{ "id": 8564751, "name": "STATE OF NORTH CAROLINA v. JAMES BUDDY WALKER", "name_abbreviation": "State v. Walker", "decision_date": "1978-08-29", "docket_number": "No. 45", "first_page": "510", "last_page": "519", "citations": [ { "type": "official", "cite": "295 N.C. 510" } ], "court": { "name_abbreviation": "N.C.", "id": 9292, "name": "Supreme Court of North Carolina" }, "jurisdiction": { "id": 5, "name_long": "North Carolina", "name": "N.C." }, "cites_to": [ { "cite": "238 S.E. 2d 322", "category": "reporters:state_regional", "reporter": "S.E.2d", "year": 1977, "opinion_index": -1 }, { "cite": "34 N.C. App. 501", "category": "reporters:state", "reporter": "N.C. App.", "year": 1977, "opinion_index": -1 }, { "cite": "287 U.S. 435", "category": "reporters:federal", "reporter": "U.S.", "case_ids": [ 369577 ], "weight": 3, "year": 1932, "opinion_index": 0, "case_paths": [ "/us/287/0435-01" ] }, { "cite": "154 S.E. 2d 485", "category": "reporters:state_regional", "reporter": "S.E.2d", "year": 1967, "opinion_index": 0 }, { "cite": "270 N.C. 357", "category": "reporters:state", "reporter": "N.C.", "case_ids": [ 8568040 ], "year": 1967, "opinion_index": 0, "case_paths": [ "/nc/270/0357-01" ] }, { "cite": "181 S.E. 2d 405", "category": "reporters:state_regional", "reporter": "S.E.2d", "year": 1971, "opinion_index": 0 }, { "cite": "279 N.C. 85", "category": "reporters:state", "reporter": "N.C.", "case_ids": [ 8565770 ], "year": 1971, "opinion_index": 0, "case_paths": [ "/nc/279/0085-01" ] }, { "cite": "215 S.E. 2d 589", "category": "reporters:state_regional", "reporter": "S.E.2d", "year": 1975, "opinion_index": 0 }, { "cite": "288 N.C. 19", "category": "reporters:state", "reporter": "N.C.", "case_ids": [ 8564626 ], "year": 1975, "opinion_index": 0, "case_paths": [ "/nc/288/0019-01" ] }, { "cite": "356 U.S. 369", "category": "reporters:federal", "reporter": "U.S.", "case_ids": [ 6163723 ], "weight": 3, "year": 1958, "opinion_index": 0, "case_paths": [ "/us/356/0369-01" ] }, { "cite": "87 S.E. 2d 191", "category": "reporters:state_regional", "reporter": "S.E.2d", "year": 1955, "pin_cites": [ { "page": "197" } ], "opinion_index": 0 }, { "cite": "242 N.C. 164", "category": "reporters:state", "reporter": "N.C.", "case_ids": [ 8611419 ], "year": 1955, "pin_cites": [ { "page": "173" } ], "opinion_index": 0, "case_paths": [ "/nc/242/0164-01" ] } ], "analysis": { "cardinality": 790, "char_count": 21725, "ocr_confidence": 0.827, "pagerank": { "raw": 4.363442317224516e-07, "percentile": 0.9187329068219807 }, "sha256": "06298a9055ddf0dfadfe6fbe7c1808a3a567b3ebfc12d2bd7faae8d083a29977", "simhash": "1:ab6a3e3e773591f2", "word_count": 3679 }, "last_updated": "2023-07-14T14:50:00.775554+00:00", "provenance": { "date_added": "2019-08-29", "source": "Harvard", "batch": "2018" }, "casebody": { "judges": [], "parties": [ "STATE OF NORTH CAROLINA v. JAMES BUDDY WALKER" ], "opinions": [ { "text": "COPELAND, Justice.\nThe sole assignment of error brought forward by defendant on this appeal challenges the refusal of the trial court to charge the jury on the defense of entrapment. We have determined that this assignment is without merit; therefore, decision of the Court of Appeals must be affirmed.\nIt appears that the first reported consideration of the question of entrapment is found in Genesis 3:13 in which the Creator rejected the plea of Eve, offered in defense of having eaten of the tree of knowledge, that, \u201cThe serpent beguiled me, and I did eat.\u201d\nThis Court has earlier held that, \u201cWhether the defendant was entitled to have the defense of entrapment submitted to the jury is to be determined by the evidence. Before a Trial Court can submit such a defense to the jury there must be some credible evidence tending to support the defendant\u2019s contention that he was a victim of entrapment, as that term is known to the law.\u201d State v. Burnette, 242 N.C. 164, 173, 87 S.E. 2d 191, 197 (1955). The defense of entrapment consists of two elements: (1) acts of persuasion, trickery or fraud carried out by law enforcement officers or their agents to induce a defendant to commit a crime, (2) when the criminal design originated in the minds of the government officials, rather than with the innocent defendant, such that the crime is the product of the creative activity of the law enforcement authorities. Sherman v. United States, 356 U.S. 369, 2 L.Ed. 2d 848, 78 S.Ct. 819 (1958); State v. Stanley, 288 N.C. 19, 215 S.E. 2d 589 (1975); State v. Burnette, supra. In the absence of evidence tending to show both inducement by government agents and that the intention to commit the crime originated not in the mind of the defendant, but with the law enforcement officers, the question of entrapment has not been sufficiently raised to permit its submission to the jury. State v. Fletcher, 279 N.C. 85, 181 S.E. 2d 405 (1971); State v. Coleman, 270 N.C. 357, 154 S.E. 2d 485 (1967); State v. Burnette, supra.\nThe evidence in the instant case relevant to the entrapment issue is as follows: (1) defendant, while on work release from prison during a term imposed on an unrelated drug charge, met with Attorney General Rufus L. Edmisten to discuss supplying information on area drug traffic; (2) the Attorney General agreed to inform the parole board of defendant\u2019s help if the information supplied by defendant proved useful; (3) while still in prison, defendant met with SBI Agent Freeman, who told him about the two heroin sales defendant had made to an undercover agent in early 1975 and, according to defendant\u2019s testimony, informed him that the undercover agent who had purchased the drugs was James Lewis; (4) defendant left this latter meeting with an understanding in his own mind that he was to associate and deal with people in the drug trade and provide more information; (5) when Agent Lewis came to defendant\u2019s house in August of 1976, defendant recognized him as an undercover agent and got drugs for Lewis because he was under the impression that he was supposed to do so in order to get the 1975 drug charges dropped; (6) defendant admitted on cross-examination that he did not feel that, on the basis of his meetings with the Attorney General and Agent Freeman, he had a license to go out and sell heroin; (7) the Attorney General, testifying as a witness for defendant, indicated that at no point did he authorize defendant to work as an undercover agent; (8) on further cross-examination, defendant stated that, although he had sold drugs prior to his 1975 convictions, he had not dealt in drugs after his release from prison in March of 1976, other than the sales to Agent Lewis, and that when a person once had been in the drug business, there was no problem getting information.\nDefendant\u2019s position here is that he understood from his discussions with the Attorney General and SBI Agent Freeman that he was to remain in contact with people in the drug trade and supply information on drug traffic to state law enforcement officials in order to have the 1975 heroin charges dropped. From this defendant asserts that a jury could conclude that when Agent Lewis came to his home and asked defendant to get some heroin for him, defendant, having recognized Lewis as an undercover agent, felt that he was acting in accord with some sort of perceived agreement with the Attorney General and Agent Freeman in procuring the heroin and selling it to Lewis and, consequently, that defendant was entrapped into committing the crimes charged in the indictments here. Nowhere in defendant\u2019s account of these two meetings, however, is there any indication that either of the officials with whom defendant spoke suggested that he sell heroin in the course of his continued association with drug figures. Indeed, as noted above, defendant conceded that he did not feel that he had a license to sell heroin. Defendant further stated that once a person had been in the drug business, there was no difficulty in getting information on the trade. In addition, defendant\u2019s testimony discloses that he neither contacted nor supplied information to any law enforcement official from the time of his November 1975 meeting with Agent Freeman until the day in August of 1976, some five months after defendant\u2019s release from prison, when Agent Lewis appeared at defendant\u2019s residence in his undercover capacity seeking to purchase drugs.\nIt is our conclusion that this evidence is simply insufficient to permit a jury to reasonably infer that any undue persuasion, trickery or fraud was practiced by government agents upon defendant to induce him to carry out the alleged heroin sales in question. The discussions related by defendant concerned only the supplying of information on activities within the drug trade and not active participation by defendant therein. Defendant does not contend that it was necessary for him to involve himself in drug sales in order to obtain knowledge to be transmitted to the authorities. He clearly conceded that information was available to him merely by virtue of his past involvement in the drug business; yet, other than one unsuccessful attempt, defendant failed to seek to communicate with any official so as to supply that which he asserts was the quid pro quo of his alleged agreement with the State.\nActivity on the part of law enforcement agents which brings about the commission of a criminal act by a defendant as a result of the persuasion of the agents constitutes entrapment under our law. State v. Stanley, supra. Defendant\u2019s own evidence here, however, indicates that the earlier persuasion exercised by the State was directed explicitly to a quest for information and that the actions of Agent Lewis on the dates of the purchases were merely in the nature of providing an opportunity for criminal conduct and not excessive inducement. Merely affording opportunities or facilities for the commission of a crime, however, does not amount to entrapment. Sorrells v. United States, 287 U.S. 435, 77 L.Ed. 413, 53 S.Ct. 210 (1932). We therefore hold that the trial court did not err in refusing to submit an instruction on entrapment to the jury and defendant\u2019s assignment of error to the contrary is overruled.\nFor the reasons stated, the decision of the Court of Appeals finding no error in defendant\u2019s trial and conviction is\nAffirmed.", "type": "majority", "author": "COPELAND, Justice." }, { "text": "Justice EXUM\ndissenting.\nI vote for a new trial for failure of the trial court to submit the defense of entrapment to the jury. The legal definition of entrapment is correctly stated in the majority opinion. Defendant\u2019s evidence makes out a classic entrapment defense under this definition. It shows, or provides bases for reasonable inferences, that the crimes charged were induced by the actions of law enforcement officials, that the 1976 sales to James Lewis, an undercover agent with the State Bureau of Investigation (SBI), originated with agents of the state and not the defendant, and that these sales were a product of overtures by Lewis and other officials to defendant rather than defendant\u2019s criminal inclinations.\nThe evidence is undisputed that defendant sold heroin to Lewis while Lewis was an undercover agent for the SBI in March and April, 1975. Defendant had also made other sales in 1975 to which he pleaded guilty and for which he was sentenced to two years imprisonment. Immediately prior to the inception of his prison term he made the sales to Lewis. He was not indicted for these 1975 sales to Lewis until February, 1976. He was arrested therefor in February or March, 1976, and immediately acquired counsel to represent him. While defendant was required to post a $10,000 appearance bond on the charges being tried here, he was released on his own recognizance on the charges arising out of the 1975 sales to Lewis. These charges were pending when defendant dealt with Lewis in August and September, 1976. So far as the record reveals they had not been disposed of at the time of defendant\u2019s trial on the instant charges in November, 1976.\nDefendant testified that he understood these indictments for the 1975 sales to Lewis would be dropped if he continued to cooperate with the SBI in its undercover drug operations. The attorney representing him on these charges, Mr. Douglas DeBank, corroborated his testimony. Mr. DeBank testified that the Attorney General agreed to recommend to the Wake County District Attorney that these charges be dropped in return for defendant\u2019s help. Defendant said he became aware in November, 1975, that the state knew of these 1975 sales to Lewis. He testified:\n\u201cI met with Mr. Freeman [Special Agent and Assistant Supervisor with the SBI] in the last of November. Well, he made me aware of the two sales and asked me did I remember a Mr. James W. Lewis at the time. Mr. Lewis is that gentleman there. He did not tell me what I was going to be charged with those two sales. I was under the impression that if I continued giving them information that the two charges were supposed to be dropped.\nCOURT: Did he say that?\nA. Yes, sir. He said that he would see what he could do about it.\u201d\nDefendant further testified that when Lewis approached him on 17 August 1976 he told Lewis that he had nothing to sell. Lewis then asked, \u201c[W]ould I get something for him and I told him yes I would. I had the impression that that was what I was suppose [sic] to do. When he requested me to get drugs for him I knew that he was an SBI agent. I got it for him because I was under the impression that that was what I was suppose [sic] to do.\u201d\nDefendant readily admitted selling heroin to Lewis on 26 August 1976 and 14 September 1976. His entire defense rested on entrapment. He testified that on 14 September 1976 he was in the presence of a drug dealer when Lewis came to make the purchase. He said, \u201cLewis gave me the money, I gave it to the guy and I gave him the drugs. Lewis gave me the money, I gave it to the dealer and the dealer gave me the drugs and I handed it to him. I felt I was suppose [sic] to help him. The dealer who was at my house on September 14th was \u2018Shaky\u2019. I don\u2019t know his last name.\u201d Defendant further said, \u201cBut I felt like you were trying to make a bust, but I had no idea that he would bust me with it.\u201d\nDefendant\u2019s testimony itself tends to show he was induced to make the 1976 sales to Lewis by agents of the state and that the sales were the product of the creative activity of these agents rather than defendant. Lewis, according to defendant, did more than merely give defendant an opportunity to commit a crime. His words and actions together with defendant\u2019s earlier conversations with other officials made defendant believe he had to comply with Lewis\u2019 request as a part of his earlier agreement to cooperate with the authorities.\nThe majority, however, concludes that the contacts made with defendant by the authorities furnished no reasonable basis for defendant\u2019s belief that he was expected by them to sell heroin to Lewis in August and September, 1976.1 strongly disagree with this assessment of the evidence relating to these contacts. The Attorney General testified that in November or December, 1975, he talked personally with defendant. While making it clear that he made no promises to defendant, the Attorney General did say he agreed to accept information from defendant. He said further, \u201cMr. Walker gave us certain knowledge, certain information. The information did prove helpful. . . . Q. Did you anticipate further information from Mr. Walker? A. I am sure that I was hoping there would be.\u201d\nFreeman testified for the state in rebuttal. He admitted talking with defendant while defendant was in prison in November or December, 1975. He said he requested defendant to cooperate with the SBI in its undercover drug operations and to help it in gathering information. Freeman also admitted that he told defendant \u201cthat our agent had purchased heroin from him and that he would be indicted for that.\u201d Freeman denied mentioning Lewis\u2019 name to defendant and said, \u201cI did not know if [defendant] ever knew who James Lewis was.\u201d\nIt is true that no one, including defendant, testified that any person in an official capacity told defendant expressly that he was to sell drugs to Lewis or to anyone else. Defendant conceded that he had no license to sell heroin generally and that he had avoided doing so since being released from prison. He was, however, supposed to \u201ccooperate\u201d with the state and to assist it in gathering information about illicit drug traffic. Moreover, and most importantly, he says he knew in August and September, 1976, that Lewis was an SBI undercover agent, having been advised of Lewis\u2019 identity by Freeman in November, 1975. Whether Freeman in 1975 expressly advised defendant of Lewis\u2019 identity, it seems reasonable to assume that defendant knew Lewis\u2019 identity at least as early as February or March, 1976, when he was indicted, arrested and acquired counsel in connection with the 1975 sales to Lewis.\nThese arrangements for defendant\u2019s cooperation together with his knowledge of Lewis\u2019 identity form a reasonable, if not a compelling, basis for defendant\u2019s belief that he was supposed to comply with Lewis\u2019 request to acquire and deliver heroin to Lewis. \u201cCooperation\u201d can take many forms. Defendant\u2019s realization that he had no license to sell heroin generally does not detract from his stated belief that he was supposed to cooperate with Lewis whom he knew to be an undercover agent. If defendant, experienced in illicit drug traffic, knew in August and September, 1976, that Lewis was an undercover SBI agent, it is inconceivable that he would have dealt with him other than under the belief that he was expected to do so by the authorities.\nThe question, in essence, is not what the Attorney General, Freeman, and Lewis subjectively intended defendant to do or not to do. The question is what their words and actions might have reasonably led him to believe he was supposed to do. Whether defendant in fact knew Lewis\u2019 identity, whether he sold to Lewis believing this was what the authorities intended him to do, and the reasonableness of defendant\u2019s belief under the circumstances, are crucial factual questions which the jury under proper instructions, and not this Court, should resolve.", "type": "dissent", "author": "Justice EXUM" } ], "attorneys": [ "Joseph Reichbind for defendant appellant.", "Attorney General Rufus L. Edmisten, by Special Deputy Attorney General John R. B. Matthis and Assistant Attorney General Alan S. Hirsch for the State." ], "corrections": "", "head_matter": "STATE OF NORTH CAROLINA v. JAMES BUDDY WALKER\nNo. 45\n(Filed 29 August 1978)\n1. Criminal Law \u00a7 7\u2014 elements of entrapment\nThe defense of entrapment consists of two elements: (1) acts of persuasion, trickery or fraud carried out by law enforcement officers or their agents to induce a defendant to commit a crime, (2) the criminal design originated in the minds of government officials, rather than with the innocent defendant, such that the crime is the product of the creative activity of the law enforcement authorities.\n2. Criminal Law \u00a7 7.1\u2014 entrapment \u2014 insufficient evidence to require instruction\nIn a prosecution for possession of heroin with intent to sell and sale of heroin in 1976, the trial court properly refused to charge the jury on the defense of entrapment where the following evidence relevant to entrapment was presented: (1) defendant, while on work release during a prison term on an unrelated drug charge, met with the N.C. Attorney General to discuss supplying information on area drug traffic, and the Attorney General agreed to inform the parole board if information supplied by defendant proved useful; (2) defendant then gave information to the Attorney General which did prove useful; (3) while still in prison, defendant met with an SBI agent, who told him about two heroin sales defendant had made to an undercover agent in 1975 and, according to defendant\u2019s testimony, informed him of the undercover agent\u2019s name; (4) defendant left the latter meeting with the understanding that charges concerning the 1975 sales would be dropped if he would associate and deal with people in the drug trade and continue to supply information; (5) when the undercover agent came to defendant\u2019s house in 1976, defendant recognized him as such and got drugs for the agent because he was under the impression that he was supposed to do so in order to get the 1975 drug charges dropped; (6) defendant admitted that, on the basis of his meetings with the Attorney General and the SBI agent, he did not feel that he had a license to go out and sell heroin; (7) the Attorney General testified that he did not authorize defendant to work as an undercover agent; (8) defendant testified that he had not dealt in drugs after his release from prison, other than the sales to the undercover agent, and that when a person once had been in the drug business there was no problem getting information; (9) and defendant neither contacted nor supplied information to any law enforcement official from the time of his meeting with the SBI agent until his sale of heroin to the undercover agent some five months after his release from prison.\nJustice Exum dissenting.\nOn indictments proper in form, defendant was charged with and convicted of two counts each of felonious possession of heroin with intent to sell and felonious sale of heroin. The Court of Appeals, 34 N.C. App. 501, 238 S.E. 2d 322 (1977), {Parker, J., concurred in by Morris and Clark, JJ., reported under Rule 30(e)), found no error in defendant\u2019s trial before Bailey, J., 6 November 1976 Session, WAKE Superior Court. We allowed discretionary review 24 January 1978.\nThe State\u2019s evidence tended to show the following facts:\nOn 26 August 1976, James W. Lewis, an undercover drug agent for the State Bureau of Investigation, went to defendant\u2019s residence in Raleigh to find out if defendant was selling drugs and while there purchased two packages of heroin from him for $25.00 each. At the time of this transaction, defendant told Lewis that \u201cthe dope won\u2019t that good\u201d and stated that if Lewis would return the next day, he would give him an extra package free. Lewis returned to defendant\u2019s home on 14 September 1976, at which time defendant sold him two more twenty-five-dollar packages of heroin and gave him a third package free, saying it was the one he had promised Lewis earlier. The sales on these two dates are the subjects of the indictments on which the instant convictions are based. Agent Lewis had made two previous heroin buys from defendant in early 1975, including one in April of that year, when he first became acquainted with defendant.\nDefendant\u2019s evidence tended to show that:\nIn 1975, defendant, on charges unrelated to the sales to Agent Lewis, pleaded guilty to selling heroin and was sentenced to two years imprisonment which commenced on 25 April of that year. While on work release during this imprisonment, defendant was employed at a Howard Johnson Restaurant on Glen wood Avenue. On defendant\u2019s request, his supervisor at the restaurant, who was a friend of North Carolina Attorney General Rufus Ed-misten, arranged a meeting between the Attorney General and defendant in November or December of 1975. At this meeting, the Attorney General agreed that if defendant provided information on area drug traffic he would inform the parole board that defendant had been helpful. Defendant then gave information to the Attorney General which did prove useful. At a later date, defendant met with SBI Agent Joseph Freeman, who informed him of the two heroin sales defendant had made to Agent Lewis earlier in the year. Defendant testified that he left this meeting with an understanding that if he would associate and deal with people in the drug trade and continue to supply information, charges concerning the two 1975 sales would be dropped. Defendant subsequently was released from prison on 30 March 1976. Defendant further testified that he procured and sold the heroin to Agent Lewis in August and September of 1976 because he had been told by Agent Freeman that Lewis was an SBI Agent and it was his understanding that this was what he was supposed to do in order to erase the two 1975 charges.\nOn rebuttal, SBI Agent Freeman testified that he made no promises to defendant during their 1975 meeting, nor did he tell defendant who had made the undercover drug purchases from him in early 1975. In addition, two of defendant\u2019s neighbors testified that during the spring and summer of 1976, they observed defendant frequently hiding and retrieving small packages outside his home and that people often left defendant\u2019s house in a drugged or intoxicated condition.\nAdditional facts relevant to the decision are set out in the opinion.\nJoseph Reichbind for defendant appellant.\nAttorney General Rufus L. Edmisten, by Special Deputy Attorney General John R. B. Matthis and Assistant Attorney General Alan S. Hirsch for the State." }, "file_name": "0510-01", "first_page_order": 542, "last_page_order": 551 }