The question whether one can “knowingly” possess drugs without having actual knowledge of it has always vexed defense counsel - and has even confused the courts. More than 30 years ago, the Ninth Circuit attempted to resolve that issue by holding, in U.S. v. Jewell, 532 F.2d 679 (9th Cir. ...

John Clay was convicted at trial of possession of pseudoephedrine, with reasonable cause to believe it would be used in the manufacture of methamphetamine. He was also acquitted of a more serious charge of conspiracy to manufacture some 1.5 kilograms of methamphetamine - although that acquittal made little difference in ...

A year prior to this decisions, the First Circuit issued an en banc decision in U.S. v. Jiménez-Beltre, 440 F.3d 514 (1st Cir. March 9, 2006) (P&J, 02/06/06) “to provide stable guidance in this circuit for the determination and review of post-Booker sentences." The instant decision provides one of the ...

Almost more certain than death and taxes is the inevitably of Congress taking a popular statute and milking it, time and time again, to create an ever expanding mantle of Governmental regulation over our lives. A good example of that type of inexorable legislative expansion is the Federal DNA statutes, ...