(Minneapolis Star-Tribune) Bong water can count as a controlled substance, the Minnesota Supreme Court ruled Thursday in a decision that raises the threat of longer sentences for drug smokers who fail to dump the water out of their pipes.
In a 4-3 decision Thursday, the state’s highest court said a person can be prosecuted for a first-degree drug crime for 25 grams or more of bong water that tests positive for a controlled substance.
The statute defines a drug “mixture” as “a preparation, compound, mixture, or substance containing a controlled substance, regardless of purity.” When the language of a statute is unambiguous, the high court said, precedents prohibit courts from disregarding the letter of the law under the pretext of pursuing the letter of the law.
“Regardless of purity” means that even a fleck of an ash that registers a molecule of THC floating in your bong water makes all that water weight a controlled substance. 25 grams of water equals 25 milliliters, which equals a little over five teaspoons of water. Five teaspoons of water in your bong makes you a first degree criminal. An ounce and a half of bong water makes you a felon.
If any substance that contains illegal drugs is a illegal drug then its illegal to be a Homo Sapien. Every human being can be tested positive for trace amounts of dmt. Since DMT is a schedule 1 illegal drug we better all turn ourselves in for violating the law.
[...] NORML Stash AKPC_IDS += "1582,";Yigg It! – Deine Stimme für mehr Leser yigg_url = [...]
What next, will I be charged with having open containers of alcohol in my vehicle if there are trace elements of beer left in any of the cans that I am driving to the recycling center?
Since drugs are now in river water (search: “drugs in water supply”) and cities get their water from rivers, city water is a “mixture” of illegal drugs, according to the absurd logic of this majority of four Minnesota Supreme Court judges.
So – now that all of us living in Minnesota are criminals possessing “drug mixture” water in our homes and toilets – shall we wake up, end the abuse of government power, and repeal all laws criminalizing drugs possession?
For more discussion of this Minnesota case, and it’s excellent dissent, see my blog post:
Minnesota Court Waters Down Legal Definition of Illegal Drugs: Toilet Water Now Criminal to Possess
http://wp.me/pAFjr-2g
A milliliter of water weighs one gram and takes up one cubic centimeter of space. Good thing about drugs; it made us all learn the metric system.
WTF?! Just another excuse to bother otherwise law abiding citizens. Seems that this ruling clearly contradicts the will of the MN voters. MN is a decrim state (and, yes, I am thankful everyday for that fact!) and almost medical state. Would have been medical if not for Pawlenty- I will not vote for him again if he were to run.
Pawlenty will be out next year. He says he will not run for Goobernor. Rumor has it that he will be making a run for Prez in 2012.
Love their Gov Pawlenty too (NOT!!!!!) Prohibitionist asswipe that he is.
Wow..
that is ridiculous..
Well time to move outta MN. lol
The water it takes for my smallest bong weighs around .67 lb. That is approximately 304 grams, more than enough for a felony in MN.
I guess in MN it is a good idea to empty the bong water when you are done.
Okay. Last time I checked, an ounce = 28.4 grams, so 25 grams = .88 oz. of bong water. Got volume and weight measurements getting mixed up. Grams & ounces are weights, milliliters & teaspoons are volumes even though they relate to weights when the liquid is known as in a given volume of water at a given temp relates to a given weight of water. .88 oz. bong water = 5.28 teaspoons.
Most folks are going to figure 25 grams are less than one ounce.
Ha. I was sitting with you when we got this bulletin… (it was great to meet you!)
It will be interesting to see what happens next with this…. Wouldn’t it be great if they used the language I saw in the recent DOJ memo, and decide these things on a “case by case basis”, instead of this blanket moronic case law!?
Do you really think they’ll loop potheads with this? Any cop should be able to tell if a bong was used primarily for cannabis or meth.
I’m not sure how meth bong water works…it could be ingested later unlike cannabis bong water. While this does open yet another way a pot smoker can get arrested…it will only be that way if they choose to use it for that purpose. Will they test every bong’s water that they find? Or only one’s that are “pink with a fruity odor”
Wow, Minnesoooda, as they pronounce it, is sooo progressive! NOT. (I mean their supreme court, of course, not the peeps)
This really highlights the need to reschedule the good herb post haste. Ideally, we should be De-scheduling this remarkably useful plant; it’s really not a “drug” in the sense of the schedule.
But that makes too much sense.
Here’s hoping this is appealed and goes to the highest court in the land, and they do the right thing. But don’t count on it.
Meth is a horrible drug that no one should use, but this law also sucks for marijuana smokers. Another unfortunate side effect of the meth problem, if what RayGreen says is true.
How can lawmakers be so plain stupid? They’re like, oh, well, weight is weight, aint it?
Is it seriously that hard to realize how disconnected from anything reasonable using a weight/penalty system like this is? At least evaporate the WATER and weigh the CANNABINOIDS, IDIOTS!
you gotta be freaking kidding me. People are willing to go THIS far to tack on as many charges as possible on innocent drug users as possible. as if the ridiculously low amount of possessed pot required to make you a felon and tax stamps which can add tax evasion weren’t enough.
is there anything ELSE that can be charged on a pot smoker to label them on the same level as murderers?!
The decision, which reverses two lower court rulings, came in the case of Sara Peck. Items seized during a search of her Rice County home in 2007 included a glass bong — a type of water pipe often used to smoke drugs — that contained 37 grams — about 2 1/2 tablespoons — of a liquid that tested positive for the presence of methamphetamine.