A federal judge in the United States District Court for the Middle District of Florida has ruled that Florida drug crime laws violated a defendant’s due process rights. At issue was whether prosecutors must prove that an accused drug trafficker had knowledge of drug possession, which is a fundamental legal principle in American criminal justice and the common law that preceded it.
Amendments to Florida’s criminal code in 2002 removed the mens rea requirement from the Drug Abuse Prevention and Control law. The term is Latin for “guilty mind” and is best summed up in contemporary language as criminal intent. Orlando federal judge Mary Scriven found that the law was unconstitutional because, under Florida law, a
“person is guilty of a drug offense if he delivers a controlled substance without regard to whether he does so purposefully, knowingly, recklessly, or negligently.”
The case involved the habeas corpus appeal of a man who was convicted in 2005 and is serving an 18-year sentence for delivery of cocaine. Unlike other criminal appeals, habeas petitions are a last resort measure for incarcerated individuals to convince the court that constitutional violations or other legal irregularities justify their release.
As a single decision by a lower court judge, this potentially sweeping legal development is subject to further review in the U.S. Court of Appeals and beyond. But the judge’s decision was unequivocal, saying that the statute was unconstitutional on its face, and nothing that all other states have rejected “such a draconian and unreasonable construction of the law that would criminalize the ‘unknowing’ possession of a controlled substance.”
Legal commentators quickly speculated that an affirmance of this case could affect thousands of convicted Florida defendants. A statement from the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers executive director Norman Reimer praised the ruling: “This is a victory for the most fundamental notions of fairness and justice in our system – the idea that no one should suffer a conviction unless the state proves criminal intent beyond a reasonable doubt.”
