State v. Robles-Chavira

An unpublished opinion of the North Carolina Court of Appeals does not constitute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. COA25-16

Filed 1 October 2025

Guilford County, No. 22CRS276647-400

STATE OF NORTH CAROLINA

v.

JOSE JESUS ROBLES-CHAVIRA, Defendant.

Appeal by defendant from judgment entered 14 December 2023 by Judge

Susan E. Bray in Guilford County Superior Court. Heard in the Court of Appeals 13

August 2025.

Center for Death Penalty Litigation, by Ryan C. Kuchinski, for defendant-

appellant.

Attorney General Jeff Jackson, by Assistant Attorney General Rana M.

Badwan, for the State.

FLOOD, Judge.

Defendant Jose Jesus Robles-Chavira appeals from the trial court’s judgment

finding him guilty of trafficking in cocaine by possession, trafficking in cocaine by

transportation, and conspiracy to traffic cocaine by possession and transportation. On

appeal, Defendant argues the trial court: first, prejudicially erred in allowing a

STATE V. ROBLES-CHAVIRA

Opinion of the Court

detective lay witness to opine that Defendant’s acquaintance, Saul Garcia-Romero

(“Garcia”), was a drug addict; and second, erred in failing to intervene ex mero motu

when the State improperly commented on Defendant’s constitutional right to plead

not guilty during closing argument. Upon careful review, we conclude Defendant’s

first argument is not preserved for our appellate review, and second, the trial court

did not err in failing to intervene ex mero motu where Defendant has not shown he

was prejudiced by the State’s improper comments made during closing argument.

I. Factual and Procedural Background

In the weeks leading up to 23 August 2022, officers of the Guilford County

Sheriff's office investigated and surveilled Apartment K in Building 3552, located in

Greensboro, North Carolina, for narcotics activity based on a tip they received from

a confidential informant. During the surveillance of Apartment K, officers observed

Defendant enter and exit through the front door of Apartment K using a key. After

Defendant’s girlfriend moved out, Defendant lived alone in Apartment K.

On 23 August 2022, officers observed a silver Kia park in the parking lot in

front of Apartment K. Officers watched Defendant walk from Apartment K to the Kia,

retrieve “a black bag from the vehicle,” return “directly back into Apartment K[,]”

walk back to the Kia with the same bag, leave the bag inside the vehicle, and then

return to Apartment K “empty-handed.” The Kia then “drove away[,]” and soon

thereafter, a red Mercedes SUV pulled into the parking lot, which officers were

“already familiar with” as being “involved in this investigation.”

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Officers observed Defendant, Garcia, and one other person walk from

Apartment K and get into the Mercedes. As the group left Apartment K, Garcia

carried a white bag with “LIMS” written in red, containing what “looked like a

shoebox in the bag.” Once the group entered the Mercedes, the vehicle left the parking

lot, and a mobile surveillance unit began following the Mercedes. At different

locations, the mobile unit observed the Mercedes traveling above the speed limit and

failing to use a turn signal, which prompted officers to conduct a traffic stop.

During a search of the Mercedes, officers located and opened the white bag

with “LIMS” written in red, along with the shoebox, and found a “half kilo of cocaine”

and “a digital scale” inside. As a result of officers finding the cocaine, all occupants of

the vehicle were handcuffed and arrested. The officers questioned Garcia about the

contents of the bag, and Garcia told them that he did not know, stating: “That’s

[Defendant’s] bag, he gave it to me so I can took [sic] it to the car.” At this time,

officers also observed Defendant wearing what appeared to be the same shoes

depicted on the shoebox in which the cocaine was found.

The officers then returned to search Apartment K. Defendant admitted that he

lived at Apartment K, and he consented to a search of Apartment K by the officers.

The search resulted in officers uncovering drug paraphernalia, including “a plate that

had cocaine residue on it or suspected cocaine residue on it[,]” “a box cutter located

on a cutting board with white residue on the tip of the box cutter with the blade out[,]”

“prop money[,]” “packaging material, which [officers] know is consistent with kilo

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Opinion of the Court

wrappers[,]” and a safe. Defendant gave permission for the officers to forcibly open

the safe, which contained “the other half of the kilo of cocaine[.]” Defendant was

charged with two counts of drug trafficking and one count of conspiracy to traffic

drugs.

On 20 February 2023, a grand jury indicted Defendant with: (1) trafficking in

cocaine by possession; (2) trafficking in cocaine by transportation; and (3) conspiracy

to traffic cocaine by possession and transportation. Garcia, however, entered into a

plea deal, promising to testify at Defendant’s trial in exchange for a reduction in his

sentence.

This matter came on for trial on 11 December 2023. At trial, Garcia testified

to using cocaine and that he bought his supply of cocaine from Defendant “twice a

month” at Defendant’s apartment, Apartment K. Garcia explained that, on the day

of their arrest, Defendant had invited Garcia to attend a party with him, and that

Defendant offered to give Garcia “free drugs” for going with him to the party.

During trial, several officers testified, including Detective J.A. Jasso. During

his testimony, Detective Jasso referred to Garcia as a drug addict, and explained that

Garcia likely agreed to go to the party because, based on Detective Jasso’s training

and experience, he “know[s] that addicts or people addicted to this poison or this

substance, are easily persuaded with, obviously this notion of being given narcotics”

and thus “they would agree.” Defendant objected here, but the trial court overruled

the objection.

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During the State’s nearly thirty-page closing argument, the prosecutor

remarked: “Defendant has simply opted to plead not guilty. I don’t think all of this

that’s going on around me, by virtue of his plea of not guilty, he’s insisting he knew

nothing.” Additionally, the prosecutor briefly compared Defendant’s decision to plead

not guilty with Garcia’s decision to plead guilty, arguing that Defendant is “insisting

he knew nothing” in contrast to Garcia who “acknowledged” and “admitted” his

involvement in return for a deal to plead guilty. Defendant did not object to these

remarks.

At the close of trial, the jury returned a guilty verdict. The trial court

consolidated the trafficking by possession and conspiracy charges and sentenced

Defendant to 175 to 222 months of imprisonment for those counts, and sentenced him

to a consecutive 175 to 222 months of imprisonment for the trafficking by

transportation count. Defendant timely appealed.

II. Jurisdiction

This Court has jurisdiction to hear an appeal from a final judgment of a

superior court, pursuant to N.C.G.S. §§ 7A-27(b) and 15A-1444(a) (2023).

III. Analysis

On appeal, Defendant argues the trial court (A) prejudicially erred in allowing

Detective Jasso, a lay witness, to opine that Garcia was a drug addict, and (B) erred

in failing to intervene ex mero motu when the State improperly commented on

Defendant’s constitutional right to plead not guilty during closing argument. We

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address each argument, in turn.

A. Lay Witness

Defendant first argues the trial court abused its discretion and prejudicially

erred in allowing Detective Jasso to testify that Garcia was a drug addict. We hold

this argument is not preserved for our appellate review.

“In order to preserve an issue for appellate review, a party must have

presented to the trial court a timely request, objection, or motion, stating the specific

grounds for the ruling the party desired the court to make if the specific grounds were

not apparent from the context.” N.C. R. App. P. 10(a)(1).

Here, Detective Jasso gave the following relevant testimony concerning Garcia:

Q. Okay. And when you spoke with [Garcia], tell me about

your conversation with him. What if anything did you learn

from him? What was reduced to report form?

A. So, obviously, like many interviews – and I’ll refer to []

Garcia as the perfect example – [] Garcia is what I know to

be in my training and experience an addict. Someone who

is addicted to cocaine, and, obviously, when encountering

law enforcement, they become nervous or scared of the

situation itself.

....

[] Garcia told me that [Defendant] here had told him and

invited him to this party in Danville, and that’s where []

Garcia was believed and thought that they were going.

And, obviously, because of my training and experience, I

know that addicts or people addicted to this poison or this

substance, are easily persuaded with, obviously this notion

of being given narcotics, they would agree.

MR. KOBRIN: Object.

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THE COURT: Overruled. You can answer.

A: That these addicts would agree, and they would do

things like [] Garcia would have done.

(Emphasis added).

Defendant argues Detective Jasso improperly testified as an expert witness by

identifying Garcia as an “addict” and further testifying to his likelihood to be “easily

persuaded” to attend a party where he may be given narcotics. Specifically, Defendant

contends “[s]ubstance-related and addictive disorders are a recognized mental

disorder” so a witness must be qualified as an expert to make this diagnosis and give

this sort of testimony. He argues Detective Jasso was a lay witness and “did not have

the proper expertise or foundation to make such a psychiatric diagnosis of Mr.

Garcia.” We note that Defendant’s one-word objection follows about one- and one-half

pages of Detective Jasso’s answer to a question, and it is not entirely clear which

portion of that answer the objection was directed to. But even if we generously assume

Defendant’s objection was directed to the portion of Detective Jasso’s testimony noted

above and addressed in Defendant’s brief, including both his reference to Garcia as

an “addict” and his tendency to be “easily persuaded,” Defendant did not state any

grounds for the objection at trial and made no argument at trial, either at this point

or at any other time during the trial, regarding the ground he asserts on appeal. See

N.C. R. App. P. 10(a)(1) (“In order to preserve an issue for appellate review, a party

must have presented to the trial court a timely request, objection, or motion, stating

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the specific grounds for the ruling the party desired the court to make if the specific

grounds were not apparent from the context.” (emphasis added)); see also N.C. R. App.

P. 10(a)(4) (“In criminal cases, an issue that was not preserved by objection noted at

trial . . . may be made the basis of an issue presented on appeal when the judicial

action questioned is specifically and distinctly contended to amount to plain error.”).

Here, Defendant’s claimed ground for the objection was not apparent from the context

of the questioning and his objection. See N.C. R. App. P. 10(a)(1).

Defendant argues the ground for his objection was Detective Jasso’s lack of

qualification to testify as an expert witness on diagnosis of substance use disorders

and the behavior of those who suffer from these disorders. Read in context, however,

Detective Jasso’s testimony was not giving an expert medical diagnosis of Garcia. In

Detective Jasso’s testimony leading up to the portion of testimony where Defendant

made the one-word “objection,” Detective Jasso described his law enforcement

experience and training in narcotics investigations, his participation in the

investigation which led to Defendant’s arrest, the arrest of Defendant and the other

men, and his interactions with Garcia after his arrest. Detective Jasso was referring

to Garcia as a person addicted to cocaine based on all the things he observed during

the incident. In addition, Garcia himself testified and admitted that he was a habitual

cocaine user, and that at the time of the incident, his “mentality” was “like oh yeah,

free drugs, free alcohol, let’s go, why not?”

Defendant’s objection was not sufficiently specific to preserve his argument

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regarding Detective Jasso’s testimony for anything other than plain error review.

Our Supreme Court has explained the rationale for this requirement:

The specificity requirement in Rule 10(a)(1) prevents

unnecessary retrials by calling possible error to the

attention of the trial court so that the presiding judge may

take corrective action if it is required. Moreover, a specific

objection discourages gamesmanship, and prevents parties

from allowing evidence to be introduced or other things to

happen during a trial as a matter of trial strategy and then

assigning error to them if the strategy does not work[.]”

Practically speaking, Rule 10(a)(1) contextualizes the

objection for review on appeal, thereby enabling the

appellate court to identify and thoroughly consider the

specific legal question raised by the objecting party. N.C.

R. App. P. 10 drafting committee note, cmt., para. 2,

reprinted in 287 N.C. 698, 700-01 (1975) (“After an

objection at trial, the fact that error will be asserted on

appeal in respect of particular judicial action must be noted

in the record on appeal, first for the benefit of the adverse

party, then for the reviewing court.”).

State v. Bursell, 372 N.C. 196, 199 (2019) (citation modified).

Defendant has not requested plain error review of this issue and has therefore

waived plain error review. See State v. Dawkins, 265 N.C. App. 519, 525 (2019) (“By

failing to ‘specifically and distinctly’ argue that the purported error amounted to plain

error, [the d]efendant has waived plain error review.”); see also State v. Frye, 341 N.C.

470, 496 (1995) (holding the defendant “waived appellate review of [unpreserved]

arguments by failing specifically and distinctly to argue plain error”).

Accordingly, Defendant’s argument regarding Detective Jasso’s testimony was

not preserved for our appellate review. See N.C. R. App. P. 10(a)(1), (4).

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B. Closing Argument

Defendant next argues on appeal that the trial court erred in failing to

intervene ex mero motu when the State improperly commented on Defendant’s

constitutional right to plead not guilty during closing argument. We disagree.

Defendant concedes he did not object to the State’s closing argument, and thus

our review is limited to determining “whether the remarks were so grossly improper

that the trial court committed reversible error by failing to intervene ex mero motu.”

State v. Goins, 377 N.C. 475, 478 (2021) (citation and internal quotation marks

omitted). This requires a two-step analytical inquiry: “(1) whether the argument was

improper; and, if so, (2) whether the argument was so grossly improper as to impede

the defendant’s right to a fair trial. Only when [this Court] finds both an improper

argument and prejudice will this Court conclude that the error merits appropriate

relief.” Id. at 478 (citation omitted). The defendant “has the burden to show a

reasonable possibility that, had the errors in question not been committed, a different

result would have been reached at the trial.” Id. at 478 (citation modified).

“When evaluating the prejudicial effect of an improper closing argument, we

examine the statements in context and in light of the overall factual circumstances

to which they refer.” Id. at 479 (citation modified). This Court has routinely held that

it is improper for a prosecutor to remark on a defendant’s decision to plead not guilty

and exercise his right to a trial by jury. See State v. Goins, 269 N.C. App. 618, 619

(2020), writ allowed, 374 N.C. 262 (2020), rev’d and remanded, 377 N.C. 475 (2021);

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see also State v. Thompson, 118 N.C. App. 33, 42 (1995).

In Goins, the defendant pleaded not guilty for assault with a deadly weapon on

a law enforcement officer and attempted murder. 377 N.C. at 475, 479. A trial was

held, and in closing arguments, the prosecutor made the following remarks without

objection:

[You m]ight ask why would [the defendant] plead not

guilty? I contend to you that the defendant is just

continuing to do what he’s done all along, refuse to take

responsibility for any of his actions. That’s what he does.

He believes the rules do not apply to him. [The defendant’s]

not taking responsibility today. There’s nothing magical

about a not guilty plea to attempted murder. He’s got to

admit to all the other charges. You see them all on video.

The only thing that’s not on video is what’s in his head. He

also knows that those other charges carry less time. There’s

the magic.

Id. at 477 (citation modified). After closing arguments, the trial court explained to the

jury that “[the] defendant is presumed to be innocent, that when a defendant pleads

not guilty he is not required to prove his innocence, and that the State must prove

[the] defendant’s guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.” Id. at 481.

On appeal to this Court, we held the statements were improper and remanded

for a new trial. Goins, 269 N.C. App. at 622. On appeal to our Supreme Court, the

Court reversed, holding that although “the prosecutor’s reference to [the] defendant’s

plea of not guilty was undeniably improper,” “in the context of the entire closing

argument[,] we cannot conclude that the prosecutor’s use of this improper argument

was so overreaching as to shift the focus of the jury from its fact-finding function to

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Opinion of the Court

relying on its own personal prejudices or passions[,]” nor “can we conclude that the

mention of [the] defendant’s choice to plead not guilty so infected the trial with

unfairness as to make the resulting conviction a denial of due process.” Goins, 377

N.C. at 480 (citation modified). Additionally, our Supreme Court noted that “the

judge’s instruction to the jury effectively cured any error[,]” reasoning that “[t]he

judge clearly instructed the jury on their role and made it clear that defendant is

presumed to be innocent, that when a defendant pleads not guilty he is not required

to prove his innocence, and that the State must prove [the] defendant’s guilt beyond

a reasonable doubt.” Id. at 481.

Here, during closing arguments, the prosecutor remarked that “[t]he

Defendant has simply opted to plead not guilty. I don’t think all of this that’s going

on around me, by virtue of his plea of not guilty, he’s insisting he knew nothing.” The

prosecutor also briefly compared Defendant’s decision to plead not guilty with

Garcia’s decision to plead guilty, arguing that Defendant is “insisting he knew

nothing[,]” in contrast to Garcia, who “acknowledged” and “admitted” his involvement

in return for a deal to plead guilty.

While we find these remarks improper, as they discuss Defendant’s right to a

trial by jury, Defendant has failed to show that, had these remarks not been made,

there is a reasonable possibility a different result would have been reached. See id.

at 478. The jury heard overwhelming evidence Defendant was involved with

trafficking cocaine, including that: Officers observed Defendant retrieve a bag from a

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silver Kia, which Defendant later admitted to officers that the driver of the silver Kia

delivered cocaine to Defendant; upon leaving Defendant’s apartment with Defendant,

Garcia carried a white bag with “LIMS” written in red containing a shoebox that had

cocaine inside; Defendant and Garcia then entered a red Mercedes, which was

subsequently stopped by the officers; officers testified that they found a half kilogram

of cocaine in a shoebox that was in a bag in the red Mercedes, while they found

another half kilogram of cocaine in a safe owned by Defendant at his apartment; and

Defendant was wearing the same shoes depicted on the shoebox where the cocaine

was found.

Additionally, like the trial court in Goins, the trial court here effectively cured

this error when it instructed the jury that, “[u]nder our system of justice, when a

defendant pleads not guilty, he is not required to prove his innocence. He is presumed

to be innocent. The State must prove to you that [Defendant] is guilty beyond a

reasonable doubt.” 377 N.C. at 481. We therefore conclude the trial court did not err

in failing to intervene during the State’s closing argument.

IV. Conclusion

Upon careful review, we conclude Defendant’s first argument—that the trial

court prejudicially erred in allowing Detective Jasso to testify that Garcia was a drug

addict—is not preserved for our appellate review, and second, that the trial court did

not err in failing to intervene ex mero motu where Defendant has not shown he was

prejudiced by the State’s improper comments made during closing arguments.

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NO ERROR.

Judges STROUD and FREEMAN concur.

Report per Rule 30(e).

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