CHARLOTTE, N.C. — The North Carolina Court of Appeals upheld the convictions for a man found guilty of killing two people and injuring two others in a 2019 shooting in south Charlotte.
Caldwell Cole, 82, was found guilty in a July 2023 trial of two counts of first-degree murder, two counts of attempted murder, and one count of discharging a weapon into a home to incite fear. He was sentenced to life in prison, specifically being given two life sentences for each murder charge and decades of additional years for the remaining charges.
Cole argued that the Mecklenburg County Court erred by denying his dismissal motion on two of the charges, providing jury instructions that effectively canceled his self-defense arguments, denying his request that the jury be instructed on his defense of accident, and committing double jeopardy by charging him with the one count of discharging into a home. The appeals court rejected all of these arguments…