Opinion ID: 790004
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: GHB's Status as a Controlled Substance

Text: 70 Having attempted to question GBL's susceptibility to regulation in its own right, Turcotte's next claims that GHB was not properly scheduled as a controlled substance, and therefore that GBL cannot be regulated as a controlled substance analogue of GHB. Turcotte asserts that GHB was put on Schedule I at the behest of the Attorney General in March of 2000 as a temporary or emergency scheduling under 21 U.S.C. § 811(h), which expires if not made permanent within one year. Turcotte then claims that since GHB's status as a Schedule I controlled substance allegedly expired in March of 2001, he cannot be convicted for possession or distribution of its analogues, including GBL. The government responds by asserting that Congress directed the Attorney General to place GHB on Schedule I in Public Law 106-172, and thus that the aforementioned time limit applicable to emergency schedulings should not apply. 71 We need not attempt to navigate this legislative thicket because Turcotte's expiration claim fails for a more basic reason: Even if the scheduling of GHB expired in March of 2001 as Turcotte claims, it is undisputed that GHB was still a Schedule I controlled substance at the time of the conduct leading to Turcotte's arrest and conviction (the summer of 2000). 14 Matters of timing similarly thwart Turcotte's claim that FDA approval of Xyrem — a drug for treating narcolepsy that contains GHB — in July of 2002 converted GHB to a Schedule III substance not subject to the CSA's Analogue Provision. (Appellant's Br. at 33-34.) Aside from the fact that FDA approval of a specific drug for certain medical uses need not have any bearing on the status of its component chemicals in non-medical contexts, the FDA's approval of Xyrem came after Turcotte's misconduct and subsequent arrest in September of 2000. Thus, even if the FDA approval of Xyrem has some effect on the status of GHB as a controlled substance — a proposition which appears extremely dubious to begin with — that approval still would not have any bearing on Turcotte's conviction. 72 Turcotte's claims as to the status and/or scheduling of GHB under the Controlled Substances Act are thus unpersuasive, and we affirm the ruling of the district court on this point.