Drugs

What do you get when you combine a routine traffic stop with the driver's criminal history, several air fresheners in the car, driving from a job interview, and the driver's movements while looking for proof of insurance? Knoxville, Tenn. drug interdiction officer: Reasonable suspicion of drugs that justifies prolonging the stop to request a drug dog? (Which reveals an illegal gun but no drugs.) Sixth Circuit: No! And no good-faith exception. Evidence of the illegal gun should have been suppressed.

The Department of Justice (DOJ) announced that the DEA will cease its "cold consent encounters" at airports, during which agents demand to search people's bags while telling them things like, "I don't need your consent." The suspension coincides with an inspector general report condemning the practice (access full artic

The Commission released its Preliminary FY24 Fourth Quarterly Sentencing Update.

In FY24, 61,137 individuals were sentenced federally—representing a decrease from the previous fiscal year.  Nearly equal proportions of individuals were sentenced for a drug (30.0%) or immigration (29.7%) offense.

With warrant, Cleveland police searched a suspected drug dealer's house. Out on the street, an officer peers into the tinted windows of a car of a person found in the suspected dealer's home—but the car was not mentioned in the warrant—and sees what he suspects is a "bag of dope." Officers tow the car but don't get a warrant. Turns out it, indeed, was "dope." Man: the search of my car is unconstitutional because police need a warrant. Police: we don't need a warrant because drugs were in plain view and here's a video of officers peering into the car and the photo taken inside the car.

Yesterday, the United States Sentencing Commission issued a press release announcing proposed amendments to the federal sentencing guidelines for the amendment cycle ending May 1, 2025.  Among the proposals are those that would:

A Mississippi federal court declared opposition to federal sentencing guidelines for methamphetamine offenses, and sentenced an admitted drug offender lower than prescribed by the U.S. Sentencing Commission’s guidelines.

Citing DEA date, the court rejected the guidelines' reasoning that purer methamphetamine is indicative of a defendant’s role in criminal drug trafficking because it is not based on empirical data. This reasoning is “divorced from reality.”

Kannapolis, N.C. police officer Jeremy Page catches drug dealer/informant selling crack but says he won't arrest drug dealer if he hands over any other drugs he has and does more to help the police. He agrees, hands over more drugs, and helps police find a fugitive. Officer then decides that's not enough, swears out arrest warrants, and more drugs are found during arrest. Is cop's non-arrest-for-cooperation deal enforceable?

Title 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(3) bans gun possession by anyone "who is an unlawful user of or addicted to any controlled substance." Man is pulled over for driving without a license plate. Officers, one of whom is DEA, find guns and marihuana cigarette butts. He's sentenced to nearly four years in prison (and three years of supervised release) for being an "unlawful user" of a controlled substance while possessing a gun. Fifth Circuit: Conviction reversed. The gov't didn't show he was high at the time he was stopped.

Doctor is convicted of running pill mill based on 13 counts of unlawfully dispensing schedule II controlled substances (one count for each unlawful prescription). At trial, the government put on evidence of many prescriptions beyond the ones in the indictment. That evidence came from the government’s statistician and its medical expert.

Law enforcement agents sometimes find unlawul drugs concealed in vehicles attempting to cross into the United States from Mexico. The drivers of these vehicles commonly deny knowledge of the drugs, arguing they are unknowing couriers, aka "blind mules."  Of course, in a prosecution for importation of illegal drugs, the government must prove that the defendant knew she was transporting drugs in order to separate wrongful conduct from innocent conduct. Proving the knowledge element has led to a circuit split: