Larceny charge in North Carolina? Here’s what you should know. Larceny, the legal term for theft, can have serious consequences in North Carolina, even for misdemeanors. A criminal record can impact your job prospects and future opportunities. Here’s what to do if you’re facing a larceny charge:
- Know your rights
- Consider the impact on your employment, housing, and even your ability to volunteer
- Get legal help from a seasoned North Carolina theft and larceny lawyer to help you navigate the legal process
Don’t wait. Contact an experienced criminal defense attorney today to discuss your case.
Larceny is a legal term for theft or stealing. A larceny occurs when one person takes and carries away the property of another, that the other had the right to possess, they didn’t even have to own it, and that person who takes and carries away the property did it with the intent to permanently deprive them of the use of that property, knowing that they were not allowed to possess it.
Larcenies are class one misdemeanors in North Carolina. That’s the second-highest misdemeanor there is in North Carolina. They can result in active sentences.
Even a charge of larceny without a conviction does look bad on a criminal record. Employers, when they’re doing background checks of potential employees, are looking for trustworthiness, and someone that they can trust to handle their property, their money, their finances, their information, so they’re gonna look for truthfulness. A larceny charge often goes to truthfulness. I’ve seen in my own client’s experiences where they have– even just a charge itself has kept them from valuable jobs.
Larcenies are one of the most common crimes charged in North Carolina. They’re typically brought in relation to big-box chain stores such as Walmart, Target, and other things like that. They often occur around self-checkout, where people change the price tag, which is a different type of larceny, or shoplifting, which is another type of larceny.
Oftentimes, law enforcement does not even personally observe a larceny occurring, but the charges still occur. Stores have a loss prevention staff whose job it is to monitor potential larcenies. What they will do is often stop you, ask you to make a statement, and that statement will be given to law enforcement, and that’s where the charge is gonna result from.
The Fifth Amendment protects you from having to make any statement against your self-interest. I would advise not speaking to any law enforcement personnel, or loss prevention officers, or any non-attorney about any criminal matter, without an attorney present. Any statement you make to loss prevention or law enforcement can be used against you at trial, and often will be one of the central pieces of evidence against you in a larceny.
If I never made a statement to law enforcement, and law enforcement never even saw me take the property, can I still be prosecuted for larceny? Unfortunately, yes, the loss prevention officers or the witnesses to the larceny can still appear and testify against you in court. Now the Sixth Amendment gives you the right to confront any witnesses against you, so you must speak to an attorney to make sure the state has all the correct witnesses there.
An employer or a big box chain store cannot simply rely on a recording that has not been authenticated as evidence against you. The best evidence concerns, as well as confrontational concerns that may violate your Sixth Amendment right. It’s important to have an attorney present to make sure that there are proper objections to any evidence that should not come in against you.
