A Chemisty lesson from the US Supreme Court
Courthouse News Service
Thursday, June 09, 2011
Supreme Court Tips the Scales on Crack Cocaine
(CN) - A "cocaine base," as mentioned in sentencing guidelines
for drug offenses, encompasses all types of cocaine in their
chemically basic form, as well as crack cocaine, the Supreme Court
ruled Thursday.
The combination of coca leaves and other ingredients produces
"coca paste," cocaine in its base form that can be smoked, and
that paste can be turned into the salt form with the addition of
water and hydrochloric acid.
This powder is not a base, and it can be snorted, or converted
into crack with the addition of baking soda and water, or made
into "freebase" when dissolved in ammonia and water.
"Chemically, therefore, there is no difference between the
cocaine in coca paste, crack cocaine, and freebase - all are cocaine
in its base form," according to the lead opinion authored by
Justice Sonia Sotomayor. "On the other hand, cocaine in its base
form and in its salt form (i.e., cocaine hydrochloride) are
chemically different, though they have the same active ingredient
and produce the same physiological and psychotropic effects."
Frantz DePierre was arrested in 2005 for 55.1 grams of drugs to
a government informant, and the court determined that the drugs
were cocaine base.
Since crimes involving 50 grams or more of cocaine-based
drugs carry minimum 10-year sentences, the jury imposed that
sentence on DePierre. In his unsuccessful appeal to the 1st Circuit,
DePierre argued that the minimum sentence applies only to crimes
involving crack, and that the drugs he sold could not be properly
established as crack since it had the same ingredients as other
forms of cocaine base.
The high court justices affirmed the decision Thursday in an
18-page opinion that parses the confusing and seemingly
redundant governing statutes.
"Given crack cocaine's sudden emergence and the similarities it
shared with other forms of cocaine, this lack of clarity is
understandable, as is Congress' desire to adopt a statutory term
that would encompass all forms. Congress faced what it perceived
to be a new threat of massive scope," Sototmayor wrote.
"Accordingly, Congress chose statutory language broad enough to
meet that threat. ... In the absence of any indication in the
statutory text that Congress intended only to subject crack cocaine
offenses to enhanced penalties, we cannot adopt DePierre's
narrow construction."
Justice Antonin Scalia joined in the first two sections of
Sotomayor's opinion, but he did not join in the section containing
the aforementioned quotation.
In a concurring opinion, Scalia complained that the third section
of the majority opinion "needlessly contradicts DePierre's version
of legislative history."
"Our holding today is that the statutory term 'cocaine base'
refers to cocaine base, rather than, as DePierre contends, one
particular type of cocaine base," Scalia wrote. "This holding is in
my view obvious, and the Court does not disagree. It begins its
discussion of the legislative history by saying that DePierre's
position 'is not supported by the statutory text,' and ends the
discussion by saying that "in the absence of any indication in the
statutory text that Congress intended only to subject crack cocaine
offenses to enhanced penalties, we cannot adopt DePierre's
narrow construction.'
"Everything in-between could and should have been omitted," Scalia continued.
This "needless detour into legislative history" can have
unintended consequences, according to the two-paragraph
opinion.
"It conveys the mistaken impression that legislative history
could modify the text of a criminal statute as clear as this," Scalia
wrote. "In fact, however, even a hypothetical House Report
expressing the Committee's misunderstanding (or perhaps just the
Committee staff's misunderstanding, who knows?) that 'cocaine
base means crack cocaine' could not have changed the outcome of
today's opinion." (Parentheses and emphasis in original.)
djh
----
Professor Edgeworth of All Soul's avoided
conversational English, persistently using words
and phrases one expects to meet only in books.
One evening, Lawrence [the famous Lawrence of
Arabia] returned from a visit to London, and
Edgeworth met him at the gate. "Was it very
caliginous in the metropolis?"
"Some what caliginous, but not altogether
inspissated," Lawrence replied gravely.
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