Powers Law Firm

June 21, 2026

Embarrassment After Criminal Charges | How Shame Can Make a Bad Situation Worse

Embarrassment after criminal charges may be one of the least discussed but most powerful forces affecting how a case unfolds. Long before a judge hears evidence or a jury enters the courtroom, a lot of defendants are already fighting a private battle with humiliation, regret, fear, damaged pride, and the sudden awareness that others may now see them differently.

Criminal charges can carry consequences beyond the legal system. They can affect family relationships, employment, professional licenses, reputations, friendships, and self-image. For many clients, the emotional fallout begins the moment they are arrested, served with a warrant, receive a citation or traffic ticket, learn they are under investigation, or see their name appear in a court file.

What surprises criminal defense lawyers is not the existence of embarrassment. It is what embarrassment sometimes causes defendants to do.

June 18, 2026

Marijuana Use and Gun Rights in North Carolina | United States Supreme Court Hemani

by Carolina Attorneys

Can the government prohibit firearm possession based on marijuana use?

Marijuana use and firearm possession in North Carolina require a more careful legal analysis after the United States Supreme Court decided United States v. Hemani on June 18, 2026. The decision does not legalize marijuana in North Carolina. It does not allow anyone to carry a concealed handgun while impaired. It does not erase felony firearm bans. What it does is narrow the federal government’s power to treat every unlawful marijuana user as automatically too dangerous to own or possess a firearm.

TL;DR | Marijuana Use & Gun Rights in North Carolina After Hemani

June 18, 2026

How to Work With Your Criminal Defense Lawyer

by Carolina Attorneys

Learning how to work with your criminal defense lawyer can be difficult when you believe the accusation against you is unfair, exaggerated, or legally wrong. That reaction is human. A criminal charge can affect your record, your license, your job, your family, your reputation, your immigration status, and your sense of who you are. Even a traffic ticket can feel personal. When the stakes feel high, especially in cases like DUI, domestic violence, and drug charges, fear can come out as anger, anxiety can make every sentence feel like something to fight, and embarrassment can make even careful advice sound like criticism.

Key Tip | Lawyers want to help. Part of helping is being honest, even when it’s hard to hear. An important part of criminal defense involves explaining the law and clearing up misunderstandings about how the legal system really works.

That is why it makes sense to understand what your defense lawyer likely intends when the questions feel direct, the advice feels uncomfortable, or the conversation does not go the way you expected.

June 6, 2026

Judge Rejects Plea Bargain | What Happens in North Carolina?

by Carolina Attorneys

A plea bargain in North Carolina Superior Court is more than an understanding between lawyers. While a negotiated resolution, the terms and conditions of the plea arrangement are subject to judicial approval.

When a judge rejects a plea deal, the case changes substantially in the courtroom, in real time. A defendant who came to court prepared to resolve the case now faces a different procedural posture and related (potential) long-term consequences of a rejected plea.

The State’s sentencing recommendation no longer controls the path forward. As such, defense lawyers tend to respond immediately, on the record, before the defendant’s transcript answers, factual-basis assent, or sentencing admissions create confusion about what remains usable after the arrangement fails.

May 30, 2026

Racial Bias in Jury Selection | Batson Challenges

by Carolina Attorneys

On May 29, 2026, reporting surrounding the United States Supreme Court’s review of a Mississippi death penalty case again pushed one of the oldest constitutional problems in American criminal law back into public discussion. The issue involves racial discrimination in jury selection under Batson v. Kentucky, 476 U.S. 79 (1986), and whether prosecutors improperly struck black jurors during a capital murder trial.

The opinion matters far beyond Mississippi. Jury selection disputes are a regular aspect of criminal trials in North Carolina. Prosecutors, defense lawyers, and trial judges still wrestle with the practical reality that Batson litigation remains one of the hardest constitutional violations to prove cleanly and one of the easiest constitutional protections to weaken through procedural language. Readers should care because jury selection determines who exercises the power of judgment in a criminal courtroom. A constitutional right means little if discriminatory conduct can be repackaged as “strategy,” “demeanor,” or “trial preference.”

TL;DR Batson Challenges |Racial Bias During Voir Dire Jury Selection

May 24, 2026

Can police come into my house without a Warrant?

by Carolina Attorneys

Police can enter a home without a warrant under the emergency aid exception to the Fourth Amendment’s warrant requirement. Also called the emergency assistance exception or emergency doctrine, this exception permits warrantless home entry when officers have an objectively reasonable basis to believe someone inside is seriously injured or imminently threatened with serious injury. On January 14, 2026, the United States Supreme Court decided Case v. Montana, reaffirming that probable cause is not required for emergency aid entry while rejecting a lower reasonable-suspicion approach. This guide explains when warrantless entry into a home may be lawful, what Case v. Montana changed, and how North Carolina courts will likely apply the doctrine.

Written by Bill Powers, a North Carolina criminal defense lawyer with 33 years (since 1992) of courtroom experience. Bill is a Board-Certified Criminal Law Specialist through the National Board of Trial Advocacy / National Board of Legal Specialty Certification and a former President of the North Carolina Advocates for Justice. Powers Law Firm represents clients in criminal, traffic, and impaired driving matters in the Charlotte area and accepts select serious felony driving and vehicular homicide cases across North Carolina.

Part I: Search Warrants | Constitutional Foundation

May 20, 2026

Traffic Ticket Infractions in North Carolina | Superior Court Jurisdiction

by Carolina Attorneys

On May 20, 2026, the North Carolina Court of Appeals decided State v. Myers, a case that may quietly create one of the stranger jurisdictional and constitutional problems in modern North Carolina traffic-stop litigation. The opinion itself appears relatively narrow at first glance. Superior Court lacks subject-matter jurisdiction to adjudicate contested standalone traffic ticket infractions unless N.C.G.S. § 7A-271(d) applies, even if those infractions are indicted alongside related felony and misdemeanor charges. Digging a bit deeper, the opinion more subtly raises a harder question for defense lawyers going forward. What happens when the alleged traffic infraction is not properly triable in Superior Court, yet that same alleged violation is the entire constitutional basis for the felony stop, detention, seizure, or arrest?

TL;DR: A New Hanover County jury convicted defendant of felony fleeing to elude arrest by motor vehicle and misdemeanor resisting a public officer. The jury also found them responsible for two traffic infractions, those being failure to signal a lane change and failure to carry a valid driver’s license. The Superior Court consolidated the misdemeanor conviction with the infractions and entered judgment. The Court of Appeals vacated the consolidated judgment, holding that Superior Court lacked subject-matter jurisdiction over the contested standalone infractions because they were not lesser-included violations and the defendant did not admit responsibility. The fact that the infractions were included in an indictment returned by a grand jury did not cure the jurisdictional defect.

N.C.G.S. § 7A-253 sets forth that original and exclusive jurisdiction for the adjudication and disposition of infractions lies in District Court, except as provided in N.C.G.S. § 7A-271(d). Superior Court must submit an infraction to the jury when it is a lesser-included violation of a criminal action properly before the court. Superior Court may also accept an admission of responsibility to an infraction when it is either lesser-included or a related charge. Myers did not fit either category. The defendant did not admit responsibility, and the alleged infractions were not lesser-included violations of the felony or misdemeanor charges.

May 19, 2026

Latest North Carolina DWI Conviction Data | What the Numbers Show in 2026

by Carolina Attorneys

North Carolina DWI conviction data show a court system in which most convictions resulted in Level 5 punishment (the lowest level), probation was far more common than an active jail sentence, guilty pleas resolved the overwhelming share of cases, and some convictions took more than one year to reach sentencing. These patterns come from the FY 2024 Quick Facts report, published in October 2025 by the North Carolina Sentencing and Policy Advisory Commission, which is the latest official statewide DWI conviction dataset currently available from NC Courts.

The report is useful because it gives a statewide snapshot of convictions. It is limited because it does not tell you whether a pending DWI charge in 2026 will be contested, negotiated, tried, or resolved by plea.

TL;DR | The latest official North Carolina DWI Quick Facts report, published in October 2025, analyzes FY 2024 conviction data. It reports 24,694 DWI convictions, with 58% sentenced at Level 5, 94% receiving probation, 6% receiving an active sentence, and 92% resolved by guilty plea. The report does not include arrests, dismissals, pending cases, acquittals, reduced charges, DMV consequences, or case activity after the reporting period. NC Courts has not published a fixed release date for the calendar year 2025 report.

May 16, 2026

Child Facing Criminal Charges? | Don’t Be a Helicopter Parent

by Carolina Attorneys

WARNING: If your child is facing criminal charges in Charlotte and you don’t want to hear the truth, STOP READING NOW. This blog post isn’t for you. If you want to know how things really work in the legal system, from experienced defense lawyers who honestly care but also tell it like it is, what follows might save you a whole lot of heartache and pain.

Starting off, know this:

Defense lawyers understand your child is a good person

May 13, 2026

Proof of DWI Charges in North Carolina | Operation of a Vehicle

by Carolina Attorneys

Proof of DWI charges in North Carolina does not always require an officer to see the vehicle move or the defendant behind the wheel. In State v. Trexler, the North Carolina Supreme Court sets forth what evidence can prove the operation of a vehicle (a prima facie essential element of the offense) when law enforcement arrives after a crash and determines who was driving from statements, including confessions, physical and forensic evidence, witness observations, and the surrounding circumstances.

Trexler matters because of the State’s Burden of Proof. An overturned vehicle, signs of impairment, a breath test result, and a defendant’s statements may be enough in one case, but not so in another. The legal question (and factual inquiry) involves whether the evidence proves more than the defendant’s mere presence near a wrecked car supports a reasonable inference, sometimes predicated on circumstantial evidence, that the person charged actually drove while impaired.

TL;DR | Trexler, Prima Facie Proof of Operation, Corpus Delicti, and the State’s Burden