State v. Brown

An unpublished opinion of the North Carolina Court of Appeals does not constitute

controlling legal authority. Citation is disfavored, but may be permitted in accordance with

the provisions of Rule 30(e)(3) of the North Carolina Rules of Appellate Procedure.

IN THE COURT OF APPEALS OF NORTH CAROLINA

No. COA24-991

Filed 20 August 2025

Durham County, No. 23 CR 296185-310

STATE OF NORTH CAROLINA

v.

JANESSIA MICHELLE BROWN

Appeal by defendant from judgment entered 20 February 2024 by Judge

Brenda G. Branch in Durham County Superior Court. Heard in the Court of Appeals

31 July 2025.

Attorney General Jeff Jackson, by Assistant Attorney General Charles G. White,

for the State.

King & Moss, PLLC, by John W. Moss, for defendant.

PER CURIAM.

The issue on appeal is whether the trial court erred in admitting into evidence

video surveillance footage (“Exhibit 5”) from a car wash. For the following reasons,

we find no error.

I. Background

On 4 March 2023, Brandi Hunt, her boyfriend Eugene Clayton, her aunt, and

STATE V. BROWN

Opinion of the Court

her two-year-old son went to a car wash in Durham, North Carolina. {T 125-26}

Hunt sat in the passenger seat, while Clayton drove. {T 126-27} A McDonald’s was

located next to the car wash. {T 126} As Hunt and the others exited the vehicle,

defendant ran up from a car at the McDonald’s drive-thru and leaped into the

passenger side of the car, trying to get at Clayton. {T 127} When she could not reach

him, she began hitting Hunt in the face. {T 127} Defendant’s friends, who had been

with her at McDonald’s, helped Clayton and the aunt pull defendant off Hunt. {T

128} A few days later, Hunt’s left eye had swollen shut, so she went to the emergency

room and was treated for a fracture to the orbital bone. {T 131-32}

Eventually, Hunt reported the incident to the police. {T 134} Along with her

report, she provided a recording of a phone call allegedly between defendant and

Clayton. {T 138-39} Although the parties disagreed on the validity of the phone call,

the evidence tended to show that defendant called Clayton a few days after the

incident. {T 166} They were previously involved romantically, and defendant

testified to an ongoing dispute between them regarding the paternity of her child. {T

242, 245} In the recording, Clayton referred to the caller as “Neesha,” a nickname

only he used for defendant. {T 247} The recorded dialogue included what appeared

to be defendant’s admission to the assault: {T 166-69; State Ex. 3}

Clayton: Neesha, you ain’t have to punch that girl in the

face.

Caller: No, I didn’t. I didn’t have to do s*** to her. But

she—I wanted to talk to you, and I couldn’t get to you, so

-2-

STATE V. BROWN

Opinion of the Court

she had to take them licks.

Investigator Joel Turner of the Durham Police Department was assigned to

the case. {T 196} On 15 March 2023, he visited the car wash and watched

surveillance footage of the incident. {T 201} When he was unable to download the

video, Turner asked William McFadyen, Digital Forensics Supervisor for the police

department, to retrieve it. {T 201} Relevant questioning of McFadyen by the State

prosecutor included:

McFadyen: The video that [Turner] requested . . . was a

Avert X Digital Video Recorder. I was able to copy the

video from the video recorder onto a flash drive. I then took

the flash drive back to my office and put it in—what we

have is Foray; it is a digital storage for our video and

pictures.

State: And can you describe how you upload the video to

Foray?

McFadyen: The video is, like I said, downloaded onto a

flash drive. Once I get back to the office—it is cloud based

through the web—so the video was uploaded through the

web into the storage.

...

State: Did you alter or change the video in any way?

McFadyen: I did not.

State: Can the video be altered after being uploaded to

Foray?

McFadyen: One it’s in Foray, it cannot be altered. It can

be viewed, and it can be downloaded out of Foray, but it

cannot be changed once it’s in there. {T 192-93}

-3-

STATE V. BROWN

Opinion of the Court

Both Turner and McFadyen rewatched the video (“Exhibit 5”) during the trial

and confirmed that it was the same, unaltered footage they viewed in March. {T 194,

202-03} Defendant did not object to admission of the video surveillance footage

during the trial. {T 206}

The jury found defendant guilty of assault inflicting serious injury, but not

guilty of assault inflicting serious bodily injury. She was sentenced to sixty-days in

jail, suspended with ten days in active confinement and twenty-four months of

probation. {R 31, 34-38} Defendant orally appealed on 20 February 2024. {R 39}

II. Discussion

Defendant argues that Exhibit 5 lacked sufficient foundation to be admitted

into evidence. As she did not object during the trial, review is limited to plain error.

N.C. R. App. P. 10(a)(4); see State v. Reber, 386 N.C. 153, 157, 900 S.E.2d 781, 785

(2024). The burden of proof is on defendant to show that (1) “a fundamental error

occurred at trial”; (2) “absent the error, the jury probably would have returned a

different verdict,” resulting in prejudice; and (3) the error is an “exceptional case”

which affects “the fairness, integrity or public reputation of judicial proceedings.”

Reber, 900 S.E.2d at 786–87.

Surveillance footage may be admitted into evidence “upon laying a proper

foundation” for illustrative or substantive purposes. N.C. Gen. Stat. § 8–97. Rule 901

of the Rules of Evidence requires “authentication or identification . . . by evidence

sufficient to support a finding that the matter in question is what its proponent

-4-

STATE V. BROWN

Opinion of the Court

claims.” N.C. Gen. Stat. § 8C–1, Rule 901. In reviewing the foundation for

admissibility of a videotape, this Court generally considers the maintenance and

operational ability of the taping system, the accuracy of the events depicted, and the

chain of custody of the video. State v. Jones, 176 N.C. App. 678, 683, 627 S.E.2d 265,

268 (2006) (quoting State v. Mason, 144 N.C. App. 20, 26, 550 S.E.2d 10, 15 (2001).

“Evidence that the recording process is reliable and that the video introduced at trial

is the same video that was produced by the recording process is sufficient to

authenticate the video and lay a proper foundation for its admission as substantive

evidence.” State v. Snead, 368 N.C. 811, 814, 783 S.E.2d 733, 736 (2016).

After careful review of the record and transcript, we conclude that there is no

plain error. First, the witness testimony of McFadyen and Turner lays a proper

foundation for the video’s admission into evidence. McFadyen provided a description

of the equipment used at the car wash, detailed how he retrieved the footage,

accounted for its chain of custody, and verified that it had not been altered. Turner

also confirmed that the video presented to the jury was the same footage he had seen

at the car wash. See State v. Jones, 288 N.C. App. 175, 188, 884 S.E.2d 782, 793–94

(2023) [hereinafter Jones II] (“[V]ideo surveillance can be authenticated by a witness

testifying the video ‘accurately depicted events that he had observed.’ ” (internal

citations omitted)); see also Snead, 368 N.C. at 814, 783 S.E.2d at 736; State v.

Fleming, 247 N.C. App. 812, 817, 786 S.E.2d 760, 765–66 (2016) (concluding that an

investigating officer’s testimony on the functionality of the video system was

-5-

STATE V. BROWN

Opinion of the Court

sufficient authentication). In addition, the two other witnesses, Hunt and Clayton,

corroborated the content of the video with their congruous descriptions of the

incident. See Jones II, 288 N.C. App. at 188, 884 S.E.2d at 794 (“[T]he fact that [the

witness’] description matched the footage proves further support for the reliability of

the surveillance footage . . . .”).

Defendant argues that the trial court plainly erred by admitting Exhibit 5 into

evidence because no witness testified to the reliability of the camera system or the

condition of the video. We disagree. The mere lack of witness testimony to the

equipment’s functionality does not constitute plain error without more. Jones, 176

N.C. App. at 682, 627 S.E.2d at 268. In Jones, this Court held that defendant must

show that if she had objected on the grounds of authentication to the admission of a

videotape during the trial, the State would not have been able to supply the necessary

foundation. Id. “Since defendant has made no showing that the foundational

prerequisites . . . could not have been supplied and pointed to nothing suggesting that

the videotape in this case is inaccurate or otherwise flawed,” we cannot conclude that

there was a fundamental error or that this is an “exceptional case” of injustice. Id. at

684, 627 S.E.2d at 269.

Further, defendant has failed to meet her burden of showing that the jury

probably would have failed to convict, absent the video evidence. In State v. Moore,

the defendant was found guilty of various crimes after initiating a high-speed car

chase in an attempt to avoid arrest. State v. Moore, 254 N.C. App. 544, 545, 803

-6-

STATE V. BROWN

Opinion of the Court

S.E.2d 196, 199 (2017). Video surveillance from a gas station showed the defendant

getting into the same car engaged in the chase. Id. Although the court concluded

that the State failed to offer a proper foundation for the video’s admission into

evidence, the defendant’s own confession to the crime undermined this fact. Id. at

566, 803 S.E.2d at 211. Therefore, the court ultimately held that the admission of

the video was non-prejudicial and did not constitute plain error. Id.

Here, the recorded phone call between defendant and Clayton functions as a

recorded admission to the assault. As in Moore, this undermines the plain error

argument of prejudice. See also Snead, 368 N.C. at 815 (“Given that defendant freely

admitted that he is one of the two people seen in the video [committing the crime], he

offered the trial court no reason to doubt the reliability or accuracy of the footage

contained in the video.”) The State also adduced ample other evidence of defendant’s

guilt, including eyewitness testimony by Hunt and Clayton which perfectly described

the content of the video prior to its presentation in the courtroom.

Thus, we hold that admission of the video was not prejudicial.

III. Conclusion

As we are unpersuaded by the assertion that the footage is unreliable and do

not think it probable that the jury would have returned a different result, we conclude

that there is no plain error.

NO ERROR.

Panel consisting of Judges ARROWOOD, STADING, and MURRY.

-7-

STATE V. BROWN

Opinion of the Court

Report per Rule 30(e).

-8-