DRUG
LAWS
The drugs in this book are subjected to a
variety of laws. Tobacco and alcohol are legal to possess and use in the
United States, as long as you are at least eighteen years old (for tobacco) or
twenty-one years old (for alcohol). The same pertains for many of
the
over-the-counter cold medications that can
be used as precursors of methamphetamine and for dextromethorphan—if you show identification and are at least eighteen years
old, you can possess amounts for personal use. Most herbal drugs we discuss (except ephedrine) can legally be
purchased and possessed by anyone.
Most of the other drugs are covered by the
Controlled Substances Act. According to this federal law, some substances
cannot be purchased or possessed by anyone, while others can be used if
they have a prescription from a doctor. There are different
"schedules" that are based on the danger of abuse, and the medical use. These are
described in what follows. These drugs can be
purchased and possessed only with an appropriate
license from the Drug
Enforcement Administration (DEA) or a prescription from a physician.
· Schedule I: Drugs in this
class have no currently accepted medical use in the United States, a lack of accepted safety for use under medical supervision, and a high potential for abuse. They cannot be
purchased or possessed by anyone.
Some of the
drugs in this category are all forms
of marijuana (natural and synthetic), heroin, all serotoninrelated hallucinogens (LSD, psilocybin, and all
their derivatives), MDMA and all its
congeners, and all
cathinone derivatives (bath salts).
These can be possessed only for research purposes with an appropriate license.
Schedule II: Substances in
this schedule have appropriate medical use
but a high potential for abuse that may lead to severe psychological or physical dependence. This includes many
opiates, such as methadone, morphine,
opium, oxycodone, fentanyl, meperidine, and codeine; some sedatives like pentobarbital; and stimulants that are used clinically, including amphetamine,
methamphetamine, and methylphenidate.
· Schedule III: Substances
in this schedule have a potential for abuse less than substances in Schedules I or II, and abuse may lead
to moderate or low physical dependence or high psychological dependence. Drugs in this class include combination products
containing some opiates like hydrocodone with acetaminophen; buprenorphine formulated with naloxone (Suboxone), which is used to
treat opiate addiction; the
anesthetic ketamine; and testosterone.
· Schedule IV: Substances in
this schedule have a low potential for abuse relative to substances in Schedule
III. Drugs in this category include
many benzodiazepine sedatives, including diazepam (Valium), alprazolam (Xanax), and triazolam (Halcion).
· Schedule V: Substances
in this schedule have a low potential for abuse relative to substances listed in Schedule IV and consist primarily of preparations containing limited quantities of
certain narcotics.
This list is not comprehensive, but it provides enough examples. The penalties that result from purchasing or possessing
them vary by the schedule and by how
much you have in your possession, so you should consider this only as an introductory guideline. You need to understand that if you
purchase or possess anything in these schedules without a doc‑
tor's
prescription, you are breaking the law. In addition, state laws may differ from federal laws. For example, marijuana is
scheduled much lower by most states,
but many states have broadly liberalized availability for medical purposes (although it is not completely legal in
any state).
We have a word of caution about the scheduling of
drugs. While this list describes the various schedules for drugs,
placement at a given level in the list does
not necessarily represent the degree of safety of the drug. For example,
marijuana is a Schedule I drug, but it is almost impossible to die from it acutely. On the other hand, benzodiazepines
are Schedule IV drugs, and with regular use over a period of time, an
individual can become very tolerant to
them. At that point, stopping their use can be almost impossible without
medical help. If you take one of these drugs, get good information about it and don't depend on the level of scheduling
to keep you safe.
Not all psychoactive drugs are controlled
substances and, therefore, are on
these schedules, but they do require a prescription. In most situations, you are breaking the law if you possess these drugs
without a prescription and
particularly if you give or sell them to another person.
GETTING
SEARCHED
There's this joke about a very large
canary: Where does an eight-hundredpound
canary sit? Anywhere he wants to! Likewise, a law-enforcement officer will search just about anywhere if he
really wants to do it. Eventually the courts could decide whether the search
was legal, but if an officer has
reason to believe that a crime is being committed, he may well initiate the search process and let the lawyers settle the
issue later.
Laws in the United States on the subject of a
search are extremely complicated, in
part because the legal rights of individuals have been defined over the years by many different court cases.
However, there are a few general principles that govern when someone can
legally be detained and searched.
First is the "expectation of privacy."
The expression "A man's home is his
castle" applies here. To search a residence usually requires more stringent legal prerequisites than searching elsewhere.
Often a search warrant signed by a
judge is required, unless there is evidence of a major and immediate threat to public safety.
Next is the
automobile. This is the place where most individuals con‑
front the law. An
officer will see a traffic violation in progress, stop the vehicle, and then come to suspect that illegal
drug activity is being carried out.
If an officer reasonably believes that a crime is being committed, then he probably has the right to detain the
occupants of the car until a legally
proper investigation can be carried out. Remember, this officer can stop and hold someone if he believes that a crime
is being committed, even if he is
wrong!
A court official gave us an extreme example: Say a
murder has been committed in the
course of a bank robbery and the killer is driving away in a 2007 blue four-door sedan. In the heat of the
moment, an incompetent 911 operator
becomes confused and broadcasts that the killer is leaving the scene in a 2003
red pickup truck. An officer down the road sees a 2003 red pickup truck and stops it, removes the
occupants, and searches the truck for
weapons. He finds illegal substances. Was the search legal? Probably, because the officer had reason to
suspect that the occupants were
criminals. He was wrong, but with good reason, and the occupants may well be
convicted for whatever offense they committed.
There are equally odd outcomes in which
convictions are not possible because
the officer was found to have no reason to search a vehicle. That is why most officers ask permission to search a car
before doing so. That permission
usually makes the search legal and any evidence is thus legally obtained. If permission is not given, then the officer may choose to
detain the individuals further and call
for a drug dog or other assistance to examine
the vehicle. This issue then gets very complicated.
The practical side of all this is that a law
officer has quite a lot of power to detain and arrest, because the lawmakers
have decided it is in the public good to be able to temporarily detain potential criminals and, to
some extent, to ask questions later.
Even if an officer is eventually found in court to be wrong, the suspected individuals would have suffered loss of
time and perhaps arrest, legal bills,
and considerable life discomfort.
Finally, there is the situation when a person is
out in public and walking about. This
is the least "private" act, and so there is the least expectation of privacy. In this case a law officer has
much more leeway in searching a
person for the protection of the officer herself and for that of the general public. For example, imagine that an
officer sees a person walking down the
street in and out of traffic, in an erratic manner. She has the right to stop and talk to that person to
ensure that he and the driving public
are safe. If in the process of that stop the officer suspects
that the
individual may be carrying a weapon, she could search him by doing a pat down.
If in the course of that search the officer feels something she recognizes to
be an illicit drug, the officer can seize the drug. Can the person be convicted of a drug-law
violation? It is very likely that he
can because the search was legal.
The same rules might apply at a concert. Let's say
that two students are obviously
intoxicated and fighting. An officer moves to stop the fight, the students resist, they are appropriately searched
for weapons, and illicit substances
are discovered. If the officer chooses to charge them, there is a good probability that the charges will stick.
Do law-enforcement
officers have a pathological agenda to harass drivers and students at a concert, looking for drugs
everywhere? Rarely. Most law officers see their work as a job, not a mission.
Think of all the traffic laws that
are broken every day and how seldom stops occur. Think of how seldom someone who is innocent of any law
violation is stopped in a car or interdicted
at a concert. By and large, the legal community just does its job.
