Court Opinion

ID: 9488479
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 12:46:59.151635+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:52:55.231826
License: Public Domain

BRIGHT, Senior Circuit Judge,
dissenting.
I respectfully dissent from the majority’s opinion which affirms the conviction of Anthony Johnson. The circumstantial evidence is too slight to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Johnson was knowingly associated with the drugs seized from the co-defendant Chico Tillmon.
In this case, the crucial issue is whether the government’s evidence is sufficient to support the conviction of Johnson of the charge of conspiring to possess cocaine or aiding and abetting possession. Here, the government has failed to meet its burden of proof, and no reasonable jury could have found Johnson guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.
A review of the record reveals the following:
(1)Johnson traveled as a passenger in the Lexus;
(2) Johnson stayed in the same hotel room where drugs were found concealed in a laundry detergent box;
(3) Neither Johnson nor Tillmon carried identification;
(4) Johnson possessed only $52.00 in cash;
(5) Johnson told officer Nelson that his name was Kermit Davis (a close friend who possessed a valid driver’s license);
(6) Johnson denied any knowledge of the Excel Inn; and
(7) An electronic scale and pair of Johnson’s boots were stored in the same softsided briefcase which Johnson asserts he did not pack.
All of this circumstantial evidence corresponds with the activities of an innocent person.
As I see it under the evidence, Johnson, a twenty-five year old African American, with no prior criminal history, must serve a prison term of more than twelve years (151 months) based on a case resting on his association with the driver of the Lexus, Chico Tillmon. As we have observed, the police found crack cocaine in a Tide detergent box in a paper sack located in the hotel room occupied by Johnson, Tillmon and a third defendant, Ja-von Cheek, who was acquitted. The detergent box in the paper sack also held clothing and other articles, not associated with Johnson.
The government does not argue that it showed any direct connection between Johnson and the crack-cocaine. The government’s case essentially rests on the circumstances that Johnson’s boots and the electronic scale were in the same baggage container (not the paper sack); that Tillmon and Johnson carried no identification and possessed about $160 cash ($52 on Johnson) and that Johnson did not give his correct name or acknowledge staying at the Excel Inn. Therefore, the government argues that Johnson must have been a participant with Till-mon in proposed drug sales.
*1129Because the government found the “goods” on Chico Tillmon does not, except by association, put those “goods” on Johnson.
As I have said before, and I say it again, guilt by association was the Code of Hammurabi, but is not the law of this land. I quote from Brown v. Frey, 807 F.2d 1407, 1415 (8th Cir.1986):
Guilt by association may have been the law of Hammurabi1 but I do not believe that law should be applied in this country, even in a prison setting.
Brown v. Frey, 807 F.2d 1407, 1415 & n. 1 (8th Cir.1986) (Bright, J., dissenting).
The guilt in this case is only that of association. That sort of case does not support a conviction here.1
In a case of questionable guilt, Johnson must serve a very heavy sentence. Under the mandatory sentence provisions and the guidelines, Anthony Johnson, who has no prior convictions, will serve a term of incarceration of more than twelve years because he was found guilty of distribution of crack cocaine. Sentences in drug cases are in large part measured by the weight of drugs, and not necessarily the bad acts of the defendant. Crack cocaine carries weight for sentencing which is 100 times greater than that of powdered cocaine, a drug substance quite similar to crack cocaine. Johnson is presently the age of twenty-six years and when he is released from the penitentiary he will be approximately thirty-eight years old. If Johnson had been convicted of a cocaine violation his guideline sentence would have amounted to less than three and one-half years. It seems to me that the extra incarceration in this case is unnecessary and will be at a substantial cost to society. If we would assume a five year sentence would be a proper sentence in this case, the cost to the public of the extra incarceration is approximately $154,000. See United States v. Hiveley, 61 F.3d 1358, 1364 (8th Cir.1995) (Bright, J., concurring). Mandatory minimum and concomitant guideline sentence requirements can produce unreasonable sentences in drug cases. I commented on sentences of this sort in a recent concurring opinion:
These unwise sentencing policies which put men and women in prison for years, not only ruin lives of prisoners and often their family members, but also drain the American taxpayers of funds which can be measured in billions of dollars. In these times, the government, Congress and the President see the need to make drastic cuts in the federal budget, including budget cuts which already affect the poor, the disadvantaged and the elderly. This is the time to call a halt to the unnecessary and expensive cost of putting people in prison for a long time based on the mistaken notion that such an effort will win “The War on Drugs.” If it is a war, society seems not to be winning, but losing. We must turn to other methods of deterring drug distribution and use.
Id. at 1363.

 The Code of Hammurabi "made the guilt of the individual the guilt of his family as well, so that if a man struck the pregnant daughter of a free man, and she died, 'his daughter shall be slain.' ” People v. Sobczak, 344 Mich. 465, 73 N.W.2d 921, 923 (1955) (citing The Hammurabi Code and the Sinaitic Legislation, Edwards, p. 63; C.H. § 210; Diamond, Primitive Law, p. 284; 17 University of Chicago Law Review 148).

. Brown v. Frey and its discussion of the Code of Hammurabi emanates from the opinion in People v. Sobczak of the late Judge Talbot Smith for the Michigan Supreme Court. Judge Talbot Smith later served as a federal judge and frequently sat with the Eighth Circuit. I am indebted to Judge Talbot Smith for the material and vignette contained in note 1 of Brown v. Frey, 807 F.2d at 1415.