Legal Commentary

Watch Those Bagels: U.S. Insists Poppy Seeds Are Narcotics

By Jeralyn

War on Drug news: The U.S. has declared poppy seeds to be narcotics. In a recent raid in Afghanistan, the U.S. trumpeted its success. The raid took place in the Marja district of Helmand province:

.... U.S. forces, after a four-day military offensive, proudly announced the biggest-ever drug bust in Afghanistan: more than 101 tons of “narcotics,” whose seizure “severely disrupted one of the key militant and criminal operations and narcotics hubs in southern Afghanistan,” according to U.S. military spokesperson Col. Greg Julian.

What he failed to highlight was that more than 80 percent of it — 82.5 tons — was bagel topping, although most of this cache was probably destined for planting, rather than eating. “We cannot really say that poppyseeds are narcotics,” acknowledged a U.S. official, speaking on background. “They are potential narcotics.”

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Yes, they also seized some real drugs:

Smaller amounts of actual drugs were seized — 18.5 tons of opium, 0.04 tons of morphine, 0.22 tons of heroin and 0.2 tons of hashish. To put the numbers in perspective, the opium represents three-tenths of 1 percent of the nearly 6,000 tons that Helmand produced in 2008. “It was not hugely substantial,” admitted the U.S. official.

I don't think the policy of considering poppy seeds as narcotics is new. I will always remember a case of the client of a close lawyer friend in the early 90's. The client was at a half-way house serving his final months of a prison term for a money laundering offense involving marijuana when he stopped for a bagel on the way back after work. At his next drug test, he tested positive for narcotics. He insisted it could only be the bagel. He was a businessman with no history of drug use. (He had sold something to a pot dealer and the government alleged he should have known the item was purchased with drug proceeds.)

Even though his lawyer tracked down the bagel manufacturer (in Australia, if I remember correctly) and obtained an affidavit about the poppy seeds, the client was sent back to jail and did many more months in because of it.

Moral of the story: If you are on probation, supervised release or at a half-way house, choose another kind of bagel. Eating poppy seeds can land you in prison. What a ridiculous policy.

Full post as published by TalkLeft on June 22, 2009 (boomark / email).