If you are facing criminal charges in North Carolina, recent court decisions may directly affect what evidence your lawyer can obtain and how quickly that evidence becomes available. One of the most important of these rulings is State v. Chemuti, a decision that changes how body-camera and dash-camera recordings are requested, reviewed, and used in criminal cases.
Access to law-enforcement video can shape suppression motions, plea negotiations, and trial strategy. When that access is delayed or restricted, the balance of a criminal case may shift in ways that are difficult to correct later. Understanding how discovery works after Chemuti is therefore part of protecting your legal rights from the earliest stage of a prosecution.
For questions about criminal discovery, suppression issues, or how recent North Carolina case law may affect your defense, Bill Powers is available for legal consultation at Powers Law Firm. Call 704-342-4357 to schedule a confidential consultation. Bill Powers is a trial lawyer with more than three decades of courtroom experience handling criminal defense matters in North Carolina, a past President of the North Carolina Advocates for Justice, and a recipient of the James B. McMillan Distinguished Service Award.
State v. Chemuti | The Statutory Gate Controlling Access to Law-Enforcement Recordings
The Holding and Its Immediate Consequences
State v. Chemuti resolved a recurring discovery dispute arising in Iredell County that produced occasionally inconsistent trial-court rulings across North Carolina for years. The primary issue involves whether a criminal defendant can compel production of body-camera and dash-camera footage through a district-court subpoena, or whether the detailed statutory procedure in N.C.G.S. § 132-1.4A provides the exclusive mechanism for obtaining such recordings.
TL;DR: The North Carolina Supreme Court held that the statute is exclusive. A defendant seeking law-enforcement recordings must file a petition in superior court under the statutory framework. A Rule 45 subpoena issued in district court cannot compel disclosure, even when the recordings are central to evaluating probable cause, officer credibility, or impairment evidence.
Criminal Discovery After State v. Chemuti in North Carolina
| Issue | Before Chemuti | After Chemuti |
|---|---|---|
| How defense obtains body-cam or dash-cam video | District court subpoena commonly used | Superior court petition under N.C.G.S. § 132-1.4A required |
| Speed of access to recordings | Often early in district court process | May take weeks or months depending on petition and ruling |
| Court handling disclosure disputes | District court motion practice | Separate superior court litigation |
| Impact on suppression hearings | Video frequently available | Suppression may proceed without video if petition not resolved |
| Effect on plea negotiations | Negotiations informed by recordings | Negotiations may occur before disclosure |
| Constitutional rights to evidence | Still protected | Must be asserted within statutory petition framework |
| Appeal rights if disclosure denied | Limited and unclear | Interlocutory appeal permitted because substantial right affected |
| Overall defense strategy | Routine subpoena investigation | Early superior court litigation and preservation may be necessary |
This holding changes the practical meaning of discovery in district court criminal practice. For decades, defense lawyers treated subpoenas as a routine investigative tool. If officers arrested a defendant and body-camera footage existed, counsel issued a subpoena, and agencies either complied or objected on narrow grounds. Disputes were resolved informally or through motion practice in the court where the case was pending.
Chemuti eliminates that pathway. The statute now functions as a procedural gate. Compelled disclosure requires:
- Filing a petition in superior court (not the court where the criminal case is pending if that court is district court)
- Providing notice to the law-enforcement agency
- Demonstrating grounds for disclosure under statutory standards that balance confidentiality against the defendant’s need for evidence;
- Obtaining a judicial order that may include conditions, redactions, or protective measures.
The additional, and to some extent burdensome procedural protocols matter. They introduce the potential for substantial delay, separate litigation costs, and the risk that critical evidence remains inaccessible during the early stages of case development when suppression motions, plea negotiations, and trial preparation ordinarily occur in District Court proceedings.
What the Decision Does Not Say
Chemuti does not hold that defendants lack a constitutional right to evidence necessary for a defense. The Court explicitly preserved that principle. The opinion states that the statutory procedure does not extinguish due process or compulsory process protections. Trial courts remain obligated to safeguard those rights even while enforcing statutory confidentiality.
The nuance (critical for litigation) is that constitutional entitlement and procedural access are, in large measure, no longer synonymous. A defendant may possess a constitutional right to a recording while simultaneously being required to pursue disclosure through the statutory petition process. The constitutional question becomes whether denial or delay of the petition in a given case interferes with the right to present a defense.
This creates a litigation pathway that many criminal defense practitioners have yet to navigate. One would be remiss in failing to note, some jurisdictions may choose voluntary disclosure of video materials without Superior Court litigation. The appellate court specificly references that possibility in its opinion.
That said, the matter came up for appeal because the local District Attorney in District Attorney refused to provide video materials, despite that being a common practice in many, if not most judicial districts across the state.
Assuming the State (and local law enforcement agencies) take a stiff-necked approach to the issue, defense counsel will be required to file a Superior Court pleading and argue that the statutory process, as applied to specific facts, cannot constitutionally bar access to evidence that is indispensable to testing the State’s case. That argument may in fact necessitate proof of:
- What the recording is likely to show
- Why that content is essential to a viable defense theory
- How delay or denial undermines preparation or trial fairness
- Why alternative evidence cannot substitute for the recording.
Generic assertions that “the video is important” likely will not satisfy this burden. Courts applying Chemuti very well could expect concrete factual showings tied to the elements of the charged offense and the anticipated defenses.
Immediate Strategic Implications
The first strategic consequence is chronological. Evidence that previously became available early in district court proceedings may now remain inaccessible until after a superior court petition is filed, noticed, and ruled upon. That delay can span weeks or months, depending on docket congestion and the aggressiveness of the law enforcement agency’s response posture.
BWC – Body Worn Camera and “Dash Cam” recordings may be the only evidence capable of impeaching officer testimony or corroborating the defendant’s version of events, including but not limited to:
- Cases involving DWI prosecutions where the defendant contests probable cause for the stop, reasonable suspicion for the investigation, or the officer’s impairment observations.
- Resisting arrest or assault on a government official charges where the sequence of events and the defendant’s conduct are disputed.
- Use-of-force encounters where officer conduct is central to self-defense or defense-of-others claims.
In the unfortunate event that video-evidence is unavailable when a suppression motion is argued or when plea negotiations occur, the defendant litigates and negotiates from a substantially limited, if not weakened, evidentiary posture.
Prosecutors may be tempted to rely on officer narratives without visual contradiction, subject to Rule 3.8 Special Responsibilities of a Prosecutor and Brady. Trial courts could be called to resolve credibility disputes and Fourth Amendment reasonableness without the most probative evidence available, that being video evidence.
The second strategic consequence concerns suppression litigation specifically.
Suppression motions frequently depend on whether the Court (the Judge) believes the officer’s account of what happened. When the recording shows something different (a longer detention than the officer described, a more aggressive encounter than the report reflected, impairment indicators that the officer exaggerated), the motion’s likelihood of success can change materially.
Under Chemuti, that evidence may not be available at the suppression hearing unless counsel initiated the petition process early enough to secure disclosure before the hearing date. Failure to do so could mean litigating suppression without the evidence that might defeat the State’s version of facts.
The third strategic consequence is systemic, if not systematic.
Chemuti shifts part of routine district court case preparation into a separate superior court litigation stream. That could be problematic at best and paralyze Superior Courts throughout North Carolina at worst.
Fortunately, pressure from the bench might encourage voluntary disclosure agreements where agencies prefer efficiency over contested petition litigation. That could foreseeably include protective orders that allow disclosure with conditions rather than outright denial and more standardized judicial practices in superior courts handling recording petitions on a recurring basis.
Defense counsel would be wise to acknowledge that agencies and prosecutors now have strategic incentives around timing and disclosure. An agency that delays response to a petition, or that seeks protective conditions that limit how recordings can be used, may be attempting to constrain the defendant’s litigation posture while complying nominally with Chemuti. One would hope that never comes to fruition, as the disclosure of exculpatory evidence very much remains a condition precedent for justice and good faith compliance with both Constitutional and statutory precepts.
Preservation and Constitutional Litigation
Chemuti also clarifies that orders compelling or denying disclosure of confidential recordings affect a substantial right and are immediately appealable on an interloculatory basis. One might surmise this creates an appellate pathway in pretrial discovery disputes that did not exist before.
For defense counsel, that means two things:
First, denial of a petition should trigger immediate consideration of interlocutory appeal if the recording is essential to a viable defense and no adequate substitute exists. Waiting until after conviction to raise the issue may produce harmless-error analysis that assumes other evidence was sufficient to convict.
Second, constitutional arguments must be preserved in the petition and at any hearing and on the record. If the Superior Court denies disclosure on statutory grounds without addressing whether denial violates due process or compulsory process, appellate review may be constrained by inadequate preservation.
The constitutional framing should therefore identify the specific defense theory the recording supports, why the recording is not cumulative of other available evidence, how denial materially impairs the ability to test the State’s case or present exculpatory evidence, and whether the statutory confidentiality interest can be safeguarded through protective conditions rather than outright denial.
Interaction With Other Developments
Chemuti’s effect may be further amplified when considered alongside other developments addressed herein infra. State v. Rogers narrows suppression remedies by permitting admission of evidence when officers relied in objective good faith on legal authority later deemed insufficient. Defeating a good-faith claim could require a showing that officers omitted material facts, acted beyond the scope of authorization, or disregarded evidence undermining their legal justification for a Search Warrant.
Without video evidence showing what actually occurred and in what sequence, proving those facts becomes significantly harder. Chemuti and Rogers could interact with synergistic effect. The statutory gate that delays access to recordings, combined with a “good-faith” framework that requires detailed factual showings to produce a system where suppression becomes more difficult to obtain in practice.
What State v. Chemuti Means for Your Criminal Defense in North Carolina
The practical impact of State v. Chemuti is not limited to courtroom procedure. The decision changes how quickly critical evidence becomes available and how defense strategy must be developed at the beginning of a criminal case. When access to video evidence requires separate litigation in superior court, timing, preparation, and legal guidance take on greater importance.
Anyone accused of a crime in North Carolina should understand that discovery rules continue to evolve through appellate decisions and statutory interpretation. Early legal advice can determine whether evidence is preserved, whether constitutional arguments are properly raised, and whether the defense is positioned to challenge the State’s case effectively.
Bill Powers at Powers Law Firm is a North Carolina trial lawyer with more than three decades of experience handling DWI and Fourth Amendment cases and is a past President of the North Carolina Advocates for Justice and a recipient of the James B. McMillan Distinguished Service Award.