Trooper on Routine Stop Finds $20,000 Worth of Marijuana

[BluntKilla]

A state trooper who pulled over to help a motorist stranded on Interstate 95 found 8 pounds of marijuana valued at $20,000, police said.

Authorities charged Liam Day, 26, of Middletown, R.I., with felony possession of marijuana with the intent to distribute, state police Sgt. F.L. Tyler said.

Trooper Freddie Childs stopped on the shoulder at 5 a.m. Monday to check on Day's disabled car. Childs spoke with Day and two male passengers and was told the car had mechanical problems, Tyler said.

Childs searched the car after seeing a small amount of marijuana and found the other marijuana in the trunk, Tyler said.

Police said the two passengers were not charged.

The car was impounded and the marijuana was headed to a state lab for analysis, Tyler said.

Source: Associated Press
Copyright: 2007 Associated Press
Contact: http://www.dailypress.com/contact
Website: http://www.dailypress.com

[Valley_Co-op]

Hope that all charges if any will be dropped

[Gorillabuds]

8 lbs valued @ $20K? How'd they arrive at that number? Police reports say the silliest things sometimes. The guy got snagged with 8 lbs of pot and the only reason he got charged with the intent to distribute is that a silly law associates intention to distribute with quantity. I know that my grow is far larger than I can smoke up myself but I have "NO" intentions of distribution so those laws are simply unfair and immoral. If convicted, a felony will be a lifelong sentence of scrutiny and loss of rights to this young man.

In the United States felons often face additional consequences, such as the loss of voting rights in many states, exclusion from certain lines of work, prohibition from obtaining certain licenses, exclusion from purchase/possession of firearms or ammunition, and ineligibility to run for or be elected to public office. In addition, some states consider a felony conviction to be grounds for an uncontested divorce. These, among other losses of privileges not included explicitly in sentencing, are known as collateral consequences of criminal charges.

Civil sanction imposed on United States citizens convicted of a felony in many states include the loss of competence to serve on a grand or petit jury or to vote in elections even after release from prison. While controversial, these disabilities are explicitly sanctioned by the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, a Reconstruction-era amendment that deals with permissible state regulation of voting rights.

Theoretically, federal law allows persons convicted of felonies in a federal United States district court to apply to have their record expunged after a certain period of time with a clean record. However, the U.S. Congress has refused to fund the federal agency mandated with handling the applications of convicted felons to have their record expunged. This means that, in practice, federal felons cannot have their records expunged.

For state law convictions, expunction is determined by the law of the state. Some states do not allow this, regardless of the offense, resulting in class of citizens permanently lacking many legitimate opportunities. These citizens can have extreme difficulty finding a job or even a place to live, regardless of qualifications or references, which can result in their return to a life of crime.

He will be lumped right in with aggravated assault and/or battery, arson, burglary, embezzlement, grand theft, treason, espionage, racketeering, robbery, murder, rape and fraud.

All that just for possessing 8lbs of something that man has been ingesting for thousands of years. It's insanity. Isn't it great that Federal law has provisions for expunging a conviction but actually doesn't allow it in reality?
(the U.S. Congress has refused to fund the federal agency mandated with handling the applications of convicted felons to have their record expunged. This means that, in practice, federal felons cannot have their records expunged)

[C.Earl]

TOO close to home, glad it won't affect my chain though. (am I a dick for saying that?) haha.