Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/21pdf/20-1410_1an2.pdf
Page Number: 17.0

Cite as:  597 U. S. ____ (2022) 

13 

Opinion of the Court 

“objective honest-effort standard.”  Brief for United States 
16–17; cf. post, at 13 (concurrence arguing that doctors can 
defend  against  a  §841  prosecution  by  proving  that  they 
have “act[ed] in subjective good faith in prescribing drugs”).
That is to say, once a defendant meets his or her burden of 
production, the Government can convict “by proving beyond 
a reasonable doubt that [the defendant] did not even make
an  objectively  reasonable  attempt  to  ascertain  and  act
within  the  bounds  of  professional  medicine.”    Brief  for 
United States 16. 

We  are  not  convinced.   For  one  thing,  §841,  like  many
criminal statutes, uses the familiar mens rea words “know-
ingly or intentionally.”  It nowhere uses words such as “good 
faith,” “objectively,” “reasonable,” or “honest effort.”

For another, the Government’s standard would turn a de-
fendant’s criminal liability on the mental state of a hypo-
thetical “reasonable” doctor, not on the mental state of the 
defendant himself or herself.  Cf. id., at 24 (Government ar-
guing that “a physician can violate Section 841(a) when he 
makes  no  objectively  reasonable  attempt  to  conform  his 
conduct to something that his fellow doctors would view as 
medical care” (emphasis added)).

We have rejected analogous suggestions in other criminal 
contexts.  In Elonis, for example, we considered the mental 
state applicable to a statute that criminalized threatening 
communications but contained no explicit mens rea require-
ment.  575 U. S., at 732.  The Government argued that the
statute required proof that a reasonable person would find 
the communications threatening.  Id., at 738–739.  But, we 
said, “[h]aving liability turn on whether a ‘reasonable per-
son’ regards the communication as a threat—regardless of 
what the defendant thinks—reduces culpability on the all-
important element of the crime to negligence.”  Id., at 738 
(some internal quotation marks omitted).  “[A]nd,” we em-
phasized, “we ‘have long been reluctant to infer that a neg-
ligence standard was intended in criminal statutes.’ ”  Ibid.