Opinion ID: 1476714
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 11

Heading: The Chain of Possession

Text: The appellants contend that the opinions of the Government's witnesses, based on tests made after the drugs had been shipped to Washington are absolutely worthless because the expert witnesses had no knowledge that the alleged adulteration or misbranding did not occur enroute to the doctor's office, or in the doctor's office, or in the hands of the Government inspectors who picked up the drugs, or enroute to Washington, D. C., when shipped there by the Government inspectors. Carried to its logical conclusion, this chain of possession theory would require the Government to prove affirmatively that each one of the many mail clerks, Administration clerks and experts, doctors, nurses, express company employees, and others, handled and cared for the goods so that changes could not occur while the drugs were in their custody. It must also be shown that the products were not tampered with, say the appellants. Such a rigorous exaction regarding proof is supported neither by reason nor by authority. If the Government were obliged to establish the absence of tampering by every one who had any contact whatsoever with the drugs, the Act would be incapable of enforcement. In Lestico v. Kuehner, 204 Minn. 125, 283 N.W. 122, 125, the court derided the unique theory that it was incumbent to show the chain of possession of a punctured tire casing offered in evidence after it had been repaired, during the whole period from accident to trial. The court said: The tire had been removed and repaired in Minneapolis. The thought of objections and sustaining rulings was that no sufficient foundation could be laid except by testimony not only as to genuineness, but also the absence of tampering, from every person through whose hands the casing had passed in the meantime. There is no such rule and never has been. [Emphasis supplied] In quoting authorities to support their position, the appellants significantly omit two pertinent passages from their excerpts. From the opinion in United States v. S. B. Penick & Co., 2 Cir., 136 F.2d 413, 415, they delete the following sentences: But there is no hard and fast rule that the prosecution must exclude all possibility that the article may have been tampered with. [Citing Lestico v. Kuehner, supra.]    Here the samples were taken in the ordinary course of business for the very purpose of being retained as samples; they were put in the usual place where samples were kept to remove them from accident or meddling and there they remained, so far as appear[s], undisturbed. We think this showing was sufficient to justify admission in evidence of the bottles and their contents and that it was for the jury to decide how likely it was that some other substance had been substituted for what was originally put in the bottles. [Cases cited] Similarly, the appellants omit the following sentences from the very middle of their quotation from 32 C.J.S., Evidence, § 607, at pages 457, 458: However, it is not necessary that the article be identically the same as at the time in controversy. It is unnecessary to show an absence of tampering on the part of every person through whose hands the article has passed; as long as the article can be identified it is immaterial in how many or in whose hands it has been. A direct statement that the article was in the same condition at the time of an occurrence as at a subsequent time is not required if it sufficiently appears that it must have been in substantially the same condition.