccordingly, we arrest the judgment of the trial court and vacate defendant\u2019s convictions under Section 14-91. As we vacate defendant\u2019s convictions, we do not address his other assignments of error.\nVacated.\nJudges Arnold and Orr concur.",
        "type": "majority",
        "author": "GREENE, Judge."
      }
    ],
    "attorneys": [
      "Attorney General Lacy H. Thornburg, by Assistant Attorney General John F. Maddrey, for the State.",
      "Erdman, Boggs & Harkins, by Harry H. Harkins Jr., and Trawick, Pollock & Nunallee, by Gary E. Trawick, for defendant-appellant."
    ],
    "corrections": "",
    "head_matter": "STATE OF NORTH CAROLINA v. MICHAEL DAVID BONNER\nNo. 875SC1165\n(Filed 20 September 1988)\nEmbezzlement \u00a7 6\u2014 director of continuing education at technical school \u2014 no state funds held in trust \u2014 charge of embezzlement improper\nThe trial court should have dismissed embezzlement charges under N.C.G.S. \u00a7 14-91 for lack of evidence that defendant ever held any state funds in trust as required under that statute, where the evidence tended to show that defendant, as director of continuing education for a technical school, executed contracts with twenty-eight \u201cbogus\u201d instructors to teach nonexistent adult education classes to fictional students, and the bogus instructors then allegedly turned over to defendant a portion of their pay from the technical school; the power entrusted to defendant to hire instructors did not constitute the necessary power to possess or maintain control of the state funds which the school eventually paid those instructors; and defendant\u2019s alleged scheme thus did not misapply state funds he already possessed or could otherwise control but instead deceived those with such control into paying those funds to his co-participants in the scheme.\nAPPEAL by defendant from Tillery (Bradford), Judge. Judgment entered 27 May 1987 in Superior Court, PENDER County. Heard in the Court of Appeals 12 April 1988.\nAttorney General Lacy H. Thornburg, by Assistant Attorney General John F. Maddrey, for the State.\nErdman, Boggs & Harkins, by Harry H. Harkins Jr., and Trawick, Pollock & Nunallee, by Gary E. Trawick, for defendant-appellant."
  },
  "file_name": "0424-01",
  "first_page_order": 452,
  "last_page_order": 455
}
